Beacon Sunday Service: March 9, 2025

Stand with me, and I'm gonna read in Titus chapter 2, verses 11 to 12 for us. Titus chapter 2, verses 11 to 12. It reads, For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us that denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age. Let's pray together. Father, we are gathered to worship, and we're gathered to give you thanks, to give you praise, and we avail ourselves this morning to your instruction. As we learn about you, I pray that you would help us to respond appropriately in fear, terror, joy, gratitude, and affection, not only for Christ, but also for one another. And as we are changed, and as we grow, as we live in accordance to your will for us, would you magnify your name just in our lives and in this church?

So help us to hear well. Help us to listen not just with our ears, but also with our hearts, and we avail our hearts to you. Would you inscribe your truths onto the very fabric of our being? In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Go ahead and take a seat.

There are a few things that you and I had no choice in. For starters, you had no say in your ethnic makeup. And I'm not necessarily unhappy about this, but I did not choose to be Korean. And I'm assuming you feel similarly to your ethnic makeup, no matter how many makeups you have. And also you and I did not choose into what historical context or into what geographical location we were born into. I was fortunate to be born as a Korean in Seoul, South Korea, and not as a Korean in Pyongyang, North Korea. And I had no say in that. No one chooses his parents. So if a person has been born into a healthy, love-filled home, that's 100% by the grace of God. And it's 100% a kindness of God that a person has parents willing to love, to nurture, to provide for, and to raise them up into adulthood.

So if you were born to two genuinely Christian parents, what an extra measure of grace that was. But for the orphaned child who did not have, who did not choose to not have parents, the world can be very cruel. And that's what makes adoption such a wonderful and a beautiful thing. Adoption is beautiful, and it's 100% grace. And the adoptive parent takes on the responsibility to provide for, to nurture, to protect, and to care for a child, he or she is not obligated to do to care for.

For an adoption altogether. So over the past 10 to 15 years, especially, adoption abolitionists have cited many physical abuses, sexual abuses, neglect, and prejudices suffered by adoptees. And many of the adoption abolitionists had once been adopted themselves, and they're speaking from firsthand experience. They had suffered bad experiences with their adoptive families and often ostracism among their foreign communities. And they returned as to Korea as damaged adults to prevent others from suffering similar injustices. And it also did not help that over those years there have been discoveries of rampant adoption fraud in which corrupt adoption agencies have turned the adoption of children into a lucrative business for themselves.

So the reasons are complicated and many, but there are some in the world who are trying to put an end to the institution of adoption. Experiences may sometimes be exaggerated and embellished, but I do not doubt that many of the abuses suffered, the neglect experienced, and the cases of corruption and injustice are all actually very real and very true. Adoption is a beautiful thing, but as we human beings do with all beautiful things, we corrupt, pervert, and ruin it. The perspective of many of the adoption abolitionists is that these orphaned and unwanted Korean children will be better off not being adopted. And here are two questions I would ask these abolitionists. The first question would be this is the institution of adoption in and of itself the problem.

So similarly, if you profess faith in Christ, you are saved by no merit, quality, or worth of your own. So beautiful a thing is adoption, and beautiful a thing is grace. And we're gonna reflect together today on this grace, on our salvation and what it looks like in our present-day context, or as it says in Titus 2 12, the present age. Okay. So I've titled today's sermon, The Ramifications of the Appearing of the Grace of God. It's like a Puritan uh title, right? It's pretty long. I was with Howard when he first saw this title, and Howard chuckled at the title, saying that it was tip longer than my typical titles were, and it is, but hopefully uh you understand the necessity of its length through our time together.

The apostle Paul had touched upon how the grace of God affects the character of older men and uh older women, the grace of God, how it affects younger men and how it affects younger women, how they're to live their lives. And we've touched upon the last couple weeks the grace of God and how it affects both leaders, how it affects slaves slash employees, and how they're to model and adorn the adoptions of God on their behavior. Grace changes everything, and there are many ramifications of grace. And so, as much as a human adoption into a human family changes everything for an orphan child, an adoption by grace into the family of God changes everything exponentially far more, or at least it should.

