Understanding True Grace
SESSION 3
Anybody here that does not know that Grace is amazing, you need your bumps read! So what we are going to do is we are going to start from that high place and we are going to go up from there.
I want to read a passage to you from Ephesians chapter 1, and I want you to check out the language in this passage. It is so prosperous. It is so powerful. It opens up a door into a whole new dimension of relationship with God.
Ephesians 1:5-8a He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.
I am going to read it again.
He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.
OMG! Which might be another way of saying “Amen” in the future! Oh my goodness!
Primary Purpose
Grace can never be separated from primary purpose.
Primary purpose is that we should be made in the image of God. Primary purpose is God bringing many sons into Glory.
Grace can never be separated from full on personal relationship with the Godhead. Grace cannot be separated from God’s Kindness or His intention towards us. Grace cannot be separated from praise. We worship the God of all Grace. We worship in Grace, by Grace, through Grace, about Grace, in Grace. Grace covers everything. His Grace must be seen, known and felt. It has to be experienced as something glorious, because we believe that Grace and Glory cannot be separated.
in our experience of the
nature of God.
When God’s Grace is not yet glorious to us, it is a sign that we have something immense and precious still to discover in our relationship with God. Grace overwhelms us; it overwhelms everything in its path. Grace even covers. Love covers a multitude of sins, and Grace cannot be separated from love.
Everything God did for us He did in love, and everything He did for us He did by Grace. So Grace and love are inseparable in our experience of the nature of God. His glorious Grace is a strikingly beautiful and impressive blessing that turns people into beloved sons.
All the language around Grace has to be rich. It has to be eloquent. It has to contain superlatives. God ties Grace to His own nature and He ties Grace to His relationship with us.
Listen, Grace is not undeserved favor. That is the poorest description of Grace I have ever heard. Grace is not undeserved favor. If that is all Grace is, then Jesus never had any, because the Bible says He grew in Grace and favor with God. If we are only tying Grace to something that is wrong about us, there is something wrong about our understanding of Grace. Grace is tied to the nature of God. It is not tied to your condition.
This is my definition of Grace, that I love and I live by.
Grace is the empowering Presence of God that enables you tobecome the person that God sees every time He looks at you.
His Grace is what makes us acceptable to God in Jesus. Grace combines redemption and forgiveness. It covers our present/past beautifully. It makes us open to the impressive future that belongs to us in Christ.
When you leave here this weekend, I want you to be utterly overwhelmed about the future that is in front of you. I want you to be overwhelmed for everything that is on that path and on that journey. God has given us an outcome for every situation and circumstance. Every battle is winnable and everywhere out there as you walk in newness of life you will find the Presence of God going before you, going with you, coming behind you, and that you will be covered in all things by the Grace of His Presence.
If Grace is not rich in our hearts, the chances are we are going to have a poverty spirit in our relationship with God. It is Grace that makes us rich. When God talked about the riches of His Grace which He lavished upon us, you get a picture of why Grace is so important to Him, and if it is that important to Him, it has to become vital for us.
We are here in Christ having His glorious, gracious Presence lavished on us. Grace is an aspect of God’s nature that is so powerful it elevates everyone who walks in it. Grace lifts us up. It is much more than a blessing that we can receive in moments of need. It is a place in which we stand. It is a lifestyle that we practice. It is an elevator, not the stairs! You step into it and it lifts you up.
The Language of Grace
The language that God uses to describe Grace tells you the magnitude of what it means for Him personally.
In the Old Testament when Moses asked God to show him His glory, He said, “I will cause all My goodness to pass before you, and I will proclaim the Name of the Lord and I will be gracious and compassionate.” So Glory, Goodness, Grace and Compassion are all bound up together in the heart of God toward us. He has immense Compassion for you - so much Compassion you will never get to the bottom of it and you will never see the end of it. So much Goodness, so much Grace – it is designed to overwhelm you thoroughly.
I think Grace is one of the happiest and most humbling experiences that you could have in the Lord. Grace is so wonderful it humbles you and it causes you to believe like a much loved child. Grace takes all the weight off of our lives and leaves us free to walk and to run and to laugh and to skip like much loved children. To know that God is lavishing Grace upon you and that He intends to make you wealthy in Grace, possessing so much Grace you can have your own 501(c)(3) - you can have your own charitable enterprise giving Grace away because no one is safe from the Grace of God.
In His Kindness towards us He has lavished Grace upon us. If He is rich in Grace we cannot be poor in Grace because as He is so are we in this world. If He is rich in Grace beloved, then you too have to be rich in Grace. His Grace is overwhelming. It is staggering. It is breath-taking. It makes us euphoric! If you see people in the street with a black Book and they are giggling incoherently, it is probably a believer who has just finally had a revelation about Grace!
If Grace is designed to overwhelm you, then it is designed to overwhelm everything that opposes you.
When the enemy is radically opposing us,Grace only needs to be adequate to deal with him.
