What Have We Gotten Ourselves Into?

Want to read instead of watch? Check out the content below!

Hi, I'm John Lynch, and this is John Lynch speaks. 

This is the first article in what I hope will someday be an entire library of practical truths and application about grace, and how I live them out. I am so excited to be doing this with you! 

Grace: It's enough to say that grace is not a theology; not a theology intended to defeat other theologies. 

Grace is a gift from God that allows me to live out of my new nature - my new nature in Jesus. 

And it changes everything when I trust that, and believe it. Just that alone… wow!

For years, I tried to deal with and solve my sin issues by striving and trying harder to be a good man. And all that did was appeal to the flesh - that incorrigibly, unregenerate place in me that has the M.O. of “Why can't you? Why don't you? You ought to. Try harder? Do it this way. You can make it happen. You've got enough discipline to pull it off. Others can do it, why can’t you?” 

The flesh keeps me in a place of shame, of wondering, “What's wrong with me? Why can't I get that right now?” But grace breaks the power of that chain because at the cross, I got a brand-new identity - a brand-new, shame-free identity. And because of this, I can be vulnerable, I can tell the truth of who I am, and I can let the power of God in me fight my battles. 

And you know, I don't hear that voice as often - that one that says, “You're not enough. What's wrong with you? Why can't you? When will you?” And I get to influence my friends in that grace. Isn’t that beautiful? And I want to woo grace and their new nature out of them and not appeal to their flesh. I want them to be able to receive discernement, insight, and wisdom from me. I want to earn the right to speak to their hearts, not just give them information. 

It's a beautiful, powerful reality that changes my language. It changes the way I speak with my kids and approach them in their failures and in the things that they can't figure out. It changes my conversations with my spouse and my friends... 

I had no idea what I was getting into when I came to Christ... 

I just thought, “I get to go to heaven! I love Jesus!” And now, I find out that there's this life that I can live, wow!