The Relational Mercies of God 10-08-23

Overview: The speaker begins with a prayer, expressing gratitude for God's love and mercy. He emphasizes that God paid a great price for humanity's salvation and urges listeners to pray by faith. He then discusses the concept of presenting oneself as a living sacrifice to God, highlighting the reasonableness of this act considering the sacrifice Jesus made. He uses the analogy of buying a toaster oven to illustrate the expectation of receiving something valuable in return and points out that Christ willingly gave Himself as a ransom for those who would not and could not offer anything of real value in return. He emphasizes that God's love is unconditional and encourages listeners to love others unconditionally as well. Pastor Williams: Let's go to the Lord in prayer before we dive into Romans chapter 12. Lord God, again, we just want to say thank You for this awesome time of celebration, that we see You still in the saving business. And we know Your Word says that You have done all things that the world might be reconciled back to You. You even paid the ransom for us. Lord, a payment that we could never repay. We are eternally in Your debt because of Your love, because of Your grace, because of Your mercy. And Lord, we lift up these requests because we know that You are sovereign, You are powerful, You are willing to listen and to heed the prayers of Your people. Lord, help us to pray by faith. Help us to pray believing. Not in our own strength, our own power, our own understanding. Not even in the doctor's understanding and wisdom, but because we know who we pray to. The all-sufficient, all-sovereign, all-powerful God of the universe that spoke the creation into existence. And so, Lord, I pray that You'll be with all these situations and circumstances and all of those names that are weighing on our hearts and minds that are left unspoken, but are spoken through the Holy Spirit directly into Your ear. Lord, we trust in You. My prayer is that of the Father. Lord, we believe. Help our unbelief. Bless our time together this morning, I pray in Jesus' name, Amen. Amen. Romans 12, verse 1, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. I just want to say for just a side note right here, Scripture says it's our reasonable service. Why is it a reasonable service? Because when we begin to understand the ransom that God paid for us, God, You gave it all for me. My Savior left His throne in heaven, a place that was untainted, unscarred, unmarred by sin. He stepped out of that glory into a sin-sick world and took on the image of man. Was tempted in every way that we are tempted, and yet sin not. And He stepped into that so that He might be the perfect Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. He stepped into that ridicule and that rejection and that rebellion. He stepped right into that and said, I love you. That's why I'm here. I love you. And when we begin to understand the sacrifice that He made to buy back a people that wanted nothing to do with God, to buy back a people who were so far and so below Him, He stepped into that and bought us for a price. So that Scripture says that we are not our own, but that we have been bought for a price. And He stepped into that. And when we begin to really allow our minds to wrap around that thought, it just makes sense. It's reasonable that we would say, God, if that's what You're going to do for me, here I am. Here I am. Think about it this way for just a second. You go to the store and you see this item that you want. You're like, man, I really want this toaster oven. And it's nice. I mean, look, it air fries, it bakes, it heats up. Man, it could cook me some chicken nuggets in like three minutes. Man, I really want this toaster oven. And so you pay that price for that toaster oven and you get home and what you find is an empty box. You're not going to look at that and say, man, I sure made a good purchase. Man, I'm glad I spent all my money on this box. You're going to be mad, aren't you? You're going to say, I didn't get anything out of this. I was expecting one thing and this is what I got. You're going to be mad. You're going to take it back to the store. You might bust that to management. How are you going to sell me an empty box? And you're going to fuss and you're going to complain. But what Christ did is say, look, you know what? I'm going to buy you. And I know that what I'm getting is worse than an empty box. I know that what I'm getting is somebody who is not going to fully put their faith in Me. They're going to say they believe, but when pressure hits, they're going to falter in that belief. I'm going to buy people back that with their lips they're going to praise Me, but with their actions, they're going to worship the things of the world. I want to buy back a people who will reject Me and turn their back on Me. And He stepped into that will and paid the full price for it. And He said, all I ask in return is that you present yourself to Me. And all your faults, all your failures, all your mess ups and your mishaps, offer it all to Me, because that's what I purchased on the cross. Don't I have to clean myself up? No. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He doesn't expect anything out of us, but for us to say, here I am. Because He loves us. Not a version of us that we think we should be. He loves us. Just the way we are invites us into that relationship with Him. A relationship that He paid for on the cross that Romans 12 says is our reasonable service. So how do we step into this relationship? How do we begin to really allow ourselves to press into that? He tells us right there in the first part of that verse, by the mercies of God. And I started this last week talking about the spiritual mercies that He gives us. The mercy of salvation. The mercy of freedom from sin. The mercy of the Holy Spirit. The mercy of reconciliation. The mercy of sonship. But I want us to look at another area of mercies this morning. Not only the spiritual mercies that He gives us, but the relational mercies. Because that's what He's inviting us into. It's a relationship with Him. The first relational mercy that I see He gives us is love. That was His whole motivation behind everything that He was willing to do is love. And I don't want us to forget about this. Because see, here in this messed up world that we live in, oftentimes our love is based on what we get out of the relationship. Our love is conditional. Our love is, well, if you don't fulfill all of my needs and do exactly what I expect you to do, then my love