Grace Revolution: Experience the Power to Live Above Defeat (10 page)

Beloved, it is the blood of Jesus Christ that continually cleanses you from all sin, not your continuous confession of sins. You have remission and forgiveness of every sin through His shed blood. You have the assurance of forgiveness according to the riches of His grace, not according to the diligence of your confessions. Your assurance is founded upon what He has done, not what you need to keep doing.

Those who insist that 1 John 1:9 is proof that the Christian must
keep confessing his sins in order to be forgiven and made righteous
will find it inconsistent with 1 John 2:12: “I write to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake.” We saw in the previous chapter how “are forgiven” here is in the perfect tense in Greek, indicating that our forgiveness is a definite action completed in the past with continuing, ongoing effect. So if Apostle John really wrote 1 John 1:9 for the Christian to practice, then he was engaging in double-talk! No, my friend, there is no double-talk in Scripture. We
are
forgiven of
all
through Jesus’ blood.

It is this revelation of the cleansing power of Jesus’ shed blood that is the launching pad to living life with greater boldness and confidence. The Scriptures tell us clearly:

Do you see? Boldness comes when you realize that because of Jesus’ cleansing blood, you don’t need to hide from God, afraid that He is out to get you for your sins. You can have boldness to enter into the holiest presence of God with a heart that fully trusts Him, and with a conscience that is free of guilt and condemnation.

This is the new and life-giving way God wants you to live by, one where you can confidently approach His throne of grace at any time to receive His mercy, favor, help, blessings, and life! My friend, whatever your challenges, if you will actively possess your perfect and complete forgiveness in Christ, you can overcome them and enjoy life at a whole new level, with greater boldness and confidence!

I
wrote this book to help you build a strong foundation for lasting breakthroughs. Whatever defeat you may be struggling with now, I want you to really anchor yourself in God’s grace by receiving and understanding the gospel of grace from His Word. Don’t base your understanding of God’s heart toward you on hearsay or man’s opinion. Base it on the unshakable and eternal foundation of His Word. My heart’s desire is to see you live a glorious and victorious life, not a life entangled with sin, doubt, apprehension, and defeat.

You may have made many mistakes. You may think that it is too late now for God to turn things around for you. You may even think that you deserve to be in the mess you are in and that God has given up on you. My dear friend, those hard thoughts are not God’s thoughts about you. His Word proclaims that His thoughts toward you are good:

God has an amazing plan, purpose, and destiny for your life. Your past need not determine your future. No matter what your story may
be, your greatest and best days are ahead of you. I believe that the more you build a rock-solid foundation in your relationship with the Lord Jesus and press in to understand His gracious heart of love and passion toward you, the more you will find security and experience lasting breakthroughs in life.

In the last few chapters, we focused on how to live with greater confidence and boldness. I centered my teaching on helping you to grow by showing you the importance of knowing beyond any doubt that when you become a believer of Jesus Christ, all your sins are forgiven. Forgiven people are not looking for an excuse to sin. Forgiven people find freedom and liberty from sin by coming to the Savior whenever they fail. Repentance is all about turning to the cross and returning to God’s grace, and allowing His words to wash and renew your mind.

Many sincere but depressed people are living in deep remorse and regret over their past mistakes. But instead of running to the Lord, they are running away from Him. They find other ways to numb their pain or escape from it. Why are they doing this? Because they don’t understand God’s heart of grace. That is why we need to preach His glorious grace with boldness. Precious lives are imprisoned in crushing defeat not because victory isn’t available to them, but because they don’t know how victory can be theirs!

Anyone who says that the preaching of God’s grace produces a license to sin probably doesn’t fully grasp the power of God’s transforming grace. Grace lifts a person who is struggling in sin out of their life of defeat. Grace produces true holiness. By true holiness, I mean holiness that is lasting. Not an outward form of holiness that is transient, but an enduring holiness that is birthed from a transformation that begins in the person’s heart. Grace doesn’t
condone
sin; it provides lasting freedom
from
sin. How can anyone think that to come under grace is to turn a blind eye to sin, when grace opens our eyes to see that it was our sins that put Jesus on the cross and cost Him His life?

I have shown you from Scripture after Scripture the Father’s heart in forgiving us of our sins. The bold preaching of the gospel of grace from this ministry has resulted in testimony after testimony of many precious lives being set free from sin, from addictions, and from all kinds of religious bondages. The testimonies of the people who have taken the time to share their astonishing breakthroughs attest to the power of God’s amazing grace. And I know very well that the only reason these wonderful testimonies flood our ministry office every single week is that the gospel of Jesus Christ is being preached. Grace is not just an academic or theological subject to be pontificated about in a Bible seminary. Grace is the gospel itself and the preaching of the gospel changes lives!

This is what our Lord Jesus Himself proclaimed would happen. When He was in Nazareth, He said, “The Spirit of the L
ORD
is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; to proclaim the acceptable year of the L
ORD
” (Luke 4:18–19).