This is why God does not need angry people to defend Him. Grace is more powerful than anger. Anger starts a fight - starts a war and Grace disarms and strips the enemy. Grace takes all the sting out of conflicts. When the enemy is radically opposing us, Grace only needs to be adequate to deal with him.
2 Corinthians 12:7 Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me—to keep me from exalting myself!
Can you imagine that? That God would want to give you such powerful, intense revelations that you sail really close to the wind of being a bighead! Can you imagine that? Religious people would say, “Well, do not give him anything like this in case he gets too big for himself.”
God is not Worried
God is not bothered about Paul being too big for himself because He will just find a way to help you see things differently. God is never worried about us in any way shape or form. He does not worry if you believe Him too much. He does not worry about presumption. God does not care about presumption. What He cares about is unbelief. He calls it “having an evil heart of unbelief”, not that people in unbelief are evil, but the effects of unbelief are evil on our heart.
You think God is seriously going to get annoyed if you have too much faith? You think He is seriously annoyed that you are going to trust Him outrageously? Do you think He is going to get mad if you believe Him too much? You think He is going to get annoyed if you step out into a place that He has not fully sanctioned? If He does not want you to go there, He will just bring you back!
The chances are, and this is what has happened with me when I have moved into a place of presumption - because sometimes you move so fast in the Lord you do not know where the lines are! Suddenly you cross into a place and you think, “Am I believing for too much here?” And you look round and you see that the line is behind you. And it is a simple thing, “Lord I apologize, I crossed a line.” 9 times out of 10 He will just draw a line in front of you. “That is ok. I would rather have you out there than way back there!”
You think He is worried about stuff like that? He is not like us. He actually does not want to be like us! He is actually training us to become like Him! Have you noticed about religious people they always want you to be like them? Seriously?
Well Content
2 Corinthians 12:7-9 (Paraphrase) So to keep me from exalting myself I had this thorn in the flesh and concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me, and He said “nah”, He said “Pauly, my Grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.
And Paul thought about that, there was a gap in his writing here… he wrote that down and he thought, “I have just got to think about that one more time before I finish this letter.” He went, “Hmm, if power is perfected in weakness then I am going to boast about my weakness!”
2 Corinthians 12:9b Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.
What he is realizing is, “I cannot lose! If I am weak, I am strong and if I am strong, I am strong! This is like, I win, and then I get to win again! I would rather boast about my weaknesses that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” Paul is going to ratchet this thing up to get as much out of it as possible. “So ok, so power is perfected in weakness, so I am going to boast about my weaknesses. I like this, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. So, I am going to be well content with weaknesses. Well content.”
“So how are you, Bob?”
“Well, I am in a period of weakness, but I am well content.”
“Do what?”
“I am in a period of weakness right now, but I am really happy. I am well content. I am in a good place, enjoying what I am learning. This is pretty cool. I am in weakness, and I am having a great time. I am well content.”
But you know what, if I can be well content with weaknesses, what about insults? Dude! That is great! I can be well content. I do not have to get mad if somebody insults me, I can just be well content. Why? Because there is Grace here. Grace is sufficient. Grace makes you well content. Grace makes you happy in opposition. Somebody insults you and the Grace of God is so powerful you say, “Thanks man, appreciate it!” Well content.
I can be well content with distresses. So, I am not stressed. My name is Graham Cooke, and I am not stressed. I am well content, I know who God is for me. I know what is mine. I know that Grace is rich. I know that Grace is sufficient. I know that Grace is always going to be enough. In fact, Grace is always going to be more than I need. So I am not stressed because Grace is here.
I am well content with persecutions. You cannot be in the prophetic ministry for four decades and not get persecuted. It is part of the job description! I am still standing. I am still here. One of the guys who persecuted me is no longer here. I am just hoping they are in the right place.
I am well content with difficulties.
“So Graham, how is it going?”
“Brilliant! We have got a difficulty today. It is great! I think it is going to last a while. It is here to teach me how to be well content.”
Here is the thing. With this difficulty comes an upgrade in the Presence of God. How can you not be happy about that? You understand how Kingdom people turn everything on its head and make it work for them. People in the world come under their language. They serve their mind-sets. People in the Kingdom know how to win through their mind-sets. People in the Kingdom know how to overcome because the nature of the Kingdom is an overcoming life.
So what if you can beat the enemy by being content? What if he is trying to make you stressful and you just get more happy? Remember when we were doing GameChangers and we were talking about the Fruit of the Spirit? You remember all that stuff? Tell me you remember all that stuff!
2 Corinthians 12:10 Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.
What is he saying? Grace is sufficient. Grace carries you through everything. Grace is so enormous, so powerful, and so brilliant; it obliterates all the plans of the enemy. Grace causes you to overcome and it causes you to rise up. Grace causes you to see things you did not see before. Grace causes you to have contentment in your heart towards life.
That word sufficient in the Greek is arkao and it means to raise a barrier against the enemy. Grace is a barrier against the enemy. It is like pulling up the drawbridge on a castle. Sufficient also means to prevail by being content.
