In his sermon, 'The Power of the Ordinary Means of Grace,' Scott Brown emphasizes the instructive role of grace, which manifests as both saving and sanctifying grace. He explains that grace, which appeared through Jesus Christ, serves as a teacher for believers, guiding them to deny ungodliness and embrace a life of righteousness. Brown outlines the 'ordinary means of grace' such as scripture, prayer, worship, and fellowship, likening them to a drip system that provides consistent spiritual nourishment. These means of grace are not dramatic events but regular practices that cultivate spiritual growth and resilience over time. The sermon highlights the importance of maintaining these practices within the church community, as they contribute to the believer's hope and zeal for good works. Brown also discusses the need for mutual encouragement and correction within the church to stimulate grace in one another, ensuring a life that reflects God's work. Finally, he concludes with an exhortation to value these ordinary means as pathways to spiritual nourishment and transformation.

So open your Bibles to Titus chapter 2, find verse 11. Find verse 11. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient, sweeter than honey word of God. For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people zealous for good works. Speak these things, exhort and rebuke with all authority.

Let no one despise you. The grass withers and the flower fades but the word of our God it stands forever. Let's pray. Father thank you for giving us your word that we might grow in grace, that we might find our way through this world either to save our souls or to continue to walk with you in holiness. Lord, I pray that all these things would take place today.

Come Lord, equip the saints. Amen. Please be seated. Of course, this is part three of sermons on this passage of scripture, verses 11 through 15. And the prominent idea here in these words is that grace is a teacher.

And we find grace spoken of in two different ways. You have saving grace and you have sanctifying grace, but the center of this text is that grace has appeared in the Lord Jesus Christ and that grace is a teacher and we've observed already there are no commands in this section of scripture what you find are there are no imperatives these are indicative verbs and principles these are realities these are the things that have happened they've already happened to the believer these These are not particularly things that you strive for except in the means of that grace, but these are grace has appeared and grace has actually captured a sinner. And so that's the idea. And of course the first principle is the appearance of grace in verse 11 just by way of review for the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men in other words Jesus Christ came he changes your heart he brings you to repentance, he forgives you of all of your sins, past, present, and future, you are justified by faith. And the second principle is that grace now is your trainer.

You have a teacher, her name is Grace. And this grace is a teacher that is a trainer at the same time and the apostle uses the very same word that he uses in the training of children. And when you bring up children in the training and admonition of the Lord, which means that parents are supposed to train their children to do everything in life, and that's what grace does as well. It's very interesting you have this mix. On the one hand, in grace there's nothing to earn, but there's much to learn from grace.

You are in the school of grace. School is always in session for the Christian and so that's why the Lord Jesus Christ said Come unto me take my yoke upon me and Learn from me This is the work of grace in the believer Believers need assistance to stoke the fire in their hearts says Thomas Watson and as we started last week grace teaches you six things and just by way of review grace teaches us to reject something to deny ungodliness and worldly lust. In other words, grace teaches you to start saying no to things that you didn't use to say no to. This really speaks of the disruptive power of grace because there are certain things that you just say no to. And the believer always has things in their lives to say no to.

All of us here have things that we need to keep saying no to and when you hear a sermon like this you should be asking what else do I need to say no to in my life because grace is a progressive work of sanctification and secondly grace not just negatively teaches you to say no it teaches you to say yes and that's in the second part of verse 11 that we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age. This is what to say yes to, what to keep doing, or what to start doing. This is sort of the adventurous element in the Christian life. There's always something more good to add. You know, it takes you places that you've not gone before in your life and this is the yes of the Christian life and reading these words should always call us to say what do I need to say yes to even more than I am now So And you'll see in your outline our focus today is the following Teaching of grace that grace teaches us for what we're facing today That's in verse 12 and then grace teaches us to hope that's verse 13 and grace teaches us to do good works that's verse 14 and then finally in verse 15 grace teaches us to stimulate grace in one another so that's that's where we're headed here this morning And grace is bestowed upon the believer through what people have called the ordinary means of grace.