And that's Titus chapter 2. And so I'm gonna give you the outline for the two verses we're feeding off of today. Okay, the first is that title, the ramifications of the appearing of the grace of God. And here in Titus 2.11, grace is personified. It appeared in a person, right? So we're gonna be thinking through what or even who the grace of God is. What did the appearing of Jesus, the grace of God, bring? And what's it say? It brought salvation. And so, what is that? What have been believers been saved from? What have been believers, what have believers been saved from? And third, we're going to be looking at what grace cannot but mean for all of her beneficiaries. All of the people who've received this salvation, all the people who've been adopted in the family of God, what does grace do?

Right? The ramifications. Because the ramifications are universal, no exceptions. The purpose for all that have been affected by this grace of God is one and the same. So what is the grace of God? What did the appearance of the grace of God bring? And what are the ramifications of this grace? And we're going to be looking at just these two verses. And let's read this again. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us that denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age. So the grace of God appeared.

Jesus personifying the justice and the wrath of God was made a sacrificial lamb to take away the sins of the world. Why? Because without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. Through the cross on which the grace of God, the Lamb of God was put to death, a way was made for sinful and rebellious men to be restored to his creator. And God, like we sing, and God the just was satisfied to look on him and to pardon me and to justify me. Right? So completely, by free choice alone, God chose to call, to regenerate, to convert, justify those he would call and adopt as his children. And this entire process is what we call salvation. And that in that entire process was initiated by the grace of God and provided through the grace of God.

And so to appreciate the word grace, and we talk about grace every week, right? But to appreciate it, we must remember first who God is. So first, it's absolutely important and imperative for us to remember that God is holy, holy, holy. And what does this mean? So in thinking about the word holiness, some people think of words like perfect or sinless or clean, and those are all not inaccurate, they're just not complete. So to be holy literally means to be set apart or completely other. Hannah sings about this in 1 Samuel 2.2. She sings, there is no one like Yahweh. There is no one holy like Yahweh. Indeed, there's no one beside you, nor is there any rock like our God. And this is what all of heaven has been declaring from before all eternity, and this is the primary attribute of God that the heavenly hosts will be proclaiming unceasingly before his throne.

And we get a glimpse of this in Revelations 4.8. The four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within, and day and night, they do not cease to say, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come. And this is a similar vision to Isaiah's glimpse of the throne room when he beheld the glory of God in Isaiah chapter 6. So Yahweh God, he is holy, holy, holy. He is completely other.

Repeat after me. God is perfectly jealous. God is perfectly jealous. His holiness makes him jealous. When we hear the word jealousy, we think of it as like a very petty thing, right? We think of jealousy as a broken emotion springing forth from insecurity. Our jealousy has been corrupted and damaged by sin. But perfect jealousy has perfect security and justice and love at its root. Okay? So jealousy is an attribute of God in which he has a perfect hatred that perfectly and rightly hates anything that tarnishes his glory or attacks what he loves. So God's holiness makes him holy, W H O jealous. God's holiness makes him wholly jealous.

And let me visualize this for you. I am the father of my children, and as a father, I protect them, I care for them, I raise them, they are mine. So if any of the men in this room were to go up to my children and say to them, Address me as daddy.

Those are my children, and my righteous jealousy would be aroused. If my wife were to run up to another man and give him a fat kiss on the lips, I would have every right to be upset and jealous. Every single one of you would sympathize with indignation that I would display, right? Every single one.

True or false.

For me. Jealousy is not a petty thing. Human insecurity has turned jealousy into a petty thing, but it actually is, in fact, a righteous quality. And jealous is our God. Our God is jealous. Yahweh is El Khana. Repeat after me, El Kanah. El Kanah, jealous is his name. Okay, so Exodus 34, 14. You shall not worship any other God for Yahweh, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God. Deuteronomy 4, 24. For Yahweh your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God. So if you were to angrily say to me, bro, share your kids. Why are you feeling so selfish? Why are you acting so insecure? Why do you alone get to be called daddy?

