Creflo Dollar - How to Be Trained by Grace - Part 1
If you have your Bibles, go with me to the book of Titus. Titus. 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus. Now, in this series, I'm gonna be, even those of us who've heard grace teaching for the last ten years, this is gonna challenge even all of that, or bring into light some more things. But I'm gonna call this series "Trained by Grace". "Trained by Grace". And one of the things we learned in previous series is that, according to John chapter 1, verse 17, he says: "For the law came by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ". And then in verse 14 in that same chapter, and listen to this carefully, he said, "Jesus, full of grace and truth".
Now, grace and truth are not two different entities. Grace is the truth. And Jesus, anytime you hear grace, it's Jesus. Jesus is the source of grace. So we're tempted sometimes to separate 'em and treat grace like a subject instead of a person. Grace is not a curriculum. It's not a subject. Jesus, full of grace, grace is a person. So in this series, we are gonna every now and then, just to bring us back on the level, remind you that we're talking about Jesus. Even in the title when I say that we're trained by grace, we're trained by Jesus full of grace, which is the truth.
Now, that's gonna help out because, you know, you've gotta understand that some people say, "Well, I got problems with that grace message". Well, you just said you got problems with Jesus. Do you follow what I'm saying? And that's why it's so important that you remember that Jesus is the face of grace. Everything about grace flows from Jesus. You can't separate the person of grace, you follow me, from grace itself. So grace is a person.
Now, let's look at Titus and I'm gonna be teaching most of this in the New Living Translation. But Titus 2, let's go to the King James first. Titus 2, verse 11 and 13. This is the key text for the entire series for the year. He says, "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us," the grace of God teaches. "Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and denying worldly lusts, that we should live soberly," level-headed, "soberly, righteously, that we should live godly, in this present world". So grace is gonna teach us about Christian conduct. He says in the next verse, "Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ".
Isn't that amazing? As he begins to talk about grace, notice the end results: "I'm teaching you this and I want you to look for the appearing of Jesus Christ". All right, now let's look at this in the New Living Translation. The New Living Translation. He says, "For by the grace of God", He says, "For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people". So everybody, whether they're Christians or not Christians, have been given access to this grace. And he says: "The grace of God has been revealed, and salvation has been made available to everybody in the whole world".
Whether you saved or unsaved, salvation has been made available to everybody in the whole world. This is not a Christian subject. Salvation has been made available to everybody in the entire world and you're gonna have to decide whether you wanna take it or not. But it's been made available by grace. God's grace is so strong he says, "I can provide this to everybody and whether you take it or not, it's up to you". Look at verse 12. He says, "And we are instructed to turn from godliness, living and sinful pleasures. We're instructed to turn from godliness, living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with wisdom, righteousness, and devotion to God, while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed".
Now, the first thing I wanna bring up is that grace teaches you to live godly. Grace does. Somebody say, "Well, big deal". Well, it is a big deal since we have been trying to achieve that on our own. There are all kinds of weird ways that have been going on in the church as far as how should I live? And then somebody gives you a rule and they give you a regulation and then you try to execute it in your own willpower. And he says, "Grace will teach you how to live a godly life". Now, a couple of things I want you to see here. Probably no other passage in the Bible, in God's Word, so completely summarizes the subject of Christian conduct. Christian conduct is still very important and the reason why you've got to know this is because grace has been given a bad rap. Grace has been given the rap of "Oh, if you live by grace, you can live any kind of way". No, and here's the lack of emphasis we've seen on the subject.
Grace is what teaches Christian conduct. Grace teaches Christian conduct. You can't throw away Christian conduct and just decide you can do anything you wanna do because you're under grace. Grace has gotten a bad rap. Grace is what teaches you how to have Christian conduct. But we've never known how grace teaches. 'Cause I don't know about you, but I, you know, I've never really heard somebody say to me that grace is what's gonna teach you how to have good Christian conduct. You don't need to waste time trying to teach yourself. Grace is going to teach you. Oh my God. Grace is gonna teach you how to treat people right. Grace is gonna teach you how to quit doing stuff you're doing in the booth in the back in the corner in the dark. Grace is going to teach you. Jesus is going to teach you Christian conduct.
Now there are three aspects of conduct that are mentioned right here in these verses. Number one, you might wanna write these down. True Christian living rejects ungodliness and worldly lust. True Christian living denies ungodliness. Christian living denies ungodliness and the Holy Ghost is going to teach you how to deny ungodliness. Now, a little later on we're gonna talk about ungodliness, but what do I mean when I say "ungodly"? I mean all the things done apart from God. Everything you do apart from God is defined as ungodly.