Well, that's what we're doing here today in this church service. We are operating really sequentially what are described as the ordinary means of grace. We've been singing, we've been praying, we've been reading the scriptures, we're gonna hear preaching. These are the ordinary means of grace and compare compare the ordinary means of grace, the ongoing work of God in the believer, to a drip system in a garden. It's a picture of regular rhythmic nourishment.

A drip system doesn't just flood a garden and then neglect it for weeks. It's a steady, measured, faithful supply of water at the right time. And in the same way the Christian life is ordinarily nourished, not by occasional outbursts, not by jags of revelation necessarily, not in occasional emotional floods. You cannot live the Christian life on an emotional flood because they don't happen that often and but on the regular means that God has provided and that includes scripture and prayer the worship of God the fellowship of the Saints the celebration of the ordinances the Lord's Supper and baptism the regular activity the daily activity of repentance and obedience these These really are the ordinary means of grace. It's a simple life, actually.

Now, the plant after a drip might not look very different after just one occasion of watering. But over time, the watering has an effect. And the roots grow deeper, and the leaves grow stronger, and the fruit becomes healthier. And the plant becomes more able to endure heat and other problems that it might encounter. And so it is with the Christian daily scripture prayer the preaching of the Word of God the fellowship of the Saints the steady work of God it creates depth and in a believer's life you know that's why That's why from the very beginning believers have always gathered together.

Why do we do this? Well, because we're commanded to do it, but believers have always done it because it's the greatest blessing in their life. And that's why we tell people, look, make the church of Jesus Christ the center of your life. Well, there are a lot of things you can do in your life, but make the meetings of the church of Jesus Christ the center of your life. And if you can fit other stuff in around it, fine.

But put the big stuff in first. And Jesus said, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. And that's this idea of this drip system that reminds us that there are roots that need to be nourished regularly and so the Christian life is not just a quick exposure. It has to sink into the heart over time. It's not that dramatic.

It's not viral. You know prayer must engage the soul connecting it to God. We come before the throne of what? It's the throne of grace. And just as that garden becomes dry and brittle and unfruitful, the Christian whose lacks in the ordinary means of grace often become spiritually dry.

Often discouraged, normally worldly, often anxious, and very often weak, when they ignore the ordinary means of grace. And not it doesn't happen all at once. It usually just happens slowly over time in the drift. And So the lesson is very simple here. The Christian life grows best under steady deposits of grace, regularly received, just like a drip system.

It's not normally for these downpours of emotion alone. It's not from emotional highs. It's not by programs that you might engage in or movements that you might join or pilgrimages or the next new hot thing. You know, the modern church tends to try to create the next new hot thing have you ever noticed that? There's some new hot program every three months.

You've got to do something to reach to rejack up the people Rather than the but that's not the way God actually designed the church You know often, you know church leaders. They're just way too creative in providing all these inventions that really are beyond the ordinary means of grace. It's a mistake that churches often make and extremely creative leaders are very, very good at it, and they know that they can keep the cycles of jackup going in their churches. But the rhythms of life are really more important than the big moments that you find in a garden. And frankly, you find some Christians, they go from one exciting new thing to the next.

They're looking for a new thing that'll fix everything in their life. Some new program that they see over there, some hot preacher over there, something to fix you, because you know you need to be fixed. And that's how we often think. But the ordinary means of grace are supplied to provide for the believer a stability, a solidity in a world that's jerking them around all over the place, to narrow you down on the things that actually will nourish you and cherish you and feed you and strengthen you these are the ordinary means of grace and they're so diminished today in kind of an entertainment evangelicalism The Westminster Shorter Catechism describes these ordinary means of grace. I'll read question 88.

The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption are his ordinances especially the word sacraments and prayer all which are made effectual to the elect for salvation effectual in other words like they work that's what effectual means and they work for the whole package of salvation from conversion to sanctification. And they're ordinary not because they're weak, but because they're the normal powerful things that work. And just a note about these ordinary means of grace And this is really important to understand. Their power is not in the thing itself. Like the power isn't in the taking of the bread and the wine.

But it's what the Lord is doing through the remembrance of the meaning of the ordinance. It isn't just the listening to the preaching, it's actually the spiritual work that God is doing in the preaching. It's not just the hard cold just reading of the words of God. It's what spiritually happens when your heart is toward the Lord and those things are moving you, the Lord's Supper moving you to remember what Christ has done. The preaching helping you to remember all of what God has done.