Why not let your kids address me as daddy too? Who would be in the wrong? Me or the guy I'm gonna punch in the face. Would selfishness and insecurity be attributable things to my jealousy in that situation? No. Every single person would understand this hypothetical interaction as a complete and total offense and a violation. If we took this to court, okay, not one single court of law in the world, except maybe California in about 15 years, not one single court of law would side with you. Right? If any man were to ask my wife on a date and accuse me of being selfish for not sharing her, he would be a lunatic.

Only the greatest of fools would not understand how inappropriate that would be.

But let's say I'm a bad father or a neglectful husband. Then is that okay? Even then, no. You see, even we who are evil know how to be righteously jealous toward those we love. Then how much more our heavenly Father, who is perfect in goodness, who is perfect in his justice, who is perfectly holy, who is El Kana, be entitled to have a claim on all that he has created. He has more claim on all that he has created than I have over the children I have been entrusted to steward. El Kanah, exponentially and infinitely has more right to claim allegiance over all that has been created than any father would have over any of his children or any man would have over his wife. Our God is a jealous God.

And hallelujah. Praise God for his jealousy. The grace of God, the salvation of man has his jealousy as the root. I want you to think with me. The grace of God has the jealousy of God at his root.

For his jealousy's sake. And that's what it says in Isaiah chapter 42, verses 8 to 10. I am Yahweh, that is my name. Here's his jealousy. I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to graven images. Behold, the former things have come to pass, and now I declare new things. Before they spring forth, I'm telling you this, I'm causing you to hear them. So sing to Yahweh a new song. Sing is praise to the end of the earth, you who go down to the sea as well as his fullness, you coastlands, and all who inhabit them. So when he says, sing to Yahweh, it's a command, all creation rightfully bows and sings. Right? All creation on the earth and the sea cannot help but to sing to Yahweh. The Bible describes even the inanimate mountains obeying and singing for joy, Psalm 89.

Rocks and stones will break forth and cry out. Luke 19, 40. You guys have heard that passage before, right? You know the only created being that says, No, I will not sing. You know who that is? Man. Only corrupt, despicable, rebellious, arrogant man would dare say no. Only the complete idiot, and I say idiot because that's a Greek word, idiote. Only the fool of fools says there is no God. Only the stupidest of the stupid would exchange the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the likeness of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Yahweh is El Kanah. He is a consuming fire, and his hatred is perfect. Think about this. God's jealousy is right. And in his jealousy, his hatred of all that tarnishes and those he loves is right.

And so God perfectly and rightfully readies his wrath for all who would tarnish his glory. And this is Romans 1.18. And you guys have all seen this verse before. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against what? All ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and right, unrighteousness. Now I've underlined three of these words on purpose: ungodliness, unrighteousness, and suppress. And you're gonna see why I underline them in the third point, because those are the three things that are correlated with what we see in Titus chapter 2, verse 12. Okay? Sensibly righteously godly. Alright. If we don't properly understand the holiness and the jealousy of God, we can't understand grace.

Let me repeat this. If we don't properly understand the holiness and the jealousy of God, we cannot understand grace. We would think of grace as something that is due us, or that is owed us. So what is grace? It's a here, it's a word that we hear so often, we forget its potency. So to help us appreciate the word grace, I'm gonna have to, or I'm gonna have us think through two related words first, all right? The first word is excuse me, justice. Do we praise God for his justice? Are we glad that God is just that no evildoer will get away with it eventually, right? We praise God. But what is justice? It's behavior, treatment, payment, andor punishment. It's due payment, reward, or compensation for what is owed.

Justice is eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life. There's an equality there, right? There's a lot of people in our day to day demanding justice. Nobody should demand justice. We're all done if that's the case. But that is God. Deuteronomy 3, or 32, 30 to 4. For I proclaim the name of Yahweh, ascribe greatness to our God, the rock. His work is perfect. Why? For all his ways are just a God of faithfulness, without any injustice, righteous and upright is he. So our God is just. So our God exacts justice. And is his justice perfect or is it flawed? It's perfect. And we're done if we ask God for justice. Second word is mercy. It's the Hebrew word chesed.