There is a power in Grace that produces maturity even in our moments of weakness. Grace means you cannot lose. You cannot fail to grow in times of enemy opposition. The ultimate frustration for the enemy, is that everything he tries against us only makes us bigger, braver, and more outspoken. We are not intimidated because we know the promises of God.
David went up against Goliath who seriously was taller, bigger - I mean, I think Goliath’s spear weighed more than David! But David ran towards him because he knew the Presence of God and he had a prophecy from Sam, that he was going to be king one day – he was not king at the moment and that means he could not die, so it kind of sucked to be Goliath at that point. There is only one person staying alive here and that is the one who has a prophetic word!
What does that tell us? Prophecy is the best health insurance around! You know if insurance companies had any business sense, they would have a section on their insurance form, “Have you got a prophetic word over your life?” Your rates would come down and your premium would drop, right? How about a prophetic word, “With long life God will satisfy me.” I should be able to get health insurance and life insurance out of that!
Grace is Sufficient
Colossians 2:15 When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.
Romans 9:17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, (who is a type of Satan) “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.”
Grace and power go together. Grace gives you power, power increases Grace. Paul’s response to Grace is to boast in it, because when you do, you are making a stand in the nature of God that allows you to experience what He would experience Himself.
God is always leading you into how life affects Him, and how He affects life. He lets you into His world. He lets you into His life – “Ah, think about it the way I think about it. Do you want to see this differently? See through My eyes. This is My perception of this.
Hey, why don’t you shift your language so it becomes more powerful? Talk like this. This is how We talk in Heaven. This is how We see things in Heaven. Actually, this is how We think in Heaven. So, you are being made in Our image. This is what it means. See it the way We see it. Think about it the way We think about it. Talk about it the way We all talk about it in Heaven.
When you are in Christ and He is in you, you get to experience life exactly as He does Himself. That is the challenge in front of us as new men and women in Jesus – we get to experience life exactly the same way as Jesus did. Why? Because we are being made in His image.
For a few seconds just think about that. It is huge! It is immense! What if you are huge? What if you are immense? What if we are the Goliaths of the Kingdom? What if we are the giants? What if in Christ, we are the giants? So why are we living like Hobbits? Why are we living like pygmies? This is the definition of Christ in you, the expectation of glory. You might just be a giant.
A friend of mine, Bob Jones, died recently. I was on the phone with a whole bunch of guys, all just telling stories about him, and everyone that I talked to said, “You know, another giant has gone out of the church.” One guy said, “There might not be many giants left.” I said, “You know what? I think more giants are coming.”
More Giants Are Coming
I think more giants are coming. People are waking up to how big they are in Jesus. People are flexing their muscles. People are standing taller and straighter. People are striding rather than walking. People are running. People are losing the ability to faint. People are getting belligerent in Grace. People are getting assertive in the Name of Jesus.
I think giants are coming. It would be great for America to be the land of the giants. (America is where this message was spoken. Insert the name of your nation.) Right? What if in every nation we represent as Aglow we are producing giants – men and women who take territory, hold territory. What if our collective presence in a country is more powerful than a government - because we can do things they cannot do? The weapons of our warfare – they are not carnal, but they will pull down strongholds. Somewhere in this room there are giants waking up.
In 1974 I had a prophetic word - the same word from four apostolic figures in a 14 month period. They all said, “One day you are going to go and live in America and you are going to go to kill a religious devil and wake a sleeping giant.” This is that. This is that which was spoken. I am living in the unfolding of prophecy. The things I am doing were foretold 30 years ago – this is that.
We are all going to have our ‘this is that’ moments before we are done. Realizing the prophetic words, reading them, working with them, partnering with the Holy Spirit over them, seeing those words come to pass. Not making them come to pass, but partnering with the process of how they come to pass.
Abounding Grace
2 Corinthians 9:8 God is able to make all Grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed.
Check the language out. I will read it again! God is able to make… a small amount of Grace… ALL GRACE… not all Grace by your definition… not all Grace that you can receive, but all Grace that He wants to pour out, He is able to make all Grace ABOUND to you.”
What does that mean? What does that mean for you? What if you can bounce in Grace? What if Grace comes into you in such a way that it makes you walk differently, talk differently, see differently, stand differently?
Nothing is impossible for you because Grace is abounding everywhere.
What does the world teach us? Do not ask for too much. Do not expect to get everything right all the time. The world teaches us to disbelieve. Oh just be careful. Do not get your hopes up. I do not want you to be disappointed.
God is able to make all Grace ABOUND to you, because He has planned for your growth. He has planned for your upgrade. He has planned for you to be bigger than you ever thought possible. He is able to make Grace abound towards you so that always, not sometimes, not occasionally, not every now and again, but ALWAYS… always having all… write that down! Always having all! Always having all sufficiency, in a few things…? the odd thing…? EVERY thing! You may have permission, promise, you may have an abundance.
