James Merritt - The Only Thing That Counts
There was a 35 year old man from California, true story, he has no use for the church. Couldn't care less about Christianity. When we asked why, why you have such antipathy to church? Why are you so just turned off to Christians and Christianity? I want you to listen to what this man said. "Christians have become political, judgmental, intolerant, weak, religious, angry and without balance. Christianity has become a nice Sunday drive. Where is the living God, The Holy Spirit, an amazing Jesus, the love, the compassion, the holiness? This type of life, how I yearn for that".
You ever felt that way? Do you know someone that feels that way? Probably on this Father's Day, there's some of you here, you have a son or a daughter who doesn't go to church anymore. You can't get them to go to church and it breaks your heart because they feel that way. Now, whether you think it's fair or not, there is an increasing antipathy, an apathy, toward the church and modern day Christianity unlike anything we have ever seen in the history of our country. Now we're gonna be brutally, brutally honest. A lot of it is our fault. It's our fault. The number one reason why there are a lot of empty seats in churches today just like today. It's our fault. It's not that we don't have people. We got plenty of people, that's not the issue. But there is an image today of the church that some of us, frankly, have helped to foster.
And it's why some Christians in America, the way some Christians in America behave, you can't really blame people for wanting to turn in their membership card. The way some Christians don't really live what they say is their Christian faith gives people a good reason to say, you know what, if that's what being a Christian means, if that's what being a Christian is all about, I don't think I'm interested. And Christians misrepresenting Jesus in the gospel is not just an American problem, and by the way, it's not a new problem. As a matter of fact, it's a big part of why a man named Paul wrote a letter to a church called Galatians in Asia 2,000 years ago. Because there were Christians who were misrepresenting Christianity.
There were Christians who were not really living the Christian life. They were living a caricature of the Christian life. And there was a danger in that church that the church was replacing the liberty that comes with trusting Jesus with the legalism that comes with trying to keep the law. And the problem has never left us and it's alive and well today. There are people that could walk into our church this morning and if they were dressed in a certain way some of you would look down on them. You would stare at them. You would let them know by your body language how dare you walk into a place like this? There are people that could come into our church today and it would be very obvious that they live a different life style than we live. And we would just have this tendency to look down on them and say you know, you really don't belong here. 70% of people in America still describe themselves as Christian.
Listen to this. But when you dig deeper, only one out of five people say that Christianity is all about trusting in Jesus Christ and having a personal relationship with Him. The other 80% say, here's what it means to be a Christian. You live a certain way and you act a certain way and you do certain things and it's all about life styles and behaviors. And there are many people that equate the term with religious practices like, okay, you're a Christian if you attend church. You're a Christian if you are religious. You're a Christian if you've been baptized. You're a Christian if you observe certain spiritual rituals. And so, the vast majority of Christians believe that in order to be a Christian you've got to add something. You've got to add something to Jesus like, do's and don'ts.
The vast majority of believing Christians say, well, Jesus is not enough. You got to have rules. You've got to have regulations. You've got to have rituals and you've got to have religion. Listen, I don't know how, where some of you grew up. I grew up in churches like that. You may think this is funny, but when I was a kid back in the day there were a lot of churches that taught you can't dance. Remember? Can't go to movies. Can't play cards. Can't go to ball games on Sunday. Don't go to a restaurant that serves alcohol. And women, don't you wear a pant suit to church. Some of you remember that. You gonna be a real Christian, have a true relationship with God, all these do's and all these don'ts.
Now today, the symptoms are different, but the problem is the same. We still have a problem that we focus on what's on the outside rather than what is on the inside. And I'm gonna tell you something that may shock you. Being on TV kind of magnifies the problem that a lot of preachers have. So I'm gonna tell you something. You may roll your eyes, but it's true. Did you know that there is still people out there that are more concerned with how a pastor dresses than what a pastor says? I get email all the time. Man, I miss you in a suit. Man, I wish you wearing a coat and a tie. And one day I think just to shock the world, I may come dressed in a tuxedo just to try to make people happy. But I mean, listen. I'm being serious, and by the way, let me just kind of, if I haven't made you uncomfortable yet, let me take one more shot.