Repeat after me, chesed. It's often translated as loving kindness. It's so rich a word. Like they don't like the word, a lot of translators avoid just using mercy, but loving kindness, because mercy is like mercy, ah, right? But loving kindness, there's actually a lot more warmth in there.

Which, while justice can be either something you look favorably with or with dread, depending on which side of justice you're on, mercy is always a word of benevolence. Okay, so it's typically one-sided. It's a withholding of a negative. It is a withholding of a just penalty. It is a slowness to anger. And this is an attribute of God that really caused Jonah's anger to be aroused so much where he's like, I want to die twice. Okay. The Ninevehites were a horrible people, horribly deserving of the wrath of God, but God was chesed. So weird. These are horrible people. Equivalent to like Al Qaeda. And Jonah wanted God's righteous justice to be on them, but what happens? Oh Yahweh, was this my word to myself while I was still in my own land?

That's why I went to flee to Tarshish. Because I know that you're a gracious and a compassionate God. Slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness. The one who relents from concern to calamity. I hate this. How funny is this picture? It's not in the children's Bibles a lot of times because it makes it makes the man look crazy. El Kanah is perfect in jealousy. But the paradox of paradoxes is this. El Kana is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abundant in mercy. So he's a God who restrains, who holds back his wrath. It's akin to a wronged husband or a wronged father not exacting justice in that moment. Even though in his heart of hearts, he wants to throw this guy into the ocean.

So keep that in mind, and then we get to get to the word grace. It literally means gift. Grace is unmerited favor. And by definition, no one can demand grace except a lot of millennials and Gen Z people, they demand it. You're not gracious to me. That's so funny, right? You can't demand a gift. Even on your birthday. You might say it in jest, but you should not demand a gift. If there is a gift and can be demanded, that will be called payment. Right? Not a gift. It is an adoption into the family of God where wrath and destruction has been due. It is not only the just the release of a mass murdering rapist who is scheduled to be executed on death row.

It's not just his release from his sentence, but it's released from his sentence, and then in making him a prince, or a priest, or a prime minister, or president or king.

That's absurd. Think about this. Mass murderer, rapist, released from execution, and not just released, but made a prince. That's unthinkable. But that is the definition of grace. Remember, God is a God who restrains. He is a God who holds back his wrath from vile sinners. Only to pour it out with all rage and fury on the only sinless man who has ever walked the face of the planet. That is why Jesus Christ is personified here and called the grace of God. Justice, mercy, and grace. One of my favorite passages of scripture hitting on all three is Ephesians chapter 2, verses 1 through 10. We who once were supposed to be condemned by the fierce wrath and the justice of God, Ephesians 2.3, what happened?

We were spared because of what? Verse 4, the mercy of God. We were not only spared, but we were elevated, raised with Christ, seated as co-heirs with Christ in the heavenly places, Ephesians 2, 5 and 6. That's absolutely amazing, dumbfounding, absurd, stupid grace. Are you guys tracking along with this? And the grace of God has appeared. And what did that appearing bring? It brought salvation to all men who are worse than cockroaches, right? The grace of God appeared, bringing salvation to all men. While we were yet sinners, while we were hostile to God, while we were not even close to being good men, he brought salvation.

The very meaning contained in the word salvation, there is a salvation from, and there's always a to. Okay? So there is a salvation from, and there is a salvation towards. If a person is stuck in a house fire, he is saved from death by burning, and he is saved to life. You got you guys have a visual. If a person is saved from the sea, he is saved from what? Drowning, he is saved too? Life on land. Right? If a lady gets proposed to, and she says, Yes, a man is saved from stupidity and saved towards maturity. This is not the right time to look at your husband's ladies, right? Hopefully, right? Saved from, saved to. So the gospel is good news that we have been saved from what? Condemnation, and then we have saved towards an inheritance from heaven.

