Hillsong Church Featuring: A Grace to Increase

Join us for live worship and an inspiring message from Nathanael Wood in our morning service from the Hills Campus, Sydney, Australia. 
MESSAGE: A Grace to Increase 

SONG LIST 
Love So Great: https://youtu.be/59-PQeL8E08 
Remembrance: https://youtu.be/U9kbdFCSrFU 
King of Kings: https://youtu.be/dQl4izxPeNU 
Good Grace: https://youtu.be/EhKSRIvDFI0

The Holy Spirit: Administrator of the New Covenant

by Creflo Dollar | 31 Jul 2019

Summary

Although God’s grace offers forgiveness for our sins and mistakes, we must not assume it excuses immorality—it does not. Grace does not condone immoral behavior; it is not a license to continue sinning. Grace is Jesus, Himself, and holiness is the objective of grace. Jesus will not punish born-again believers for immoral behavior; however, sinning has consequences in the natural realm. Although the Law of Moses has ended, God still expects us to follow moral law. We are only able to follow this law when we take to heart the law of love that Jesus gave us. Walking in love enables us to live godly lives apart from the administration of Mosaic Law.

1. Jesus offers us love and forgiveness. However, He is not okay with immoral behavior.
   1. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth… For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ (John 1:14, 17).
      1. Grace is not a doctrine; grace is Jesus. Therefore, Jesus does not excuse immorality. If we, as Christians, commit immoral acts, He still loves us and we still go to heaven; however, we will face the consequences our actions have on our horizontal relationships.
      2. We must distinguish between the natural laws of physics, the legal laws of the land, and Mosaic Law. Verse seventeen refers to the Law of Moses.
   2. For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace (Romans 6:14).
   1. Under Mosaic Law, sin dominated the people because they tried unsuccessfully to keep all the rules.
   2. Some people think that under grace, morality is no longer important to God. However, although Mosaic Law has ended, we are still accountable to moral law.
   3. Some people also think that under grace, there are no more laws or commandments; that is incorrect.
   4. A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another (John 13:34).
   5. Morality could never be governed by the Law of Moses.
   3. Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15).
   1. “The word of truth” is actually the Word of grace. If we do not rightly divide the Word, we will end up living under Mosaic Law.

2. The Law of Moses was impossible for man to keep. It actually causes an increase in sin.
   1. There are significant differences between Mosaic Law and moral law.
      1. Mosaic Law is also referred to as the Old Testament, Mount Sinai, and the first covenant. Moral law is also referred to as the law of God and the law of conscience.
   2. Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin (Romans 3:19, 20).
   1. Under Mosaic Law, we are all guilty in God’s eyes. Everyone is full of shame, guilt, and condemnation.
   2. Mosaic Law shows us what is wrong with us without giving us the cure. It was given to reveal sin.
   3. Mosaic Law strengthens sin. The law itself is good and perfect; however, it was too perfect for imperfect, fallen, unsaved man to follow. It was given for a limited time until Jesus could come and provide man with an opportunity to get saved.
   1. The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law (1 Corinthians 15:56).
   2. But still, the law itself is holy, and its commands are holy and right and good. But how can that be? Did the law, which is good, cause my death? Of course not! Sin used what was good to bring about my condemnation to death. So we can see how terrible sin really is. It uses God’s good commands for its own evil purposes. So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin (Romans 7:12-14, NLT).

3. Paul met Jesus, who is grace. Afterward, Paul preached grace, not the Law of Moses.
   1. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed…But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it: And profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers. But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by his grace, To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood…But they had heard only, That he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed. And they glorified God in me (Galatians 1:8, 9, 11-16, 23, 24).
      1. In verse eleven, Paul was referring to what Jesus gave him on the road to Damascus—grace.
      2. Paul specifically preached the gospel of the good news of the grace of Christ. There may be other gospels preached, but this is the one we must follow.
      3. Paul had a violent past; he was a stickler for observing every detail of Mosaic Law and was willing to kill believers. Despite this, Jesus preached the Gospel of Grace to Paul.
      4. Paul’s conversion was so thorough that he went from attacking faith in God’s grace to preaching it. The believers went from being afraid of him to glorifying God in him.
   2. But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God (Acts 20:24).
      1. In this context, the gospel does not refer to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but specifically to grace.
      2. We must rightly divide the Word; the entire Bible is not necessarily the Word of grace.

4. Moral law was in existence even before God gave Moses the Ten Commandments.
1. But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster (Galatians 3:22-25).
1. This refers to Jesus; Paul was preaching Jesus, who is grace.
2. Mosaic Law is divided into three parts; moral law, ceremonial law, and civil law. Jewish men see all three parts as one, because they all came from God.
1. The Ten Commandments was God’s moral law; however, we cannot keep moral law this way. In the Old Testament, efforts to keep all the law failed. Guilt and shame followed, and sin—not morality—resulted.
2. Moral law actually existed before Mosaic Law; moral law reflects God’s nature and character. It was written on the heart in man’s conscience.
3. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another (Romans 2:14, 15).
1. Mosaic Law was given only to Jewish people; however, Gentiles already followed moral law.

5. God established moral law in the garden of Eden. This type of law operated in Paul.
1. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die (Genesis 2:17).
1. God wrote moral law when He told Adam and Eve about the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. He plainly told them what not to do.
2. The death that God referred to was death of the consciousness of Him, without having to know what was right and what was wrong.
3. God is trying to move us back to a state of mind in which, instead of relying on our knowledge of right and wrong, we completely rely on the Holy Spirit.
2. And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law (1 Corinthians 9:20, 21).
1. “To them that are without law” refers to the Gentiles. When Paul became like the Gentiles, without Mosaic Law, he still had moral law inside him.
2. Paul kept the Law of Moses in an attempt to produce morality in his life. However, when he got born again, he received the Holy Spirit, who is the administrator of morality.
3. Before Paul was converted, he genuinely believed he was doing the right thing by keeping Mosaic Law. The reason he mentioned the Ten Commandments so often is because moral law is embedded in them.
4. Paul was not preaching the Ten Commandments, but instead he was teaching God’s very nature and character when He gave the commandments.
5. The change God wants to produce in us will not come through religion, but from our choice to eat from the Tree of Life.
6. …I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly (John 10:10).