If Jesus were to stand in front of you right now and say, “You may have abundance.” You are going to have an OMG moment! Seriously, you are going to want to check that out. You are going to want to take it for a spin! If it was a Lamborghini in the parking lot, you would be in there. You would not be bothered about getting a ticket. You just want to see how fast this sucker can go!
Always having all sufficiency in everything,
you may have an abundance for every good deed.
Question – how many good deeds can we think of to do in Aglow? What of the Lord is saying, “Aglow, look at Me. Focus… Aglow! You may have an abundance for every good deed.”
Here is my thing about what we are doing. What if everything has already been paid for? What is faith? Faith is moving ahead as though everything has been paid for. You get it as you go. You do not get it before you leave. You get it on the road.
Grace is more than enough to ward off the enemy and every difficulty. Grace makes us rich in Jesus. Because of Grace, He became poor that we might become rich. That is what Grace does for us. It makes us rich in Presence. It makes us rich in the fullness of who God is. It is not just this little place of favor that God puts you on so He can pat you on the head and say, “Do not worry. There there, it will be ok.” Grace is a pedestal. It elevates you. It takes you into a high place and it shows you who you are.
You know when the enemy took Jesus to a high place and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world? Where did he learn that from? That is how the Kingdom operates, and he was trying to rip the Kingdom off!
Inheritance Words
God wants to show you everything that you are. That is why we have prophecy. It is why we love prophecy. It is why we have Scripture. It is why we adore Scripture. When God gives you a Scripture, He is telling you everything in that passage belongs to you now and you may have it. You may experience it.
If God gives you a Scripture and it has someone’s name in it, you can have all the experiences in God that they had. When God gave me Numbers chapters 13 and 14, the story of Caleb, He said, “Graham I want you to be My Caleb. I want you to be a man of a different spirit. I am going to raise you up to be a man of a different spirit. You are never going to be scared, and you are not going to back down. You are going to go for things that nobody else will go for! I want you to take territory. I want you to be fearless, and the older you get, the more fearless you will become. I want you to be as strong at the end as you were at the beginning.”
When God gives you a scripture that has someone’s name in it, you get to have the same experiences that they had with God. Here is Caleb at 85 years old, with one last battle, and he is pushing. He has not claimed his inheritance yet. Other people have been quick to claim their inheritance. Caleb has been too busy enjoying the fighting! And everyone has gathered at this last stronghold of the enemy and he elbows his way to the front and gets in Moses’ face and said, “You promised me an inheritance. I want that mountain! You all push off and get your own fight. This is the last decent fight for a while and I am having it. I want it. Go and have a barbecue! I want this fight – I choose that place as my inheritance.” He chose the land where the enemy was strongest – I want that place. That is who you are. That is a giant talking.
Grace gives us this overflowing lifestyle, something that is bubbling over that makes you jubilant, that makes you accessible to this excessive outpouring. God is looking for a place to pour! Just give Him any excuse to bless you. He always makes Grace huge.
Grace is our place of safety in the Lord Jesus.Romans 5:1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this Grace.
Grace is so profound. It is so revelatory that you need faith just to get introduced to the fullness of it. Here is the thing – Grace is bigger than your logic. It will be bigger than your rationale and more powerful than your intellect. Grace is so massive, it does not matter what kind of intellectual you are. It is going to be bigger than your intellect and bigger than what you think. You need introduction to it through faith. You have to believe to get yourself into Grace. You have to believe that it is so massive, so huge, so powerful, so all encompassing - you have to receive it by faith. It is not logical. It is not reasonable. It is not rational. It is not intellectual. It is spiritual and you have to enter into it by faith.
We have obtained this introduction by faith into this Grace by which we stand. We exalt in hope of the glory of God. This place of Grace is so powerful, it is our biggest place of safety in the Lord Jesus. He puts you in a place before Him. The focal point of this passage is that by faith we can be introduced to a place where we can stand in absolute safety, absolute certainly and absolute confidence.
Grace Takes Territory
It is so powerful that Grace is a territory that is always under our feet. In every circumstance you find you can take Grace and put it in that circumstance, and change the territory of that circumstance from a difficulty to a possibility. You take that Grace with you. It makes you territorial. It gives you a territory in the Kingdom. You can stand in that place of Grace and have absolute confidence, certainty and security in who God is for you. You can take that Grace and you can put it anywhere you want.
Everywhere you apply that Grace it takes that territory. It shores up that territory. It creates a bigger space. If you have a problem with someone, get close to them so they have their big toe on your Grace. You believe in the power of Grace to do something - that your Grace is stronger.
When you stand in Grace you are standing in territory that Jesus stands in before the Father. We will talk about that in a minute.
We exalt in the expectation of the glory of God. In every situation, the Holy Spirit controls the ground of our being through Grace. He has given us this empowering Presence where we can stand. We can learn. We can grow. We can change. We can affect things. We can overcome things. We can win victories with no right to win - except that Grace is a territory. We can extend it.