Now, look at your life and check out the things you do apart from God. Look at your life and check out the things you do as you disregard God. To disregard God means to pay no attention to or literally to ignore. So what has happened in our lives where we get born again and now we don't even pay attention to God. He says that's ungodly. You ignore God and you proceed to try to do things in your own ability, your own education, your own smarts, and you ignore God. That's ungodly. All things done apart from God.
Now, I don't know about you, but I pause and say, "Let me look at my life. What am I doing apart from God? What am I doing and I'm not paying any attention to him"? And sometimes we wonder why certain things happen because that's ungodly. We thought that ungodliness was just, you know, the wicked stuff that people do. That's the fruit of ungodliness. The fruit of ungodliness will occur when you continue to pay God no attention, when you continue to do things that are apart from God.
So the first aspect of conduct that's mentioned here is that true Christian living rejects ungodliness and worldly lust, and true Christian living rejects the desire for the pleasures of this world as such are thereby excluded, these things are. You know, I thought it was all me, that I got to do this. And I found out that everything I tried to do failed because I was doing it apart from God, and grace was trying to teach me. If you got a habit and you still in that habit after being saved for 20-something years, you are trying to be the teacher, and grace says, "I'm gonna teach you". Someone say, "How's it gonna do that"? See, in order for you to really change some stuff in your life, the first thing that's gotta change is your desire and the Holy Ghost has been given that job to change your desire. Are you following me? Here's the second conduct, aspect of conduct.
Number two: life should be lived godly. It should believe, your life should be lived this way: godly, soberly, and righteous in this present world. Our lives as Christians should be lived godly, soberly. To be sober means soundness of thought. It's the opposite of being intoxicated. When somebody's intoxicated, they don't have sound thinking, okay? To be sober is level-headed or calm and collected. I like, one translation says "Good sense". And what he's saying is, is that lives should be lived godly, soberly. So life should be lived godly, which means our lives should be lived as we regard God in everything, godly. That our lives should be lived soberly, level-headed, according to the Word. And our lives should be lived righteously in this present world.
And then the third thing is the whole life should be lived in view, here's what he said in that last verse, that our whole life should be lived in view of and with an expectation of the glorious appearing of Jesus Christ. That I should be living my life every day, expecting Jesus to come. That does something, man. That does something. But we're so cluttered sometimes, that's the last thing on our mind. And we got to train ourselves in looking for the appearance of Jesus Christ every day. I think coming to church, getting taught the Word of God, and not figuring out a way how to make it practical in your everyday life is a waste of time. This is not a magic book, and I'm not giving you spells. If you find truth, you gotta take the truth, write it down, and you've got to figure out how to make it practical in your everyday life, whether it's "I'm gonna just say this every day," or "I'm just gonna repeat this every day," or "I'm gonna look at these Scriptures every day".
How is this gonna become practical in your everyday life? You know, it's one thing for you to find out that complaining is a problem. It's another thing for you to figure out how to make, you know, not complaining a practical part of your life. I ain't got time to, listen, I don't have time to come to church and listen to no Word and not get it practically operating in my life. The Word's supposed to transform me. But for some reason, people are satisfied with just coming and doing church. This is real, and godly living is real. God wants us to let the grace of God teach us how to live godly and soberly and righteously while we are looking for the appearance of the return of the Lord. I know something happens to me when I'm walking or something and I realize, "Jesus is coming back". And he says that's something we ought to do. That's something we should begin to do. Look for the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, let's move on to some things. Any practical Christianity that does not comprise of those three things I just mentioned to you is not Christian conduct. Christian conduct is mentioned right here, right here, verse 11. Go to the King James, verse 11, verses 12, verses 13, you see it right there: "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation appears to all men". Next verse: "And the grace of God teaches us to reject and deny ungodliness, to reject worldly lusts, so we can live soberly, live righteously, live godly, in this present world". That's just Christian conduct while we alive. And he says, "Oh yeah, by the way, look for that blessed hope, that earnest expectation of the glorious appearing of great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ". And grace is gonna teach us.
Here's the interesting thing: the lack of emphasis upon that which constitutes true Christian conduct, how, it's been lacking. That's why people sit and wonder if they can do this, if they can do that, if they can do that. It's been lacking. It's almost like we're in this world like we don't know what to do no more. We don't know how to live no more. And that's why it's so easy for us to accept foolishness from the world, and then try to bring it to the church because there's not been put, emphasis has not been put on Christian conduct, as if it doesn't exist anymore because you learned about grace. When in fact, it's grace that teaches us Christian conduct. And so in the same way there's been a lack of emphasis upon true Christian conduct, there's also been a lack of emphasis upon that which teaches a believer how to live the Christian life. We've got to put emphasis on what teaches the believer how to live the Christian life.