Churches are still filled with people, and we got them in our church, they're more concerned that the style of music that we do pleases them than they are that it pleases God. I knew I wouldn't get an amen to that, but that's okay. There are people that are more concerned if you say Merry X-mas, which by the way, the word, the letter X is the Greek letter that stands for Christ. But there are people that are more concerned, they'll see Merry X-mas and they'll say, man, we need to put the Christ back in Christmas and I want to say, if you knew your Greek New Testament, I never took Christ out of the New Testament. But they're more concerned that you put Christ, not X, than that people know the Christ that the X stands for.
So it's no wonder that we've got people all the time saying, I'm checking out. If this is what your brand of Christianity is, I really don't need that 'cause let me remind you. There are only two times the spiritual faith in the world, only two, and all but one falls into one type and it's easy to spot, okay? One leads to liberty and the other leads to legalism. One is dependent on our goodness. One is dependent on God's grace. One focuses on what we need to do, what we better do if we're gonna be right with God, and one focuses on what God has done for us. One emphasizes our performance. You don't wear this, you do wear that. You do drink this, you don't drink that. You do go there, you don't go there. One is concerned with our performance. One is concerned with God's provision.
So I want you, to invite you to look with me today in this letter called Galatians. And if you have one of these, and I hope you do, and if you don't make sure you get one on the way out. We've got them for you. But we're in a book called Galatians. We've given you a book called, 'cause we're in the year of the disciple, and we've got all the passages of scripture that we're studying right here for you and a place where you can take notes. And today we're on page 14 in our book. We're in a series that we're calling free at last. And what Galatians is doing is, is hitting this issue head on. Because yeah, I have a conviction and I hope you share this conviction.
I believe that everybody that walks into the doors of this building on Sunday morning ought to find two things. If they don't find those two things, we ought to close shop, sell this property and go find another place to go to church. They ought to find the God of grace and they ought to find the grace of God. Every time you walk in here. You ought to find the God of grace and you ought to find the grace of God because here's what happens when you just add more rules and stricter regulations and tighter restrictions and better religion, all you just did is you put God's grace on the shelf and you put our goodness on the table. And at the end of the day you're going to see grace is the only thing that counts. Only thing. And this is so vitally important both for believers and unbelievers.
See, as believers we ought to be about the only thing that counts, that's grace. And for unbelievers, they ought to see that we understand that the only thing that counts is grace. So in the fifth chapter of Galatians, Paul says there are three things we ought to always do every single moment of our life about the wonderful grace of God. Number one, we ought to stand firm for grace. We ought to stand firm for grace. Now, here's what Paul's done. Paul is basically wrapping up everything he's been saying in four chapters of this book and he wraps it all up in two sentences in this chapter. Verse one. He said, "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery".
Now if you want to know what the Book of Galatians is about memorize that verse. The next time you read through the Book of Galatians just kind of speed read your way to this verse, highlight it, this is what Paul's been saying for four chapters. He begins reminding us, Jesus did not come to earth to establish a new religion to give us more rules, to add more regulations, to burden us with more restrictions. He said Jesus came for one reason. Freedom. He came to set us free.
Now let me just stop right there. Think about that. The only people who need freedom are people who are in bondage. People who are in slavery. People who are in captivity. You say, well who is that? That's everybody. Because let me tell you what you don't realize. From the moment you drew your first breath when you came out of your mother's womb, do you know what your greatest need has been? Freedom. You say freedom from what? Freedom from slavery. What kind of slavery? Sin. We were all born handcuffed to sin. We were all born shackled to sin. We were all born slaves to sin.
See, people all over the world, they want to be free to do what they want to do and in once sense, we are. 'Cause the moment you're born, God gives you the freedom to do what you want to do, but then we start finding something out early in life. We start finding out that we do things that we really don't want to do. And then we find out we don't do things that we know we really ought to do. And we find out, you know the kind of freedom I was born in, really is bondage. Because I can't do the right thing sometimes when I know I ought to do it and I can't keep from doing the wrong thing when I know I ought not to do it. And see, we all know we got that problem, but we don't know what the solution is. Because the world doesn't have the solution.