What if we could have a whole ring of intercessors around Washington and just declare the Grace of God to come down into that space, and we act like the territorial spirits that we are… God is the one true great, original, territorial Spirit! And anyone that He inhabits and anyone who inhabits Him becomes a territorial spirit also.
There is a piece of land out there that has your name on it. There is some territory in the place where you live, but when we want to, we can go to places and extend our territory in prayer. We can call down the Grace of God because it is the Goodness and the Kindness of God that creates repentance. We have this power to call down Grace, and Grace is stronger than any nuclear power, stronger than any government, stronger than any law. It is part of the law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus. We can call down Grace.
We can go to Israel and call down Grace. We can go to Palestine and call down Grace. We can go to war zones and call down Grace. We can go to inner-city areas where the police do not dare go unless they are in teams, and call down Grace.
Nothing can resist the Grace of God. There is a power in it. There is an empowering Presence in Grace that will not be defeated.
We exalt in the expectation of the glory of God! Grace and exaltation! Grace and praise! You cannot separate them. We should be worshiping the God of Grace, and not only this, but we also exalt in our tribulation, knowing that our tribulation brings about perseverance, and perseverance gives us proven character, and proven character establishes expectation, and expectation does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Do you understand?
The bigness of the language should be doing your head in around about now! The language is huge. The language is huge because anybody who starts to speak it grows in it. It is the language that causes you to grow up.
Breakthrough Requires Follow-through
You know, we live in a world that wants new but thinks old. People will respond to truth, ‘yea, yahoo, great…’ but they will not follow through to create the language and the mind-set that establishes truth as a lifestyle.
The Language of Exaltation
It is in this place of Grace that we learn praise and exaltation at a higher level. Grace is so overpowering for us that it becomes compelling. It becomes compulsive. It makes us invincible. There are giants in this room. Grace forces us to move in a particular direction in the Lord where we begin to experience an irresistible lifestyle in Christ that is too powerful to be overcome. This is where exaltation lives.
What if there is a place of exaltation set aside for us in Grace that reveals the Majesty of Jesus?
Can we stop making God our size? Can we allow the Holy Spirit to cause us to grow up in Christ, so that we who are made in His image start to experience a life that is as big as He is?
What does that mean? It means that there is something limitless available to you — a life without limits — unlimited, unbounded, untethered. Don’t you want to know what it is? Don’t you want to see it before you die? You do not want to be introduced to it in Heaven when God wants to introduce it to you here on earth! As He is, so are we in this world.
I want to see Heaven on earth. I want to see the Kingdom that big - where Grace provides such a place of exaltation that our perspective on situations radically upgrades.
We begin to see connections between our circumstances and the development of perseverance, character, and expectation.
We realize that our circumstances are here to promote the development of patience and perseverance.
We know how to wait on the Lord.
If we know how to wait on the Lord the enemy is the one that gets impatient, because he does not know how to wait on you! Right now, he can persecute you and have you run, but when you understand patience and perseverance as a lifestyle – and perseverance is not about persisting in your circumstances, because God has not asked us to persist in our circumstances, He has asked us to persist in Him.
That means if there is a line and your circumstances are below it, you do not persist below the line of that privilege. You persist above it. That means you choose to believe something in spite of what you are experiencing below the line. You can experience something above it. You can persist in faith. You can stand on your prophetic word. You can persist in your identity. You can persist in the joy of the Lord and the peace of God that surpasses all understanding. You can persist in patience and goodness and nothing can overwhelm you when you stand in the Fruit of the Spirit - because there is no law that works against the Fruit of the Spirit!
When you persist in patience the enemy is the one that crumbles because all he knows is impatience. When you exhibit patience he gets antsy. It is always the nature of God that makes the enemy pay.
Grace empowers us to stand and know God’s love in an overpowering way.
Psalm 46:1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
Grace becomes our place of safety, our refuge, where all the circumstances of our life are worked out and we find a higher place of relationship with God.
Is your head about to explode yet?! What we are going to do is, we are going to enlarge your brain. We are going to make you think bigger, because we have been thinking too small and too narrow and small thinking has held us in bondage and it has made us blind. We have been below the line of our privilege for way too long. This is a life changer. The mind of Christ is bigger than yours so guess who gets to have the expansion? So I am just expanding your brain right now!
Grace is a catalyst for confidence and boldness in our relationship with God. It is really vital for our growth. We must develop a powerful attitude of partnering with the Grace of God in the Holy Spirit.
Grace is the catalyst for confidence and boldness.Hebrews 4:14-16 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore [because of Him] let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Hold on to your confession of the Jesus who really knows you. What that means to me is that the One who knows me best loves me best. The One who knows Graham the best, loves Graham the best. The One who understands everything about you loves who you are and loves who you are becoming. He understands all that you are going through, and He gives you Grace so that you can access His Presence in a higher way. What you are experiencing about Grace could take you into His Presence.