The singing that takes you into unity of faith with the believers. You're all singing off the same page. You're united in the doctrine. You're united in the emotion. And researchers tell us that when you're singing according to the same rhythm, often in a congregation, the heart starts beating at the same rate, and that's kind of what happens spiritually.

But it's not the thing, it's what the thing is, what the spirit is doing through the thing. And the preaching of the Word of God is the very same thing. It's designed to recalibrate us. Do you need recalibration? I need it every day.

And the Word of God feeds us, corrects us, and renews us. And we need that constant feeding, not just here as we gather together for worship, but we need it every day and we need to meditate it on it day and night. The Word of God is probably the chief of the ordinary means of grace and that's why Jesus said man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God it Moses said it is your life it's everything to you and prayer it makes it makes it It makes the soul dependent upon God. The very act of prayer we're saying, we're not sufficient. We don't have everything we need.

We need God. We need his help. We are in trouble. Our friend is in trouble. We are a needy people.

That's what prayer actually assumes for the power of God. The singing does the same thing. It unites us together. The ordinances show the gospel to our senses. You think about it for a minute, the receiving of the Lord's Supper.

The water, you have the bread and the wine. The message is so clear that Jesus Christ died for sinners. And he gives you an ordinance that engages all of your senses. He gives the sense of taste. He engages your sense of sight.

He engages your sense of touch. He engages your sense of smell. He engages all the senses to teach us something. And spiritually, that's supposed to enliven us to help us to remember in all of our senses that Jesus Christ forgives sinners and baptism you know you have you have the water and the the being buried in being buried in baptism the cleansing flood again you know how many of the senses are engaged in baptism? Quite a few.

Particularly the sense of water on your body covering you up and coming out of the water. It's like you're being washed clean and it's just a beautiful thing. Now these are the ordinary means of grace. Why are they so powerful? Well because they work cumulatively.

They work like sunlight does or the way training works, where there's just a constant repetitive work. And this happens in families as well. When a family reads scripture together, when a wife prays before the waking of her children, or maybe after the waking of her children. A man who prays before he goes to work, before he has a tough conversation. A person before God who says, oh God, I need your help in this moment coming up.

This happens to us. We always need help in everything and then as the church gathers for the Lord's Day. Okay with that. Now transport yourself back to the island of Crete because that's the context of this this whole thing. You know in the first century when this was written of course if you've been with us you know the Apostle Paul sent Titus to the island of Crete to plant churches and to set existing churches in order to actually to create a new culture in the churches to create a a the power of God displayed in the cultures of these churches because they lived in a these people lived in a very corrupt culture and you remember all epimetodies said it correctly that the Apostle Paul quotes all Cretans are always liars evil beasts and lazy gluttons you know it's really funny about this church So many kids in this church come up to me and quote that.

They know what happened in Crete. But I think, here's probably what you had happening in Crete. It's what happens with us, with all of us. We grew up in a corrupt culture and we're trying to figure out how to glorify God in the midst of this culture that still presses against us in so many ways. Not only do we have all this baggage, but we also have the pressures of the world.

Imagine how hard it must have seemed to the Cretans to break out of Cretan culture. That's what was happening in that church. They were all breaking out. They were all changing their lives. And how do you break free from these patterns?

Do you think that cretin believers ever doubted their salvation because they're they are still struggling with sin with remaining sin absolutely have you ever thought that Lord you know I I see people I think how could I be a Christian I they are they are so much more godly and devoted to God than I am. And you see that and you want more. And people come up to the Lord's Supper and they think, well, am I worthy to take the Lord's Supper? The answer is no, you're not worthy. Because it's Jesus Christ's worthiness.

So you have these people who have been forgiven of all of their sins but they're still grappling with remaining sin in Crete. Can you imagine the preaching on the assurance of salvation that had to take place in Crete? Because their assurance is not is not in their works but it's in their faith and the fact that God changed their life and now there is a progressive work of grace and it's a slow work isn't it did you have you ever thought this is too slow Lord I I want more and I want it faster have you ever thought that that's actually what normal Christians do and so I imagine yourself back in cretin culture and And here you have this proposition made to them that grace is at work in them. I think this was an encouraging thing for the cretins to hear, that grace has not stopped working because they're still gathering, they're still preaching the Word of God, they're still fellowshipping, they're still singing, they're still doing the things just like that drip, drip, drip that goes slow but it has a profound effect over a long horizon of time. This is how God works in your life and you know that's why it's easy to say be patient with me.