At this is why Paul wrote this letter 'cause let me remind you. There were a group of people in that church, they were called Judaizers, and they came into the church and they said we know how you can be everything God wants you to be. You got to keep more laws. You got to obey more laws. You got to try harder. You got to do better. You got to live more righteously. You got to obey more commandments and see, frankly, think about it, that's what we tend to think. We tend to think, even in our country, the solution to everything is just more laws. That's why the government thinks the same thing. They keep adding law after law after law after law 'cause we think, okay, we'll just pass a law. We'll pass another law. We'll pass this law. We'll pass that law. That will take care of our problem.
So what do we have? What have we wound up with? You know what I've learned? The more laws they make, the more laws we break. Because legislation alone is not the problem. And that's what Paul is talking about in this verse when he talks about, "a yoke of slavery". He compares the law to a yoke. Now who uses a yoke? You know, yokes are for animals. A yoke is meant to control an animal. And see here's the problem. I'm not saying it's not good to have laws. We need to have laws. Here's my point. Laws never change anybody. You pass all the laws you want to. It won't change your heart. It won't change your mind. It will not change you. With all these laws we've got on the books, people still live like animals. That's why at the end of the day, laws don't give us freedom. They just simply add to our bondage.
Then Paul says look. Jesus not only came to give us freedom, Jesus came to show us what real freedom is. You say well, what is real freedom? I've said it to you before. Freedom is not the ability to do what I want to do. It is the power to do what ought to do. So Jesus came to free us from the law, but this is where people get confused because freedom from the law is not freedom to sin. Freedom from the law doesn't mean oh, goody, goody. I get to do whatever I want to do. Here's what freedom from the law is. Freedom from the law is finally getting free from this thought that I've got to be good enough, that I've got to do enough, that I've got to work enough, that I've got to give enough, that I've got to serve enough, that I've got to obey enough to have a relationship with God.
And the problem Paul is pointing out is this. Until you finally realize you'll never be good enough, you'll never do enough, you'll never work enough, you'll never give enough to God to be right with God, you will always be in bondage. I didn't even know what happened to me when I have my life to Christ as a nine year old boy and I don't remember exactly when the light came on, but there was a day for me when the light finally came on and I finally realized, God's grace to me and my faith in Him is the only thing that was necessary to have a relationship with Him. And when I finally got that down and I finally started living like it was true is when I got real freedom. That's why Paul said, "We need to stand firm for grace". We must never let anybody add anything to grace or take anything away from grace.
By the way, that word, stand firm, it's a military term. It's the order that a general gives to an army just before they're about to go into battle. It's when a general stands before his men and he says, "Men, we're about to go into battle. Here's your orders. You fight til the last drop of your blood. Don't you turn. Don't you run. Don't you retreat. You stand your ground". That's exactly the strong word that Paul was using. You stand firm for grace. Don't you give an inch to anything that either denies Jesus or dilutes Jesus or downgrades Jesus. Jesus has come to set us free. Free from the wrath of God. Free from the power of Satan. Free from the guilt of sin. Free from the fear of death. Free from the expectations of other people. Paul said that's what it's all about. That's the most important thing and we got to stand firm for grace. But then he says something else. The way to stand firm for grace is to stay focused on grace.
You stand firm for grace when you stay focused on grace. Now remember who Paul was dealing with. Paul was dealing with Jewish Christians who still believe you really want to be a Christian? All right, you got to be a Jewish Christian. You got to act like a Jew. You got to live like a Jew. You got to obey like a Jew. You got to do what a Jew does. You've got to really become a Jew and of course, one of the marks for being Jewish for men was circumcision. So they were teaching these Galatians you know what, grace is not enough. Jesus is not enough. Faith is not enough. You've got to be circumcised. Now I may have said this last week, I don't remember, but it doesn't matter, you forgot it. I've already forgotten what I preached last week too. Listen. Every religion in the world, in one form or another, is a circumcision religion. Every religion in the world, in one form or another, is a circumcision religion.
See, every religion will tell you unless you blank and you fill in the blank. Unless you get baptized. Unless you join our church. Unless you make this march. Unless you practice these religious rituals. Unless you follow our rules. Unless you observe our obligations you can't come to God, you can't know God, you can't experience God, you can't have God. And here's the problem. When you take your eyes off the road of grace you'll always start running into all kinds of ditches and you'll start experiencing all kinds of problems. You say well, what problems? Well, Paul lays them out. Listen to what he says in verse two. He says, "Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all".