is going to go away. And we see this in relationships. Well, we just fell out of love. Well, did you just fall into it? Did you just wake up? Oops. Oh, I love you. To the first random person, no, you didn't fall into it. You made a choice to walk in that. You made a choice. You said, boy, she's cute. I'd like to get to know her. And you made a choice to step in that direction. You made a choice to be bold enough to say, hey, would you like to go have dinner with me? You made a choice to have a conversation. You made a choice to spend time. You made a choice to pursue that relationship. And yet, oftentimes when we get in the middle of that relationship and it's not exactly what we expect, I just fell out of love. Because our love is conditional. But God's love for you is unconditional. He loves you today. He'll love you tomorrow. He'll love you next week, next month, next year, next decade, next eternity. You say next eternity. There's no such thing as a next eternity. I get that. I'm just trying to paint a picture for you that God's love for you will never end. So a preacher, what if I do that? He still loves you. Listen, if you never put your faith and trust in Him as Lord and Savior, He still loves you. He must judge sin. And based on your righteousness and my righteousness, that's our righteousness, that judgment is guilty. But He still loves you. That's why we must step into His righteousness. So that when He looks on us, He doesn't see our righteousness, He sees His. And based on His righteousness, we're innocent. But the first relational mercy that He gives us is His love. And everything else that He does for us is based on that. That is the foundation. Whereas oftentimes, our foundation is actions. As long as you meet my needs. As long as you give me what I want. As long as you don't tell me no. You've seen this in your kids, haven't you? You raise them the best you can. You're giving them all the food they want. All the clothes. You're putting a roof over their head. You're providing them. You're giving them hugs and kisses. And you're doing all of that. But the first time you tell them no, I hate you! Why? Because our love is based on conditions. God's love is unconditional. Everything that He does for us flows from that. Romans 5.8 says this when it says, but God demonstrates His own love towards us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He didn't wait for us to clean ourselves up. He didn't speak to us and say, come back to me when you get your affairs in order. He said, I am here and I love you and I'll receive you whenever you're ready. His love for us. But also, He gives us love for others. He creates in us. We love because He first loved us. 1 John 4.7 Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God. And everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. And I want you to understand this about the love that we are to have for one another. It's supposed to be God love. Unconditional love. And so if I look at somebody across the room, well, my brother Bobby, and I only say this because I know Bobby well enough to know that he's not one. Well, I don't have Bobby over there. You know what he did to me last week? He told me I couldn't borrow his tractor. How dare he? I wish he'd get run over by that tractor. And all of a sudden, I find myself angry and bitter at a brother in Christ because he didn't do for me. He's not wrong. I'm wrong. Wait a minute, preacher. You don't know what they did. It doesn't matter what they did. If you find hatred in your heart for another brother or sister in Christ, you are wrong. And you need to ask for forgiveness. Plain and simple. Because the love that we are to have for one another is unconditional. And I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. I want you to know this. Our sins. And when I understand the depth and the darkness and the depravity of my sin that has been forgiven, then how can I look at somebody who simply told me no and allow that to grow bitterness and hatred in my heart? God forgave us, and so we are to forgive others. In fact, in 1 John 4, verse 11, he says that exact thing when he says, Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. Because of His love for others, He gives us forgiveness. That's the second relational mercy that I see in Scripture is forgiveness. Psalm 103, verse 12, a verse we like to quote often. As far as the east is from the west, so far He has removed our transgressions from us. Hebrews 8, verse 12, For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. Think about that. The God of this universe, the all-knowing God of this universe, the God who sees and understands even the hidden thoughts in your mind, chooses to forget our sin. He says I will remember them no more. I'm a very forgetful person. I've been here over five and a half years now. Many of you understand that about me. You have come to know and be frustrated by that forgetfulness. And I do that not by choice. I could tell you some stories about even when I was a kid, how forgetful I am. I don't do that by choice. In fact, it frustrates me about myself. And yet, God chooses to do it. So that He looks at you, brother Marion, and He sees righteousness and holiness and perfection because He chooses not to remember what you and I can't let go of, right? Because I look back on my past and I look back on who I am and I still remember every detail of it. I remember how wretched I was. I remember how I loved sin and I walked in it and I reveled in it and I woke up every morning wanting to do it. I remember that. Yet, God chooses to forget it. So that when He looks at us, He sees holiness. And God chooses that for you. He wants you and me to let go of our past and walk in who we are now. Because who we are now in Christ, if we put our faith and trust in Christ, who we are now are saints. We are more than conquerors. We are His hands and His feet. We are the light of the world and the salt of the earth. We are His children. And we are being made perfect. And He gives us that forgiveness. And because of His forgiveness, we have been reconciled to the Father. We've been reconciled to the Father. Our sin put a divide between us and God. But God's love and forgiveness through the work of Christ on the cross has allowed us to be reconciled to Him. This means that we can live in a right relationship with God the Father and that we are no longer His enemies. Romans 5.10 says, For if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. Colossians 1.21 And you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled. The love of Scripture