There is a Throne of Grace. What that means to me is you cannot separate Grace from Majesty. So in a fight with the enemy, Grace wins!
I have been fortunate enough to be cursed by some really powerful Satanists. What none of them knew was that I had a promise from God that He would turn every curse into a blessing! So I have always been super excited to meet them. “You are a Satanist, really? That is so cool! How long have you been a Satanist? Five years? Oh, that is not so hot. Twenty-five years? You must know a whole bunch of stuff.” And they start bragging and I am ok about listening.
One guy told me, “Our coven slit the neck of a cockerel and did a blood ritual, and I am here to curse you.” That is pretty cool, because he does not know what I know, and he does not have any Grace!
‘‘So can you wait just 5 minutes?”
‘‘Why?”
“Because the seatbelt light is still on and my notebook is in the overhead compartment. When the seatbelt light goes out, I will get my notebook and you can start then.”
So I get my notebook because I am going to write every curse down. Then I am going to ask the Lord what does that mean in terms of blessing? Right? So I write down everything they say, and then I rip that piece of paper out, and then I start translating it into blessings.
So I am doing this with one guy. He curses me in everything and when he is finished I said, “Thanks man! I really appreciate it.” He said, “What do you mean?” I said, “I will show you in a minute.” So we are on this plane for a few hours, and I write down and translate every curse into a blessing onto a separate piece of paper, and I hand it to him. I say, “Dude, this is what you just did for me.” And he looks at it and he says, “I did not!’ I said, “No dude, you did. Here is the missing piece that you did not know because your boss is ignorant. I have a promise from God that He will turn every curse into a blessing. This is just what you gave me. I appreciate it. Can I buy you a drink?!”
There is a Majesty in Grace that effects everything we do. There is a Majesty in Grace that overshadows every accusation of the enemy. It overshadows all the legalistic opinions of men. Grace empowers us to receive. It empowers us to receive mercy, which is the compassion of God towards us, and to help us find help just when we need it most.
Paul never forgot that he held the coats of those who stoned Stephen, or that he saw people killed because he ravaged the church.
1 Timothy 1:13-14 Even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief; and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant...
Paul stands as an example of Grace – Yes I had this history, but Grace wiped it out. Grace uses mercy to teach us how to abound in God’s Presence. Grace overshadows shame and condemnation. Grace takes precedence over our history. When Grace shows up your history dissolves. Grace, the mercy of God – it is like acid to condemnation and guilt. It dissolves it. Sin, it dissolves it.
Abundant Grace is a catalyst allowing us to receive active compassion, faith and love in our relationship with Jesus. So our testimony of Grace becomes “but by the Grace of God I am what I am and His Grace did not prove vain.” By the Grace of God I am what I am – I am not what I was, by the Grace of God, I am not yet what I will be, and that will also be by the Grace of God. Therefore I am what I am by the Grace of God.
Who is the only other person who used the ‘I am that I am’ thing? He allows you to step into one of the biggest confession about Himself. I am that I am. We step into that and say, in Grace, I am what I am. Not the finished article yet, but I am what I am and I am enjoying the Grace I have and I expect to get more. Right?
Hebrews 13:9 It is good for the heart to be strengthened by Grace.
2 Timothy 2:1 You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father, who has loved us and given us eternal comfort and good hope by grace, comfort and strengthen your hearts in every good work and word.
Grace is an incredible, astonishing, amazing provision. Grace creates this internal disposition that gives us an approach to life in Grace. It gives us a frame of mind and a perspective in Grace about how we see ourselves and how we see others in God’s Kindness.
There is a disposition that comes into you by Grace. It creates this manner, this posture before God and before man that produces this demeanor in us which allows us to generate this atmosphere in our hearts that connects people to living Kindness. No one is safe from the Kindness of God. In Grace we can liberate people who are trying to take us captive.
This is so exciting!
Romans 5:17-20 For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.
Grace Leads the Way
Grace is not keeping pace with sin. It is out in front. Grace overtook sin a long time ago and Grace stays out in front. What does that mean? You can have a spirit of stupid day and you are still ahead of the game! Grace is that big!
Grace must dominate everything.
You are always ahead of the game because of who God is and because of the Grace - the riches of His Grace that He has lavished on you. So that, as sin reigned in death even so Grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace would reign. Grace dominates everything,
The abundance of Grace overcomes all the consequences of transgression, condemnation, disobedience and death. Grace controls and directs all the negatives into a place where they are utterly defeated and must turn into something that is totally opposite.
That is so good! I am going to say it again! Grace controls and directs all the negatives into a place where they are utterly defeated and they must turn into something that is totally opposite.
When a negative touches Grace, it gets turned into something else. We are all having a Disney moment! It is a Disney moment in the Bible! Something negative touches Grace and gets changed into something else!
Misery touches Grace and gets turned into joy. Any negative touching Grace is touching what? It is touching Empowering Presence - because Grace is the Empowering Presence of God. So when a negative touches Empowering Presence it has to be turned into something else! Your Grace is so powerful it could make you a giant.
