The Complete Package

I remember the first time I knew I was in love with my wife.  Those emotions and feelings that just well up inside and you feel like you are going to explode if you don’t find a way to let it out.

The way I let it out was to blurt out those three little words so she could hear what was taking my heart by storm – ROCK CHALK JAYHAWK!  She might joke that I did fall in love with her when I found out merely three days into our communication that she was a Jayhawk basketball fan.

Truthfully, I was the first one to say I LOVE YOU in our relationship.  And yes, I was going to explode – and yes – I said it two weeks into our relationship.  But you know what – she said it right back!

The catch to this whole point is that we don’t necessarily keep those candied feelings and emotions – after a while, you start to learn that love is really a choice that you make regarding your relationships and not a feeling.

You start to learn that it becomes a process of growth in HOW to love them.  You must make a conscious decision each day to do what you have to do to acknowledge that love in the ways that will make your relationship grow and become stronger.  We have to make a choice to be willing to mold and change things in order to show our love.

This is just an example to help you understand this whole process of how Grace continues to work in our lives based on the choices that we have made.

We had a starting point: 

BEING DISCOVERED 

This is where we learned of the Prevenient Grace, the grace that exists and goes before our salvation – the love that God already has for us and His pursuit of us. Then we learned about what occurs in our life based on the choice to accept that love and relationship with God: 

PRODUCT & PROCESS

By making the choice to accept the Prevenient Grace as truth we are then able to move into receiving the Saving Grace of God.  This Saving or Justifying Grace is the product of the process that involves our repentance from our sin and a faith grounded in the acceptance of the truth that Jesus gave His life to save us.

Now, many Christians believe that it stops there – either that or they just don’t realize that there is more to this incredible gift of Grace.  See, the Prevenient has led us to the Saving and Justifying and that then leads us to: 

THE COMPLETE PACKAGE

Before we get directly into what this looks like, I need to know that you all understand what I mean.  What comes to your mind when you think about a COMPLETE PACKAGE?  I think a good illustration here are the amazing college basketball freshman that play each year.  We have a top 100 list and the top 10 of those are always talked about as having the complete package!  They have worked hard to apply themselves so they are strong in every area of their game. 

Honestly, there is really only one point to be made here regarding the complete package when it comes to the Grace that we are given from God – the complete package is first and foremost this: 

SANCTIFYING GRACE

But what does that mean?  What is the way we define this point?

DEFINING SANCTIFYING GRACE:

“The work of the Holy Spirit in our lives moving us toward perfection in love, truth and holiness.”

God’s Sanctifying Grace is what moves us from the discovery, product and process that we have found and chosen, a.k.a. the “Imputed Righteousness,” (what Christ did for us) to the completing package, a.k.a. “Imparted Righteousness,” (what Christ does IN us).

This is where the work of the Holy Spirit begins to mold us and shape us into a likeness of Christ.  This is where our hearts are to be cleansed from the CONTROL that sin had over us and that control being given over the Jesus in order that we are being set free from that bondage that we had in sin.

Look at Romans with me – this is where the truth of scripture speaks and reveals a great understanding of the Sanctifying Grace…

Romans 6:5-14

“For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to
sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin,
once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are
not under law but under grace.”

Now, we have read it, but walk through that with me here…

       5:  If we are united with Him in one way, we can be united with Him in the other

            6:  When we chose Grace, our old self died – remember – old has gone and new has come

            7:  That spiritual death we died brought FREEDOM

            8:  Again – one choice involves the other

            9:  Christ has conquered death

            10:  That death conquered sin and the life serves new purpose

            11:  Reiteration: if we chose the grace then we share in sins death and Jesus’ life

            12:  Thus, we give control to Jesus rather than to sin

            13:  All that we have, all that we are, everything should serve the grace we chose

            14:  We have become conquerors with Jesus – we can live in the GRACE we chose!

This Sanctifying Grace is not a destination that we are trying to reach – it is a direction that God is trying to take us!

We can know from God’s word that He promises that what He starts He will complete!  But the truth is it will not be complete until He returns to establish His Kingdom!  Thus the Sanctifying Grace that gives us direction in order that when He returns we will own the COMPLETE PACKAGE!

This is the continuation that occurs in order to make us whole in Christ.  As you can see, the choices must continue to be made.  Paul is speaking out for us to understand the purpose of those choices.  He continues a little later in chapter six:

Romans 6:19-22

“I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. For when
you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the
fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life.”

This “Imparted Righteousness” a.k.a. the Sanctifying Grace that we have been speaking of is God delivering us from the control and power of sin so we are enabled to live in the victory of the sacrifice of God and in the Grace that results from it!  We are no longer under any law but set free from sin by GRACE!  If we have made the choice, the gift has been received and now God is giving us the power to USE IT!  

It may seem corny, but this I see this in where we began.  In my marriage, I am constantly moving forward from the choices I have made to learn and grow in my relationship with my wife.  My choice to love her no matter what and through everything is never going to come to full completion – but will always be a learning curve that I have to work on.

That is exactly the way our relationship with Christ through His grace is meant to exist.  We have human limitations, but through the choice we make to acknowledge, receive and pursue the Grace we can become slaves to Christ and not to sin.  We can allow God to make us holy as He is holy.

Like I have said before – this is not just fire insurance.

Don’t just sit back and become lazy.  The moral decay of the world around us and the affect it is having on the church is so disheartening.

This world needs to see the REAL DEAL – the REAL JESUS!  We need to take up the power that has been given us by the Holy Spirit through the process of sanctifying grace and allow the image of God to pour forth from us into all those we come in contact with in our lives.

I challenge you – don’t let sin be your master any more – let God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit begin to make you the complete package today!