We have been saved from despair, we've been saved to a living hope. We've been saved from futility. We've been saved to usefulness. We have been saved to heralding and inviting those in abject poverty to the banqueting table of the king of kings. Amen. Taste and see. Taste and see that the Lord is grace. The Lord is good. He does not pay us what our deeds deserve. He doesn't just not pour out us punishment. He gives us grace. How can we not bow the knee? But many people, especially in the church today, look at that because the people in the world will look at that and be like, that's so dumb. That makes no sense. But the people in the church often look at that and say, well, so what? They say, meh, still not interested.

They'll never verbalize that, but in their hearts, they think, eh, I'm still gonna watch my Netflix show. I'm still gonna do this. I'm still gonna live like this. I'm still gonna pursue this. I'm still gonna pursue that. Meh, not interested. Some church people spurn the invitation outright with offense and displeasure, as if to say, how dare God inconvenience me with his rules, his stipulations, his commandments. Does he not know who I am? God needs me. How dare he inconvenience me and make me feel bad about myself? And that's due to their ignorance. Some people leave the church saying the world would be a better place without religion. Have you guys heard that before? It is akin to the adoption of abolitionists who are so disappointed and hurt by their adoptive parents.

Going and trying to abolish adoption altogether. Now I'm not trying to minimize the experiences that the adoptees have had, because some probably did have horrible experiences. But here's a question: would they truly have been better off having not been adopted? Objective statistics will say otherwise. Okay. This is not a tangent. This is important to the sermon, all right? So pay attention. So for those of us uh in Asian American church circles, we take college education for granted. It's easier to find someone, it's harder to find someone who didn't go to college than people who graduated, right? But according to data from Harvard University and Asian Development Bank, it's funny that it's Asian development bank.

Only about 6.7 of the world's population have college degrees. What percent? 6.7. So if you have a college degree, consider yourself among the elite of the world. Okay? You're elite in something. In the year 2000, that number was actually only 5.9%. In 2015, research done by higher education for foster youth in an organization called Congressional Coalition of Adoption Institute. They found that approximately 22% of all adoptees had a bachelor's degree. About 32%, they had some kind of college experience. I mean, I guess they dropped out. And even 17% of them held graduate or professional degrees. So for adoption abolitionists in Korea to say it would have been better for Korean orphans to be raised by the state, the data shows otherwise, at least in terms of the education.

Right? So, in regard to education, adoptees were saved from very few opportunities for education, and saved to greater opportunities to pursue even graduate degrees. And that's just education. For most of us who have never legally and socially been orphans, we can easily take the gift of family for granted. And some of us have families that were pretty broken, but even then, right? We take it for granted. I had a Korean uh co-worker who grew up as an orphan. She's actually half Singaporean. They did a blood test. Um she grew up as an orphan. Her name was Chehy. And she was really good at her job. Okay, super compassionate, super passionate about the children all over the world, and understandably so.

Jehi was born in 1986. Okay, so she's currently 39 years old. And the first place she called home was an orphanage. And was that her choice? No, she did not choose that. She did not choose to be an orphan, but she grew up in one of the orphanages in Seoul, South Korea. Jehi never knew her biological parents. Her parents were the state. And like most of us would assume or hope for in a state-run orphanage, there were appearances of care, appearances of protection, education, and opportunities. But day to day, all Chehi remembers is the verbal abuse, the sexual abuse, manipulation, fear, and hopelessness. So Jehi told me about the isolation, the constant reminders that they were unwanted, and then there was no place for these children to go.

So they were alone. There was no future for them. They were good for nothing, except for the lust of men. And that was the message Jehi and the 30 some odd girls heard every day. So she was with about 30 girls in that orphanage. Today, Jehi is 39. I interviewed her in 2013 when she was only 27. And in that interview in 2013, she's told me that every single girl, 100% of all the girls she grew up with in 2013 were dead. Or working as prostitutes in Souls Red Light Districts. 100%. They were or would have been in their late 20s like Jehi. But they would be taken advantage of, they would be overlooked in society. They almost had no hope for college because they were often deprived of even the basic study skills during their primary school years.