Now think about what a strong statement that is. He said, you know what. When you add anything to Jesus you just subtract to Jesus from everything. When you add anything to Jesus you just subtract to Jesus from everything. So Paul was saying hey guys. You can choose circumcision or you can choose Christ. You cannot choose both. See today I would say it this way. You can choose religion or you can choose redemption. You can choose your goodness or you can choose God's grace. You can choose rules or you can choose a relationship, but you can't choose both because once you add anything to Jesus you lose all the value of what He did by His death and His burial and His resurrection.
I was reading the other day, I didn't know this, I was reading the other day about wine. When you open a bottle of red wine oxygen enters into that wine and it causes an oxidation reaction that in maybe three or four days at most it just ruins the wine. I didn't know that. And I thought about that, I though you know what, that's exactly what happens to grace and to faith. The moment you add anything to grace or you add anything to faith you just ruin the gospel. You just tainted the gospel. And it's not a, it's just a matter of time before it becomes something else altogether.
So, to put it mathematically. Grace plus faith equals salvation. And what Paul is saying is if you add anything to this side of the equation you just lost this side of the equation. You can't add anything to it because when you add something here, you subtract something there. So, if you add anything else, you no longer have salvation. Then you face the problem that all religions face. Listen to what he says in verse three. "Again I declare to you every man who lets himself be circumcised," now watch what Paul says, "he is obligated to obey the whole law".
Now here's the point. This is so deep, but listen. Paul said when you add anything to grace or you add anything to faith you just added everything to grace and you just added everything to faith. In other words, Paul said this. "Once you believe you've got to do anything to be accepted by God, you must do everything to be accepted by God". Once you do anything to be accepted by God, you've got to do everything to be accepted by God. 'Cause I told you last week, there's only one passing grade with God. It's 100%. You make 99, you flunk. You make 99.99, you flunk. So if you decide you've got to be good enough for God, you're problem that you'll never solve and that's the problem of trying to be good enough for God when you can never be sure that you're ever good enough for God. And that's why grace is so beautiful and that's why the gospel is so wonderful because what grace tells us is this. Grace says you never, listen, you never have to be good enough for God and you don't have to be good enough for God.
Why? I hope you know this by now. You don't have to be good enough for God. You never have to be good enough for God. You can't be good enough for God and you know why? You know why you don't have to worry about that? Because Jesus is good enough for you. That simple. I don't have to be good enough for you God because Jesus is good enough for me. Then Paul lowers the boom. Listen to what he says, verse four. "You who are trying to be justified by the law," let me just stop right there, so you just fill in the blank. So you're trying to be justified because you go to church. You're trying to be justified because you're a member. You're trying to be justified because you were baptized. You're trying to be justified because you're not as bad as the guy in prison. You're trying to be justified because you're not a perfect person, but you're a whole lot better than the vast majority of people you know.
That's how you're trying to get it. That's how you're trying to make it. He says, "You who are trying to be justified by the law you have been alienated from Christ," then he makes this strong statement, "you have fallen away from grace". He said if you don't stay focused on grace you will fall from grace. Now I'm gonna deal with an issue here. Many people have read that and they say, okay, so that teaches you could lose your salvation. That teaches that people who have truly been saved can lose their salvation. Well let me tell you I know that can't be true, for two reasons. First of all, we preached on this not long ago, the Bible, God's word clearly teaches that is impossible. It's absolutely impossible for a person who's truly been saved to lose their salvation.
Now I don't have time to go into that, but let me tell you why I also know that's not what Paul means here, that's not even what Paul's talking about. That's not even what Paul is addressing here. I read the other day about two pastors that lived in the same town. I won't say what denomination they were, but one pastor was from a church who taught that you cannot lose your salvation and the other pastor was from a church in a denomination that taught that you could lose your salvation. But they were good friends. They were good buddies. Well, the pastor who taught that you can't lose your salvation happened to be on vacation and he read in the paper where his buddy across town was preaching on how to go to Heaven.