What would it look like for you to be a giant in Grace? Just saying!
Grace Rules
In this Grace we overcome. We prevail. We triumph. We reign in life by the Grace that God bestows upon us. Grace, what does that mean then? It means this – Grace is a ruling power! We reign in life by Grace. Grace is ruling power. We can bring that ruling power to any place we like!
You can bring that ruling power into any circumstance or situation. I know I have told this story before, but I like it. I was once asked by a bunch of guys – they were going to take several busloads, like about 400 people to San Francisco to speak judgment over the gay community. They said, “Would you come?!” I said, “I would rather slit my throat with a blunt knife! I'll tell you what I will do. Tell me when you are going and I will go, and I will stand on the opposite side of the street, and I will pray for the Grace of God and I will win because Grace is a ruling power.”
Grace is ruling power. We reign in life through Grace and the gift of righteousness. The gift of righteousness means we can only do what is right. We can do what is right and call down the Grace of God.
Grace is a ruling power that creates the opposite of what legalism intends. You can always tell when a religious spirit is speaking because it always downgrades the power and the effectiveness of Grace.
I was talking to a guy who was a wonderful legalist and he was sneering at me and saying, “Oh you are one of those people that believes in cheap Grace.” I said, “Dude it was not cheap. It cost Jesus everything, so you are insulting His Presence right now. How dare you!”
Grace allows us to reign through the gift of righteousness. Grace is a ruling power. The enemy calls it cheap Grace because he wants to keep us poor.
It is the Majesty of Grace that I want you to start to get your heart around - the Majesty of Grace towards you.
Honestly, you are not much of a challenge to the Grace of God. Seriously? I think a Twinkie-filled two year old is more of a challenge to the Grace of God than any of us! There is no way you could ever exhaust the Grace of God, but you have got to bear in mind, too, that Grace is Empowering Presence.
Anyone need empowering? You have a place of Grace in which you stand. You have access. You can come boldly before the Throne of Grace and find mercy and Grace to help, just when you need it most!
Grace rules because Jesus is Lord. Grace rules because in us is righteousness and we partake of His divine nature. The Majesty of Grace empowers us to reign in life through the gift of His righteousness. You are right with God and you will always be right with God. You will always have that gift of being right with God, because righteousness is a gift.
You want to be right with God? Receive Righteousness. It is the ability to be right with God, and He will give it to you as a gift, along with loads of Grace to empower you to explore that Righteousness and become it.
Come on! There is a Gospel here so powerful it penetrates every situation. Governments can fall to this Gospel. Nations can fall to this Gospel. Everything succumbs to the Gospel of the good news of the glad tiding of joy in Christ Jesus.
This Gospel is so powerful. This Grace is so astonishing and amazing nothing can stand against it. It puts you in this place of Impregnable Power. You stand in it. It is territorial. You take it with you. You apply it to anybody. Things have to change.
Astonishing! Overwhelming! Brilliant! Incredible! Amazing Grace.
You rule in life with Grace and the gift of Righteousness. It is the beauty and the Majesty of this life (of Grace) that causes us to reign from the inside to the outside.
How would Grace reign over guilt, or shame, or condemnation? How would it dominate negative opinions of others?
When you stand in Grace before the Throne of Grace, the Majesty of God’s Empowering Presence rises up and occupies your heart and it makes you invincible. The opinions of other people wash off you because Grace is waterproof. It is guilt-proof. It is condemnation-proof. It gives you this Teflon finish. You have a non-stick finish that Grace gives you! Grace gives you a Teflon coating – nothing sticks!
That was my nickname when I grew up playing rugby - which is just about the most gloriously violent team sport on the face of the earth. My nickname was Teflon because I could take punishment. I could run through a crowd of guys and get right through, because nothing stuck. I was leading point scorer year after year after year because nothing stuck. I could cross a line with three guys hanging on to me with all the guys bigger than me. I do not know how I did it, but my nickname was Teflon! I have always had this non-stick finish, now I understand why!
Nothing sticks to you when Grace is in you and all around you. Am I worried about what people say about me? Not at all. I have a Teflon coating. And I am still here. It is Grace. Empowering Presence.
What stops Grace from ruling in our heart? It is not just shame, guilt and condemnation. It is also the thoughts, perceptions, language, fears and learned behaviors that come to us as our experience from the world. But now we do not belong in the world, we belong to a different realm, and there are things coming to us from that realm that make us different in this one.
We should have shown you the superman clip! Someone coming from a different dimension and has a different kind of power on this planet. They are all just images of Jesus in the end. Everyone is trying to get a handle on Jesus… Superman… Everyone is looking for that person who can change the world. Everyone is looking for that person who can save the world. We know who He is, and He does not wear his boxers outside of His trousers!
Galatians 2:21 (paraphrased) All the time you give place to a negative youfrustrate the Grace of God.