They would be looked down upon. And again, they did not choose this. And because they had no hope, they had no means, they would try working out like the 7-Elevens of Korea, but that wouldn't provide enough. So they would begin to sell their bodies, to have someone take care of them, to have at least a roof over their head, but soon enough, that leads to despair. That leads to greater abuse. And that leads to a spiraling into even greater hopelessness. And many of them took their lives.

It's a common plight for orphans. Without anyone to intervene, very, very few orphans grow up healthier whole. That's why adoption is a beautiful thing. Right? That a stranger would decide to love and care for and take on a child. It's a wonderful display, not only of mercy, but of great grace. Jehi never was adopted, but she had loving sponsors from Australia who regularly wrote to her, shared the gospel with her, even gave her an English name, Jenny, because I guess Jehi was hard to pronounce for the white tongue. And they supported her all the way through college. They sponsored her college tuition. And Jehi was the exception. Her story is actually not the norm. One of the reasons I believe that these abolitionists are pushing for what they are pushing for they do not know how much worse their circumstances could have been.

Their ignorance fuels their discontentment. Ignorance fuels discontentment. Now, human adoption generally removes an orphaned child from a very imperfect situation to a situation that is just a lot less imperfect, right? Still imperfect, but far less horrible. Okay. So in today's context, a human orphan that has been legitimately adopted has been saved from a horrible helplessness, hopelessness, to at least having some opportunities. Right? Not perfect, but still far from horrible. Spiritually, what has the believer in Jesus Christ been saved to? We've been adopted into a salvation as sons and daughters. Are you guys tracking? Street rats have been adopted as sons by the king.

Slaves have been adopted as sons and as heirs. Here's a familiar passage. Matthew 25, 21 to 23, it's exactly the same verbatim. His master said to him, and this is the three talent or the five-talent guy, or three talent guy, two talent guy. Well done, good and faithful slave. Two talents. Okay. Well done, good and faithful servant. You guys know this passage, right? These are the only two verses that say this. You were faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master. The words enter into the joy, I believe, is adoption. And before I explain, we need to look at Galatians 4. This slave gets adopted as a son of the master. And let's look at Galatians 4 before I explain further.

But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the uh born under the law, so that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God then sent forth the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba Father, therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. Now here's something we need to understand about adoption in the biblical world. Today, first world adoptions, it's rooted primarily in compassion and a good desire to help the destitute, right? Okay. In the ancient world, it was basically your will. It was about what to do with your inheritance.

In the ancient Roman world, no one ever adopted children. That will be as weird as me adopting a 30-year-old, going up to let's say, like an Alex and saying, from today, you are my son. So in the ancient Roman world, to adopt a baby is absurd. So it's flipped. Okay? So in the ancient Roman world, adoption was typically done to a male 20 to 40 years old. Most all wealthy families, families of prominence or status, would universally adopt.

Sometimes, like you know, wealthy people, they don't have good sons, so they adopt the a gooder person. Okay. Like, I don't trust these guys with my money, so I'll adopt this person. But anyway, that's kind of how that worked. And if a wealthy family had a very loyal, trustworthy slave, they would adopt him legally as a son, so that when he dies, his inheritance can be passed on to that slave. Adoption was all about inheritance. It was not about compassion in the ancient biblical world. Are you guys tracking? Yes, God did see us in our desperation in our helplessness. His has said mercy and compassion, they were aroused, and that's all in the Bible. But the greater reason for our adoption as his children was for the inheritance.

So we were saved from wrath and saved to sharing all of the riches of heaven for all time with Jesus, the firstborn, the preeminent one, because God wants to share and display his glory. That's why he made sinful people, redeemed them, washed them, purified them, regenerated them, and adopted them as his sons to share his inheritance. And Ephesians 2, 6, 7, go on, and raised us up with him, seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Why? So that in the ages to come, he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. John 14, 2 to 3, you guys have probably heard this. This is one of my favorite songs from DC talk in the 90s. In my father's house, there are many, many rooms.

If this were not so, I would have told you.