Now, I don't know what all of us have been doing up until this point as far as learning how to live the Christian life, but I am saying that grace is gonna teach you how to live the Christian life, bar none. Grace has been assigned to teach you how to live the Christian life. Jesus has accepted the responsibility of how to live the Christian life. You're gonna learn later on that there's no way Jesus is gonna save you and just leave you like you are. What good is it to have a baby and say, "Oh, I had a baby," and then just throw it away after you had a baby? Somebody got to train the baby. And Jesus has accepted, I'll show you Scriptures where he has accepted the responsibility to say, "I saved you. I'm gonna raise you". Jesus has.
Could it be that we've been in the way? Could it be that we didn't think this was necessary? Get saved, go to heaven, is that what we thought, you know? And true enough, that's all you have to do to go to get to heaven is get born again, but how many of you know that God wants you to have a little heaven on the earth? He wants to be able to do some stuff and the first thing he wants to do is teach you how to live the Christian life. "Well, Pastor, I thought that was your job". I can't do that. See, I can tell you some stuff and then you gotta walk ahead and decide whether or not you're gonna do it or not. But what God'll do is he'll take you through a whole curriculum. He'll tell you some stuff and give you revelation, praise God, maybe I help out a little bit, but then he'll give a revelation then if you decide not to do it, then he gonna take you through another course that's gonna help you to wanna do it.
Do you know you'll get to a place in your life as grace teaches you that there are certain things you ain't gonna wanna do no mo' because grace has, first of all, given you a desire to do something opposite to what you were doin' and then when you go back and try to smoke that weed again, it just, "I don't know why, I just don't want it no more'". That's because the Holy Ghost has been working on the inside of you, teaching you. And I'm asking you to trust that he's an excellent teacher. If I was you, I'd get that in my mouth for a few weeks. Grace is teaching me. Jesus is teaching me. He's teaching me. He's teaching me. I don't complain as much as I used to. He's teaching me, praise God. He's showing me stuff. He's teaching me. The things I used to do I don't want 'em no more. I'm not interested in anymore. Grace is teaching you. Grace is teaching you. Grace'll snatch that old "want to," that's good, and give you a new "want to". Glory to God.
And he'll have you back up and look at everything you went through and you'll see the curriculum that he has personally customized for your life. Grace teaches you. Grace teaches you. Grace teaches you. Jesus teaches you. The truth that the grace of God, now watch this. The very same grace which brings salvation, according to the Scripture, verse 11. The very same grace that brings salvation also teaches those who are saved how to live pleasing unto God. The same grace that bought salvation is also the same grace that will teach you how to live pleasing unto God. Now, he brought salvation, the same grace did. I didn't do anything to help that. He brought salvation. I want you to be able to give God the glory for the finished product in your life. There's some stuff you struggling with.
Some of you been struggling with it for years and years and years and years, and I'm telling you today is the beginning of your deliverance, if you simply trust God to deliver you. And it's simple. Christian conduct is gonna be talked about. You're gonna decide whether you want it or not. Some of you are gonna decide, "I don't want it," and God's gonna go to work taking that old "want to" away. I don't know how he gonna do it, but he knows how. I still, to this day, cannot explain to you what happened to the desires, even where my eating is concerned. There's certain things I just don't miss anymore. Grace will teach you. Grace will teach you.
The same grace that bought salvation is the same grace that's gonna teach you how to live a life that's pleasing to God. And somehow this seems to have been entirely overlooked. Somehow this seems to be just so overlooked, and I'm getting into showing you what happened. Some of the stuff we learned in church, but it wasn't by the Holy Spirit. It wasn't by grace. So the person who says, "I believe in grace but I do not think it should be emphasized too much because that leads to careless living". Well, the person who will say that, they have failed to understand God's work of grace on behalf of all of those that he has saved from the wrath of God. Yo, no, no, no, no, no. Too much grace, you know, too much grace is gonna be responsible, they say, too much grace is responsible for all that sin. Grace, too much grace, will give you a license to sin.
And people will think... Have you heard that before? That's not true. In fact, it's grace that's gonna teach you how to live godly life. Grace doesn't teach you how to sin. Grace teaches you how to live godly lives. Isn't that something? The devil is a liar. Isn't that something? You go around thinking that grace is what teaches you how to sin, and grace doesn't teach us sin. Grace teaches righteousness and level-headed thinking. And grace teaches being sober and grace teaches you how to live a godly life. That's what grace teaches you. Grace does not, cannot Jesus cannot... go back to Jesus now. Jesus cannot teach you to sin.