You neutralize what God wants to be for you when you give no value to Grace. Jesus went to the cross to rob us of all these negatives. At a time in my life when I needed Grace, the Lord showed it to me in a dream. I have lots of dreams and often I have series of dreams, like a book, like a story, like a movie over a period of time.
This one particular series always started out on top of a hill full of flowers. There was this wooden structure with curtains all around and inside it had carpets and cushions and great food, and wine, because I am a European! I would wait in this place and Jesus would come and we would talk. Inevitably you would hear Him like half a mile away because there would always be like hundreds of people dancing around Him. Kids were jumping on Him. Guys were talking to Him. Grannies were trying to leap on Him and kiss Him and everything! Usually He would look up and grin, and say, “I will be there in a minute.” He would be talking and walking up the hill and everyone would leave. He would come into this structure and we would sit and eat and He would tell me things. Then I would wake up in the morning and I would have almost perfect recall. I would write the dream in my journal. All my talks and my books begin in those journals.
Give Me Back My Stuff
On this occasion I sat in the wooden structure nibbling on some grapes. I hear this heavy walking sound, and I look out and it is Jesus by Himself. No crowd. No one with Him. He is looking really kind of fierce and ferocious, and He is marching up the hill. I can hear the stamp of His feet and I am looking at His face. I am starting to quiver on the inside. I am backing away towards the back of the tent and He comes in like this, and He looks at me. He comes marching up to me and He gets right in front of me, and He says, “Graham! Give Me back My stuff!” Excuse me? “Give Me back My stuff!” But… I… I do not know what you mean… Everything I have You gave me… “That is not true! I did not give you this stuff. You took something that belongs to Me, and I want it back. Give Me back My stuff!”
I was like, but Lord, I do not know what You mean. “Graham, this is no time to mess around with Me. Give-Me-back-My-stuff!” I started to cry, Lord I do not know what You mean. I cannot think. I do not know. What did I take that is Yours? “That fear, that anger, that hate, that bitterness, that worry, that panic, that anxiety, that negativity, that resentment, that intimidation, that frustration, that stress, that irritability, that impatience, that torment, that misery, that trepidation, that tension, that friction, those grudges, those offenses, that jealousy and animosity, pressure, intolerance… I died for it. I paid a price for it. It belongs to Me. Give Me back My stuff!”
I remember falling to my knees because suddenly I get it. I am having an “oh shoot” moment. I get it. I get it. He died for all those things. I am looking at Him. I am crying. I cannot apologize fast enough. “Lord, I am so sorry! I am so sorry. I am so sorry.” And He smiles at me - and honestly it was a little like getting saved all over again. And He reaches out and He pulls me to my feet and He kisses me on both cheeks. He looks me in the eye, holding me at arm’s length, and He looks me right in the eye and He smiles. He said, “You know, when I hung on the cross, what kept Me there was the fact that I was going to rob you of all those things and that you would never experience them ever again. That I would take them all away from you and make it impossible for you, in Grace, to ever experience those things again. Gaham, all the time you have those operating in your life, you cannot rise up to the place that I have set aside for you. Give Me back My stuff. It is not yours and you cannot have it, ever. It does not belong to you. I died for it. I paid a price for it. Give Me back My stuff.”
I told that dream in a church in Dallas. There was a mum there with 2 small daughters - about eight and five I think. As they are going home the older girl says, “Mum, when we do prayers tonight I have to give Jesus some stuff back.” So the mum gets them washed, and teeth done and hair brushed and in bed, and she says, “Ok sweetheart, what do you want to give back to Jesus?” The girl had a fear of the dark all her life. She has always slept with the light on in the hallway and the door open. She has always slept like that and always had this fear.
She gives Jesus back the fear of the dark because she recognizes it does not belong to her, it actually belongs to Him. So they pray, she gives Him back the fear and mum gives her peace and so on and blesses her, and then for the first time in this eight year old girl’s life, her mum turns the light off and closes the door. Like a good mum she waits outside the door for a few minutes. Sure enough there’s a sound “Mummy, Mummy, Mummy, Mummy!”
She opens the door, turns the light on, and the younger sister is pointing at her older sister’s bed and she said, “She took the fear back. She is a take-backer-er! She took it back! Mum, she took it back!”
Mum peels the bed clothes back and asks, “Did you take back that fear of the dark?” “Mhmm” “Do you want to give it back to Jesus?” “Mm” “Ok, we are going to do a do over”. So, she prayed for her again and she renounced this fear of the dark, and her mum prayed for her and blessed her with peace, and she has never had a problem from that night on. Jesus took His stuff back.
An eight year old girl recognized ‘this is illegal behavior for me to worry, be anxious, fearful, or angry, impatient. It is illegal behavior. That behavior does not belong to me. It actually belongs to Jesus.’
All those negatives? They are not yours anymore and you cannot have them. You need to give Him His stuff back.
What does that look like for you?
Give Him His stuff back.