God's not finished with me yet. So that's the whole idea. So we've seen this grace teaches us to reject that's verse 11 and then grace teaches us to pursue to say yes and then third now we'll continue along in the exposition of this grace teaches us for what we're facing today he says in this present age grace is your teacher in this present age This is the sphere of your obedience. Now I think this was written for every church from the Cretan Church on to today. You live in a particular age, a particular moment in history.

We live in an age that's between two appearances, the appearance of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the final second coming, the second appearance of Jesus Christ at the end of the age. And the Cretans knew they were living in crazy times. They were living right in the middle of crazy times, and so are you, and so am I. And what he's saying is that you're living in a moment of time but you need to know where you are is that the grace of God is working in every age it works in this present age and the next present age as well now it does it does no good to spend your life lamenting the problems of your current times. It does no good.

They're so obvious. But you can spend your life obsessing about what's wrong with our times. Or you can focus on where you are, you're between the first and the second appearing, and Jesus Christ is coming again. Jesus Christ right now is destroying all of his enemies. That's what the Bible says.

Times have always been hard. You can read writers from 100 years ago, 500 years ago up 1500 years ago and they all report that the times are worse than ever if you just read history you'll read this and the church has always felt that times were worse than ever. Well, just wait till the next stage, okay? But The truth is there are a lot of things going on today that are not worse than ever. I mean there are things happening particularly in the younger generation.

You know what? They actually want to lead an ordinary normal Christian life. They want a sense of stability. They've lost heart for the entertainment church. And they actually want churches that are orderly.

And that's remarkable. And I could talk for a long time about how I'm seeing this happen and it's happening right here as well, too but This present age is not hopeless Because you can find grace to help in time of need. I don't care where you live, I don't care what city you're in, you can find grace to help in time of need. This is no reason to be discouraged about everything because you have grace from God. The church should be the most encouraged people in the church to be the most encouraged people in the world because they know where they are.

They know how things are wired and they know how things work And this is what is being explained here. How does grace work? And what we find here, you know, just to give you a different metaphor, you know, a man doesn't become strong by one heroic workout, Okay? In fact, it'll do the opposite. Strength, it just comes from repeated training.

Smaller weights slowly leading to greater weights, repeated movements, progressive resistance, rest, recovery, consistency. This principle works out not just in your spiritual life, it works out in almost every other area of life. It works that way in areas of knowledge. If you want to learn something about some element of science or medicine, it takes time to become an expert in anything. It doesn't happen overnight.

Nothing happens overnight. And so the Christian becomes strong through repeated acts of faith in their present moment, at the present time, in the current situation that they are in. Everybody in this room is living in a different situation. Some of you are very young and just forming families and you're poor, you're dirt poor just like Debra and I were. And some of you are in midlife and things are a little bit smoother, but everybody has enough grace for every moment in their life.

You are never, if you are a believer, deprived of the grace that you need. It's there, it's falling from the tree. Now go get it and pick it up. That's what the Apostle Paul is saying. Grace is that trainer, that teacher.

Okay, so grace teaches us for what we're facing today in this present age. Also, Grace teaches us to hope. This is the hope of grace, verse 13, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. I love this verse. This verse teaches you where to look.

You can look all around you, but there's one place to look that will teach you to hope. Does anybody need to be taught how to hope? Everybody needs to be taught how to hope. Human beings typically are hopeless people in many ways. This is why you have so many psychotropic drugs and all kinds of treatments and therapies because people lose hope and they lose hope fast and they often mask their last lack of hope through you know through all kinds of drugs and all kinds of things like that.

But God teaches you where to look. He's speaking of an outlook on life. You know, what is your outlook on life? Do you see a bright future? Do you have hope for the future?

Some of you are women, are you like the Proverbs 31 woman? She smiles on the future. When you have this hope, you're smiling on the future. And you wake up in the morning and you see where this whole thing is going. Yeah, there's a lot of smoke and fire right now, but look at where this train is going.