So he thought he's gonna go over there and he go hears his buddy preach. Well, the pastor was up there preaching about going to Heaven and in the middle of his sermon he saw his pastor buddy out there sitting in the middle of the congregation and he said, "Hey John, hey John, how you doing"? He said, "By the way John," he said, "if you get to Heaven before I do you tell them I'm coming". Well the pastor couldn't resist. He yelled back and he said, "Jim, I can't do that. You might fall from grace and not get there then I'd be kicked out for lying".
So, I know that is not what Paul meant here. Not what Paul was talking about. As a matter of fact, this is the only time in the New Testament that phrase is ever used. To fall from grace. Here's what Paul was saying. When you fall from grace, you just fell from freedom into bondage. You just fell from liberty into legalism. You just put the handcuffs of the law back on your wrist. You just left freedom and went back into slavery because whenever you add a plus sign to grace or to faith or to Jesus, listen to this, when you add a plus sign, God adds a minus sign to you. God says no, doesn't work that way. And Paul is trying to warn the church then as I'm trying to warn the church today. When we don't stay focused on grace, when we don't stand firm for grace, listen I've seen it time and time again, people will always wind up running into one of two ditches. Let me tell you what they are. One ditch is legalism.
One ditch is license. Let me tell you what I mean by that. By the way, I was reading in my quiet time when I got up this morning, I was reading my Bible early this morning and I was reading in Matthew where Jesus warned the disciples, some of you remember this, he said, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees". Just . How many of you remember reading that in the Bible? How many of you remember it? Okay, you ought to go read it, it's a good book. He said, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees". What did he mean by the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees? The Pharisees, they were all about legalism. The Sadducees, they were all about license. The Pharisees were all about being a Marine. Make your bed. Shine your shoes. Go to church. Keep the commandments. Obey the law.
The Sadducees didn't even believe in resurrection. They said, man, que sera, sera. You know, you're okay, we're okay, God's okay, we're all okay. No problem, just go at it. I mean enjoy life to the fullest. 'Cause here's what happens. When you take your focus off of grace, you will either go to one extreme that says if I want to get to Heaven, if I want to be right with God, if I want to have a shot of spending eternity with Him, I've got to obey the law. I've got to keep the commandants. I've got to follow the rules. I've got to be this religious. I've got to be that religion if I want to be right with God. That's one extreme. Or you will go to the other extreme. Here's what you'll say. Hey, because of the grace of God I could live any way I want to live. God will accept any life style that I want to participate in. God will accept me just the way I am.
God is a God of love and God says, man, just got at it. We're all good, we're all okay. Well Paul just dealt with the first ditch. He's already taken really good care of that. He says, no, it has nothing to do with keeping the law. It has nothing to do with obeying the law. It has nothing to do with being religious. But now he's gonna turn his attention to the people who say I'm a Christian. I'm a believer. Jesus loves me. I love Him, but I'm gonna live this life style. I'm gonna do life my way. I'm gonna do it the way I want to do it. Nobody's gonna tell me how to live. I don't have to worry about going to church. I don't have to worry about reading my Bible. I don't have to worry about prayer. I don't have to worry about being faithful to my wife. I don't have to worry will I sleep with my girlfriend or not.
It's all about grace and Paul says no, I'm gonna deal with you now. Because he says not only must we stand firm for grace, not only must we stay focused on grace, but look what will happen. You say, well, Pastor, how do I know if I'm standing firm for grace? How do I know if I'm really staying focused on grace? Are you ready, here's the test. Show Faithfulness to Grace You will show faithfulness to grace. You will show faithfulness to grace. Now, Paul has been hammering the grace of God. Paul has been hammering faith in Jesus. He has said it over and over and over and over. Your relationship with God has nothing to do with how good you are. It has nothing to do with you trying to keep the law.
Jesus came to set us free from all of that. He is the great emancipator. 'Cause remember what we said, but freedom is not the ability to do what we want to do. It is the power to do what we ought to do. What God wants us to do. But here's the problem. We know that grace takes care of our past. You come to faith, you come to Christ and you give your life to Christ and you ask Jesus to forgive you for all of your sins. He takes care of all of your sins. He wipes the slate clean. But here's what we forget, or we never realize, or we ignore. Grace doesn't just deal with our past. Grace deals with our present. And grace deals with our future. And let me just explain what I mean by that.