tells us that everything that He does is motivated by His love for the purpose of reconciliation. He wants us to be reconciled to Him. He wants us to be brought into that relationship with Him. He wants us to turn to Him. He wants us to cry out to Him. He wants us to be brought into the family of God. That's what He wants for you and for me. And I get it. I understand. Listen, I go back to me not being able to let go of some of the things in my past, but oftentimes in my conversations with God, it ends this way. Why me? Why would you want a relationship with me? I'm stubborn. I'm arrogant. I think I've got it all figured out. Why would you want somebody like me? I'm annoying at times. Like, I get that. My family really gets that. And I just think, why me? And that's when I fall on His love. Because He loves me. Now, when I'm counseling young, engaged couples before they get married, I always give them this advice. Constantly, I give them this advice. I want you to think about the most annoying thing that that other person does and how it just gets on your nerves all the time. Whatever that thing is, and it may be more than one, but there's one thing that just really grates against you, right? I said, I want you to multiply that times 10 or 100 because that's what marriage is going to do. That little thing that aggravates you is going to be multiplied because you can't run away. When you're engaged and you're living separate, you can always say, I'm going to go home now. I'm going to see you later. But when you're married, you're in the same house. You might can run outside. Guys, you might can run to your shop or to the garage or something, but guess what's going to be waiting on you when you come back to that door? Those shoes that are right there on the floor. And so I know we can be an annoying people. I can judge by your laughter that I'm not the only one that's annoying. And so I look at God and I'm like, why me? I can look out through here and see the faces of so many more people that I would put a preference on. That person over there, man, they got it. They got it together. And we talk about these two prayer warriors and men of God and godly women and all these things. And we say all that stuff, right? We put people up on a pedestal. But what God says is, I had to die for them. I had to die for them. I had to die for them. I had to die for them. And them and them and him. In the eyes of God, we're equals. We're a people that needs saving. A people that needs to be reconciled. A people that needs to be brought back into a right relationship with Him. And how does He do that? By the ransom that He paid. And the relational mercy that He gives us is that reconciliation, that love that whatever state we find ourselves in, whether we grew up in a Christian home or we've been going to church our whole life, knew the things of God from an early age, or whether we never heard them until we were in our twenties or older. The response by God is the same. Come unto Me, you who are weak and heavy laden. And when we turn to Him and put our faith and trust in Him, welcome home. Welcome home. We always said it this way. It's been said in the church for a long time. The ground is level at the cross. We all are reconciled the same way. Faith in Christ. The faith that was represented right behind these walls this morning. Faith in the life, the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Christ. Reconciled to Him. And lastly, on the relational mercies, I see the sonship or the childship, daughtership, or whatever the correct term there is to include everybody. John 1.12, but as many received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God. To those who believe in His name. We are His children. This means we have a Father. We have someone that we can run to and know that He has our best interest at heart. We have someone that we can run to that we know has the power to do something about our struggle. We have a perfect heavenly Father that longs to spend time with us, that desires to heal us, that wants us to just pour into that relationship with Him. This means we have a family. Ephesians 3.14-19, For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. What is this family in heaven and earth? It is those who have put their faith and trust in Christ. It is what we call the church. You have a family. If you put your faith and trust in Christ, you have somewhere that you belong. Now, I would love for it to be King's Grove Baptist Church. That you would come and you would be part of our local family here that's part of the universal family. But here's the reality. And I want you to know that there's no hard feelings, no hurt feelings. The reality is that King's Grove Baptist Church is not the local church family for everybody. But there is a local church family. There is a local church family for everybody. There is a church family for everyone. There is a place where you belong. Because God in His infinite wisdom established the local church to give us a place to belong. To give us a place, as I read at the onset of this sermon, to lift up our requests. To pray for one another. To encourage one another. To come together as a family should. There's a place for you to belong and to grow in your relationship as His child. So the relational mercies that God gives us is love, forgiveness, reconciliation, and sonship. And all of that is available if you'll put your faith and trust in Him. I want you to step into that relationship that is available to you through what Christ accomplished on the cross. And the way you do that is by putting your faith and trust in Him for salvation. First and foremost, that is the first step in that relationship. If you've done that, then you step into that relationship in the same way you would step into any relationship here on earth. You spend time with Him. Talk with Him. You press into that presence. You simply say, as He said, present your body as a living sacrifice. Here I am. Here I am. Where are you this morning? All of us are somewhere on that road. We're either just now getting started and we need to step out in faith and put our faith and trust in Him, or we have started this journey and we simply need to press into His presence through prayer, through Bible study. You've taken one of the steps by being here this morning. This altar is a great place to take another step. To come and bow before Him in His presence. Say, God, here I am. I'll be right here down front in just a moment after I spend some time in prayer. Love to pray with you. Pray for you. This altar is open.