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may also be. So believers have come up from off the spiritual streets into an incomparable, undescribable inheritance. What does that inheritance look like? I don't know. Nobody knows. Because it's beyond literally our wildest dreams. That's what the Bible says. It is beyond any human imagination. No dreamworks genius could ever draw it up. 1 Corinthians 2 9 says this. It says that no single person on earth has ever accurately imagined this. And let's read the passage.

Just as it was written. Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not ever entered the heart of man. All that God has prepared for those who love him. This is what we've been saved to, literally beyond our wildest dreams. And what we have been saved to is eternal and it's unending, and you and I will be sin free, so we will never tire.

It's hard to appreciate. But it's Christ in his full glory, and we're there overwhelmed with joy being with him and seeing him face to face.

What have we been spared from? I want you guys to go ahead and replace the word love there with the word hate. Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man. All that God has prepared for those who are hostile to him. That too is eternal and unending, where the worm will not die. You desire for death, but it will never come. So terrifying, even Satan doesn's hatred towards sin. Cancer.

God hates it. But why is cancer existing? Because of sin. Divorce. God hates it, Malachi, right? But why does it exist? Because of sin. And all the damage that sin has done in our lives, God hates it. But God is holding back his wrath. So the grace of God has appeared. And for those of us who have placed our faith in the atoning work of Christ, we were saved, we are being saved, and we will one day be fully saved. But while we wait for that final salvation, how are we to live in the present? What are the ramifications of this grace here on earth? What are the ramifications of all of this for our lives in the present age? It says there in verse 12, the grace of God, the Jesus personified, is instructing us and will continue to instruct us all the way to when Christ returns.

That's verse 13. So the Holy Spirit of God, for those who are waiting, are being instructed. You guys following this? We live life in the spirit and not in the flesh. We live as heirs of heaven and not as those destined for wrath. We deny ungodly and worldly desires, the stuff for which the wrath of God is revealed. Why do we deny that? Why do we deny them? Because it displeases our good Father. We do not live in unrighteousness, but we live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age. And all three of those words we touched upon already in Titus. So I'm not gonna, that's why I'm not gonna go into it. But those three things are the fruits of those who are instructed by the grace of God.

So these are temporary and if properly understood, in light of what we have waiting for us, this is easy. If I were to say you're getting a billion dollars next week, as long as you don't eat the rest of this week, would you be able to do it? Yeah. You tell me to not eat for a month. If I'm getting a billion dollars in April, no problem. Might as well lose some weight. If you had to hold the plank for five minutes for a million bucks, you will find a way. All of that pain and then the quivering, all of that is momentary. It's light, it's meaningless. It's nothing compared to what is behind it. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us that denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age.

So here's a very important question to close. What are the ungodly things and what are the worldly desires that the Lord is instructing you this morning to deny? I didn't talk about anything applicational, but you know what they are in your hearts that is helping to just mar your understanding of the grace of God. God didn't save you to excuse your current sins. He saved you to put your former self to death. Amen. God has saved you from the worthless stuff, for the stuff that's imperishable. God has saved you so that you would no longer exchange the glory of the incorruptible God for images made to look like four-footed animals and beasts.

So what are the ungodly things or the worldly things that are causing you to forget? That's causing you to look back toward Egypt, back to slavery, and not looking forward to the promised land. May we live with sofrona. Remember that? Sensibility. Here it is again. May we reflect Christ in our righteousness in our godliness in this present age because soon and very soon, Titus 2.13, which is next week, the Lord's coming back. And when he comes back, I am so excited to hear, well done, my good and faithful slave, my beloved son. Enter into the joy of your God and Father. Let's go. There are many, many rooms.

You will never tire, you will never sleep, you will never weep, you will never mourn, you will never miss out on anything because you will know God without sin. So while we wait, let us live sensibly, righteously and godly. Amen. Let's pray. Lord, grant us the grace not to forget what we've heard. Grant us the kindness to be uncomfortable as we think about the things that we need to recalibrate and repent of. Help us, Lord, to understand the riches of your grace. Help us never to turn the grace of God into an excuse to sin. Bless and minister in and through us for the sake of your namesake. And we pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.