And there's nothing that's going to stop it. This is a positive outlook, a bright view of the future. Spurgeon said this about this, check this out, this is really great. Oh believer in Jesus, for there is the appearing of grace behind you and the appearing of glory before you. Two manifestations of God shine upon you like a wall of fire, the Lord's appearing all around you and then he said this let grace have such an effect upon your life and character that all may say see what grace can do see how the grace of God produces holiness in his children see what grace can do grace can change your whole disposition about everything going on in the world.

I think that's why the Apostle Paul in Ephesians in Philippians 4 4 he said rejoice always and again I say rejoice. In Philippians 4 8 you know so many of you particularly young people have memorized this whatever things are true whatever things are noble whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, let your mind dwell on these things. Meditate on them. 1 Thessalonians 5, 16, rejoice always, pray without ceasing in everything give thanks. Jesus said do not worry about tomorrow here's where tomorrow is headed we're told right here grace teaches us to hope and he's made so many promises to us one of the most helpful things you could do when you get discouraged is go get out one of those little books that's filled with the promises of God do you have those those are really neat books actually Paul said I know whom I believed and I'm persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him until that day.

He's made those promises. So the ordinary means of grace remind us of hope every week. You know, every week in Church of Jesus Christ is Resurrection Sunday. We meet on Resurrection Sunday, every Sunday. And you know, every Sunday, one way or another, we are singing, up from the grave he arose and triumphed over his foes.

That's what we're celebrating every Sunday. This is the hope of the Christian life and if you've lost hope Just remember the hope that God has promised for you He promised that he who began a good work in you He will He will complete it into the day of Jesus Christ. So grace teaches us to hope and then grace teaches us to do good works. That's verse 14. This is the purpose, the final purpose of the grace.

But look at verse 14. There's so much jam-packed in verse 14. Maybe verse 14 should be part four of the series. No, I'm just kidding. Verse 14, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people.

Why? Zealous for good works. So the purpose of redemption is stated here. And first of all, you have that he gave himself, in other words, he substituted himself as the punishment for our sins. He took the punishment as our substitute for our sins.

He took the blame for our sins And then it says he redeemed us. In other words, he bought us back. He got us back, right? He created us and he got us back. And then that's the pure purchase price of Christ.

And then the purifying and purify for himself his own special people and then the result of it all is a change of life. Zealous for good works. Zealous for good works. Now we live in a current evangelical environment that minimizes good works. Grace is often the only thing that people hear.

They don't hear commands for good works. But that's not true in the book of Titus. In fact, six times, Six times in Titus, this whole idea of good works is brought up. These are the outward manifestations. Titus 1.16, there are some who are unfit for any good work.

Titus 2.7, show yourself in all respects a pattern of good works. We talked about patterns. Titus 2.14, zealous for good works. That's our verse today. Titus 3.1, be ready for every good work.

Titus 3.8, Be careful to devote yourself to good works. Titus 3.14. Let our people learn and devote themselves to good works. There's a learning process to progressively engage one's life in good works. And so, you know, what are you zealous for?

Even this morning. What are you zealous for this morning? Are you zealous for good works among your brethren? Here we are, we're gathered here, we're gonna have a fellowship meal. Be zealous, be zealous for good, don't just hang out.

Okay, that's our temptation. That's our default position. Don't just hang out today. Be zealous for good works. Go after for purpose of encouragement.

You know, Jesus said, he said, greater works will you do than I, because I go to the Father. And he's talking about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and I and I and implied in that is are the ordinary means of grace you will do these greater works because of the ongoing work of grace in your life and they they ought to become greater and greater and greater. Our confession, the Baptist confession of 1689 addresses this in chapter 16. I'm going to read you some sections. It's the section on good works.

What are good works? Is it just anything that you think is good? Well, paragraph one. Good works are only such as God has commanded in His holy word. If it's good, it's commanded in God's word.