First of all, Paul deals with our future. Listen to what Paul says in verse five. He says, "For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope". Not the righteousness we practice. Not the righteousness we're trying to earn. The righteousness for which we hope. Now here's what Paul's saying. God is a righteous God. And God demands righteousness from us. But on our own we can never produce the righteousness that God wants, that God deserves, that God desires and that God demands. On our own we can never get there. But only the Holy Spirit living in us can make us righteous. And we'll never be totally righteous and perfectly righteous until we go to Jesus. So what Paul is saying is righteousness is not something we work for. Listen to me. Righteousness is not something we work for. It's something we wait for.
Now I'm gonna tell you something right now and I hope the light will come on. If you are trying to work your way to God, I got news for you, bad grammar, great theology, you aint never gonna get there. If you're trying to work your way to God you are never going to get there. Here's the good news. We're not working our way to get to God. This is so good this will make you clap. By faith, we're waiting on God to come and get us. That's the truth. God is not waiting on me going, okay James. When you get righteous enough, when you get religious enough, I'll accept you. God says James, you'll never be righteous enough and you will never be religious enough, but that's all right. One day I'm coming to get you and you will be righteous 'cause you're gonna have my righteousness. You'll be clothed in my righteousness.
So we're not working our way to get to God. We're waiting on God to come get us. That's the future, but meanwhile back at the ranch what about today? What about life right now? So listen to how Paul concludes. "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value". Put any any words you want to in there. Church attendance, church membership, religion, doing good works, giving to the poor. Put anything you want to in there. He says, "neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value". In terms of having a relation with God. "The only thing that counts is faith," watch this, what kind of faith? The faith that expresses itself through love.
So you substitute any words you want to in there. Doesn't matter. He says doesn't matter. Baptism, religion, ritual, rules, voted Republican, voting Democrat, doing your best, trying your hardest. He said as far as Jesus is concerned none of that has any value. Then he says, what a strong statement, the only thing that counts, not the thing that counts the most, the only thing that counts he says, is faith. But what kind of faith? Not just any kind of faith. It is faith expressing itself through love. So I want you draw up close now and pay attention, listen. I preached all my ministry, believe it with all of my heart. Yes, salvation is by grace through faith. However, faith that grace produces is a faith that works. Salvation is only by grace through faith without works, but the faith that grace produces is a faith that works.
When you stand firm for grace and you stay focused on grace, you will show faithfulness to grace because faith is not only what you believe on the inside, faith also results in how you behave on the outside. I hope I make this plain, I don't want to confuse you. Faith and works are separate. Don't confuse them. Your save by grace through faith without works. Everybody got that? Raise your hand if you heard me, all right? Faith and works are separate, but faith and works are inseparable. Faith and works are separate, but faith and works are inseparable. So okay, explain that. There's a difference between ordinary faith and what I call saving faith.
See, when the Bible talks about faith it doesn't just mean what you believe in your head. It means what you've accepted in your heart. And so here's the point Paul is making. When you experience grace on the inside you want to express grace on the outside. Jesus Christ came to set us free not to do what we want, but to do what we ought. Not to live the way we want, but the way God wants us to live. Grace does not lead to legalism where you say I've got to obey the law to be right with God. Grace does not lead to license where you say I don't have to obey any of God's law and I'm still right with God. Liberty leads to love.
And here's what Paul was saying. No, you don't have to obey the law. You don't have to keep the commandants. You don't have to do this and not do that and go there and not go there to have a relationship with God. However, if you're right with God, you want to keep the law. If you're right with God, you want to obey the commandants. If you're right with God, you don't obey the law because you have to. You obey the law because you want to. And you don't obey the law because you want to, because you want to is because you love Him.
So let me tell you why I know this is the only thing that counts. I was in Birmingham this past week, fact I was there twice. I was at the Southern Baptist Convention, Monday through Wednesday, drove back Wednesday night, turned right back around, drove back Thursday 'cause Friday night I was preaching at a Gridiron Men's Conference. Preached to about 6,000 men, it was a great conference. Had a great time. Well, I was invited to preach a beautiful golf, play at a beautiful golf course over there on Friday with a dear friend of mine, Thursday I think it was on, good friend of mine, and it's a course where you can't walk, you have to walk the course, you have to have caddies, you just don't have a choice.