Listen closely to the words of our Lord. Notice how the Spirit of the Lord and His anointing are upon those who preach the gospel! The word “gospel” is the Greek
euangelion
, which means “good tidings”
¹
or good news. Luke 4:18 uses the verb
euangelizoo
, meaning “to bring good news, to announce glad tidings.”
²
Now, look at the results when the good news of Jesus is preached: the curse of poverty is destroyed, broken hearts are mended, prisoners and the oppressed are set free, and the sightless receive sight! Through the preaching of God’s amazing grace, all these effects are what we are witnessing in our church and ministry. If you are a pastor or minister of God’s Word, you can have the same results in your ministry when you preach the good news of Jesus.

Here is a Scripture that I want you to get deep inside your heart:

The law that was given through Moses refers to the Sinaitic covenant, named after Mount Sinai, where the Ten Commandments were
given. So whenever I talk about “the law” I am referring to the Ten Commandments given at Mount Sinai. For starters, let me make this clear: the Sinaitic covenant was a covenant that was made between God and Israel. Just ask any Jewish person. It was not a covenant that was made between God and the church. Our covenant is the new covenant of grace, which began at the cross of our Lord Jesus. Notice in John 1:17 that the Ten Commandments were
given
through a servant, Moses, but that grace and truth
came
through God’s own Son, Jesus Christ.

Now, don’t let anyone tell you that the “truth” here is the Ten Commandments. The verse is clearly contrasting the Ten Commandments with grace and truth. We see the Mosaic law on one side and grace and truth on the other side. In the verse, we see that truth is on the side of
grace
, not the Ten Commandments. In the original Greek text, the words for “grace” and “truth” are followed by a singular Greek verb for “came,”
³
which means that “grace” and “truth” are regarded as one item. Grace is the
truth
and this truth that sets people free is
grace
! So you cannot separate grace and truth—they are a composite whole. Let me say it again: grace is the truth and the truth is grace. Why is knowing this so important? Because grace, not the law, is the truth that sets you free and transforms you (see John 8:32).

When Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more” (John 8:11), that was grace and truth as a composite whole in action. Grace does not condemn the sinner but it also does not condone the sin. Grace pardons the
undeserving sinner and the result of grace is the power to go and sin no more. Isn’t that beautiful? That’s Who our Lord Jesus is. He loves the sinner and releases him or her with the power and strength to go and sin no more. A person whose heart is full of the love of Jesus doesn’t need to find love in an adulterous relationship. All your need for security, affirmation, and love is fully met in the person of Jesus. You don’t have to settle for a life trapped in sin when you know that Jesus has such a beautiful and glorious future for you!

How do born-again believers, who sincerely want to live holy lives, still end up trapped in a cycle of sin and living a defeated life? I believe that it is because they receive condemnation for their failings, and do not know or believe that God Himself does not condemn them because of the cross of Jesus. Show me someone who lives under constant condemnation and I will show you someone who is always struggling with sin. You see, the more believers live in condemnation, the more they actually become entrenched in a vicious cycle of sin, condemnation, and defeat.

Let me explain what I mean with a simple illustration. Let’s say a believer is surfing the Internet one day when he chances upon pornographic images and looks at them longer than he should. Before he knows it, lustful thoughts tumble across his mind. At the same time, since he is a born-again Christian, he starts to feel guilty and condemned. He tells himself, “I shouldn’t have looked at the images. I shouldn’t be having all these unholy thoughts. Oh, I’m such a lousy Christian. God must be so disappointed with me.”

The more he heaps guilt and condemnation on himself, the more he reasons, “What’s the point of resisting? I’m a terrible Christian and since I’m already guilty and fellowship with God is broken, I might as well go all the way.” What does he do? He clicks on one of the image links, which takes him to a pornographic website, and he indulges his fleshly desires. Now he feels all the more guilty and condemned, and even more convinced that God is angry with him and has distanced Himself from him.

All this guilt and alienation from God just make him more susceptible to fail the next time he faces a similar temptation. There is no power to overcome subsequent temptations, and his indulgences quickly develop into an addiction that imprisons him in perpetual guilt and self-condemnation. He knows he has a problem, but is just too ashamed of his secret sin to approach anyone for help. This is basically how many sincere believers end up trapped in a cycle of sin and condemnation. You can see this represented in the Cycle of Defeat diagram
here
.

Can you see how the cycle of defeat is perpetuated? Feelings of guilt and condemnation do not empower a believer, no matter how sincere he is, to overcome his sin. In fact, they leave him more weak and vulnerable to the next temptation. The truth is, those who are under constant guilt and condemnation have no strength to overcome temptation, and end up repeating their sins and living a painful life trapped in a cycle of defeat.

In the countless testimonies my ministry has received over the years, many sincere believers shared how guilt, condemnation, and fear of God’s judgment only perpetuated their sins and addictions. My friend, if this describes you today, and you are living under a heavy yoke of guilt and condemnation and struggling with sin, your answer
is found in the Lord Jesus and His grace. It is when you are under the Lord’s grace, not the law, that sin has no dominion over you (see Rom. 6:14). So let Him be your Savior. Don’t hide from Him. Come to Him and allow Him to set you free!