And not such as are without warrant thereof are devised by men out of blind zeal lots of works that are called good are just derived out of blind zeal in men's hearts and in other words the word what the confession does is narrows down what is truly good. Good works are not just simply what feels good to you. It's not based on you. Good works are based on God. The second paragraph, these good works done in obedience to God's commandments are the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith and by them believers manifest their thankfulness they strengthen their assurance they edify their brethren they adorn the profession of the gospel they stop the mouths of adversaries and glorify God whose workmanship they are created in Christ Jesus for good works.

Paragraph number three, their ability to good works is not of themselves but wholly from the Spirit of Christ that they may be enabled besides the graces they have already received to to work in them to will and to do for his good pleasure. So these these works are wrought by Christ. The next paragraph, we cannot buy our best works merit pardon or sin or eternal life from the hand of God. Your works cannot save you. The next paragraph, paragraph seven, works this might be this might offend many people, especially the unregenerate.

Works done by unregenerate men, although for the matter of them they may be things which God commands and are of good use both in themselves and to others, yet because they proceed not from a heart purified by faith, they are done in a right manner, nor are they done in the right manner according to the Word, nor the right end for the glory of God. They are therefore sinful and cannot please God nor make man adequate to receive the grace of God. So there's a difference between the grace at work and the believer and the good things. There are so many good things that unbelievers do but they're not done by the right for the right motive. They're not done for the right motive.

They're not done for the right purpose. They don't arise out of the power of God. They arise out of the power of man for man's own selfish purposes most of the time. So that's the confession. I mean, Jesus said this, you being evil know how to do good things for your children.

That's the deal. So good works are manifestations of the grace of God. Think of the progressive work of good works in your life in terms of the tuning of a musical instrument. Many of you play musical instruments, pianos, guitars, violins, cellos, all kinds, these instruments need to be retuned, particularly wooden instruments, they need to be tuned regularly. And you know grace, grace is a retuning of your affections.

It teaches you to do good works. So consider good works. Are there works that God has wrought in your soul as a result of his word, as a result of the work of the Spirit, as a work, as a result of the ordinary means of grace, are there works that need to be tuned up, improved in that sense. I think that grace works like the tuning of an instrument. It goes out of tune just like your life and mine and it needs to be brought back so that it rings out a beautiful sound.

And then finally, grace teaches us to stimulate grace in others. Verse 15. This is the proclamation of grace, by the way. Speak these things, exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you." Now I think that the primary application that the Apostle is driving at relates to elders, to pastors, to teachers.

They actually have very specific duties to do this, okay? But there are other places in the Bible where believers are to encourage one another and even correct one another in other places. So I think that there's a dual proper application here, particularly for pastors, but also for other believers. We have a duty to stimulate one another to love and good deeds. We have a duty to do that.

So I think that's where I want to lean on this. Notice there are two things that grace teaches you to do. First to exhort. Now this word means to encourage. We've encountered this word before in this letter and it means to be called alongside to help.

It's a beautiful word, para-kolo, one para alongside and to call, to call alongside to help. This is the word of encouragement, to spur one another on, to inspire one another, to say to one another, hey, let's get back in the game. It's that kind of encouragement. And I think that most of our relationships should focus on this. I think that's the lion's share of what believers are to be doing with one another.

And there's a beautiful and brilliant opportunity to do that in this church every time we gather on Sunday mornings in the fellowship meal. We pray that during the fellowship meal we're not just chit chatting, nothing wrong with chit chat, but when we gather together that we're purposefully, intentionally attempting to stir one another up to love and good deeds. That's what we should be doing and set your heart on that church. That's what you should set your heart on And there's so many irrelevant things you can talk about, but even maybe now, prepare yourself now to enter into the time of our fellowship meal where you have set yourself to stimulate one another to love and good deeds. What a way to live.

What a way to live instead of just casually living for nothing or saying things that don't really matter at all or having no intentionality with people that are around you. So you have the exhort that's sort of the encouragement side of it you know kind of like Barnabas he was called the son of encouragement. Be that today. And then rebuke, that's the second word. This means to correct.

That means sometimes there are diseases that are going on in your brother that need to be named. Okay? It's an unenviable position to be in where you think you should name the disease in your brother. It's, but here's the reality. It's a lot easier to rebuke than it is to receive rebuke.