Well my caddy was a 21 year old student from Argentina. Her name was Anna. So we're about to start playing golf and I said, Anna, I said, got to ask you a question. I said I'm a pastor and she said, "Okay." and I said do you mind if we talk about spiritual things? And she said, "Well no I don't mind". I said you're sure? She said, okay, I said fine. I said all I'd like to do today is just share with you the best news you've ever heard in your life. And she said, "That would be wonderful". She said, "What is it? I said well I can't tell you. I have to tell you the bad news first". she said, "What's the bad news"?
I said well, the bad news is that even though I met you and I can tell you're a wonderful young lady and you're real sweet and you're kind and I'm sure you're a great caddy and you're gonna be good for me today. I know you're not perfect. And she admitted it, said, "No, I've made a lot of mistakes and I've done a lot of things wrong". And I said yeah, we all have. And I said what we call mistakes, failures, foul ups, mix ups, mess ups, the Bible calls sin. I said we're all sinners separated from God. There's a wall, there's a barrier between you and God. She says, "Yeah, I've kind of felt that at times". And she, "Well what's the best news"? I say, well, I can't tell you the best news. I got to tell you the worst news. She says, "It even gets worse"? I said it gets a lot worse. "Well, what's the worst news"?
Now we're doing this while we're just walking, talking. I said well, the worse news is there's nothing you can do to take care of your sin problem. She stopped, she said, "Nothing"? I said, nothing. Well she says, "I'm a Catholic". I said this makes you a Catholic sinner. She said, "Well I got baptized when I was a child". I said, it just made you a wet sinner. She said, "Well I got to confession". I said, that just makes you a confessed sinner. And everywhere she went I said, but you know at the end of the day you're still a sinner. I said there's nothing you can do. There's nothing I can do. There's nothing anybody can do for you. Pope, pastor, professor, preacher. There's nothing anybody can do to take care of your sin problem.
She said, "Boy, I'm in bad shape". I said, we're all in bad shape. I said, so you understand the bad news? I'm a sinner separated from God. You understand the worst? Nothing you can do to take care of your problem, nope. She goes, "What's the best news"? I said, well I can't tell you the best news. I got to tell you the good news. "Well, at least it's good news, what's the good news"? I said, here's the good news. God loves you so much and wants to have a relationship with you so badly, He did for you what you can't do for you. You owed a debt called sin you couldn't pay off. He paid the debt off for you He didn't owe. I said, you know why Jesus could die for your sins? She said, "Why"? I said 'cause he didn't have any. He did what you couldn't pull off. He lived a perfect life and because He lived a perfect life, when He died on the cross, Jesus took your sins and my sins and Jesus put all of our sins on Him.
And then she stopped. We were on the ninth hole. She stopped and she said, "Would you please tell me the best news"? I said yes ma'am. I said the best news is forgiveness of sins and eternal life is what we need, is all we need. It's a gift and all you have to do is accept it. And standing under a tree on the ninth hole of that golf course she put my golf bag down. She said, "That is the best news I've ever heard in my life and I'd like to ask Christ to come into my heart". I got her picture on my phone. If I thought that, I would just throw it up on the screen. I told her, I said Anna, I thought I came over here to play golf. I didn't. I came over here to tell you this story.
Now let me tell you why I shared that with you. I'm not bragging on myself. You say well, you're a pastor, you ought to do that. I got news for you, you're a Christian, so should you. The reason I did it was this. Because every person you meet, every person your kin to, every person you live next door to, every person you work with, every person you ever cross paths with. The only thing that counts in their life is to experience the grace of God by faith in God. It is the only thing that counts.
That's why we keep asking and I don't care how sick of it you get, it doesn't matter. Who's your one? Who's the person you know right now that you would have given anything, you would have paid money to have heard this message today? People need freedom. They're in bondage. They're in bondage to drugs and pornography and alcohol and sex and bitterness and anger and the good news is Christ came to set us free from all of that. All by His grace to us and our faith in Him.