We often have a lot more to say to other people than we're willing to hear from other people. We'd rather say flattering things to ourselves and hear flattering things about ourselves than actually to recognize that we have a disease. And frankly, I think you know in the preaching of the Word of God, I think you always have to have this mix of the encouragement and the rebuke. At the same time, The sheep don't need to be beaten. Beating the sheep is a very bad idea.

It's not helpful to true sheep to beat the sheep. And I hope you never feel like the pastors here in this church are beating the sheep. But we're here to encourage you. Every once in a while, the rod needs to come out. Okay.

And that's why he says, look, you must do this with all authority to preserve the holiness of the church it's proper to rebuke from time to time when it's appropriate and we shouldn't feel too offended if that ever happens. So a fire is you know the Christian life is a little bit like a fire. It needs to be tended. It can gradually go out, and it needs more fuel. It needs to be stirred and fed.

It needs more oxygen. It needs more attention. And that's what the ordinary means of grace are doing. The Word of God and prayer and worship and fellowship and singing, these things stoke the fire of the love of Jesus Christ. And I think the whole point of this section is that grace is something that needs to be stirred up by this teacher whose name is grace.

So grace Grace isn't just some wonderful feeling that comes over you. It's something that is working in you through the means that God has given. And it's working on you, and it's working for you. Grace, in many ways, is God's dominion over your soul. And this rule and reign of grace that is displacing the rule and reign of sin in your life and it also marks out the danger of passivity in the Christian life and we should be crying out to God saying Lord give me more grace help me to seek more grace Help me to have more and more regular dripping of that water of grace in my life.

It's like daily bread. It's like working out. It's like the tuning of a musical instrument. It's the ordinary rhythmic focus life on the ordinary means of grace. And frankly, that's that's why your pastors are very are urgently concerned that everybody is here all the time that you don't miss you don't miss church for read for illegitimate reasons but that you're locked into the ordinary means of grace.

I think that grace is like a protective dome shooting down the incoming arrows of condemnation and worldliness that are constantly assaulting us. So there you have it grace teaches us to reject what to pursue it teaches us for what we are facing today. Grace teaches us to hope grace teaches us to do good works and grace teaches us to stimulate grace in others and they work cumulatively. Now I'm gonna I'm gonna just end with a story of John Newton. John Newton who wrote amazing grace he wrote those words twas grace that taught my heart to fear and grace my fears relieved.

Well John Newton grew up with a very wicked father, a harsh father and a godly mother who taught him scripture, taught him the hymns, taught him the catechisms, taught him to pray. She really desired to bring him up in the training and the admonition of the Lord. But his father was very stern and distant. John Newton was not a godly boy. At age 11, he went to sea on his father's ship And he followed the profanity and the vice and the rebellion of the sailors that were on that ship at age 11.

Later on, he was pressed into service by the Royal Navy. And he tried to desert, and he was publicly whipped, and he was transferred to a slave ship. And he ended up, he became a slave trader. And he became even more hardened and blasphemous in his youth. And then he was actually sold as a slave to an African slaver.

And he was the slave of this slave owner's wife. She starved him and beat him and humiliated him and mistreated him. And then he was on a ship one day and a terrible storm broke and one of his companions was washed overboard right before his eyes and that shook him to his core and that began his progress toward conversion and he became the author of Amazing Grace and he was preaching once on 1st Corinthians 15 10 by the grace of God I am what I am and then he said this I am not what I ought to be I'm imperfect and deficient not what I might be considering my privileges and opportunities not what I wish to be I am not what I hope to be but I am not what I once was a child of sin and a slave of the devil This is the power of the ordinary means of grace that God has given to every believer to teach them to walk in his ways. I highly commend to you the ordinary means of grace. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for giving us such good laws, such wonderful ways. Thank you for taking us to places we never could have gone without your grace. We praise you for your grace. Oh Lord if anyone has not received your grace I pray that they would run to the grace of Jesus Christ and for all the rest Lord that you would just continue to satisfy them with the goodness of your house. Pray you give them great urgency and delight and energy for all of your ordinary means of grace, for the reading of Scripture, the prayer, the gathering of the Saints, for the Lord's ordinances, for the fellowship, all these wonderful things you've given to us.

And know Lord I pray that you would you would multiply and magnify your grace as we continue to meet together here on this Lord's Day amen.