Parresia · Let’s Keep the Amazing in Grace, Session 1: The Gospel Plain and Simple

Synopsis of “Let’s Keep the Amazing in Grace”

This study will be boiled down, but not watered down.

Session 1 is entitled “The Gospel, Plain and Simple,” and I will share my own testimony and define the “Gospel” in a nutshell.

Session 2 is “God’s Great Demonstration of Love” where I’ll talk about the greatest demonstration of love in the history of the world: the cross of Jesus Christ, and we’ll see in the scriptures that because of the cross, God is not counting our sins against us.

Session 3 is “The Two Adams” where I will explain federal headship and difference between self-righteousness vs Christ’s righteousness 

Session 4 is “Grace vs Law,” where I will teach from Romans 5 to Romans 6 about the abundance of grace and what it means to be “dead to sin” and alive to Christ.

Session 5 is “Living from the Inside Out” where we’ll look at Romans 7 and Colossians 2 and talk about spiritual circumcision; identity in Christ, spirit/soul/body and what it means to be joined to Jesus with His life living through us by the Holy Spirit

Session 6 is “Jesus Unveiled” – a glorious teaching from 2 Corinthians 3 about the contrast between the “letter that kills,” the “Spirit the gives life,” and what happens when the veil of condemnation is removed, and we see the face of Jesus as in a mirror.

Session 7 is entitled “Father Abraham” – this is where we’ll see why he’s the father of our faith and what the righteousness of faith is. We’ll look into Romans 4 and Galatians 3 at the unconditional, unbreakable covenant of grace that God made with His own Son on our behalf. 

Session 8 is “Undiluted Grace” where we’ll all become radical grace lovers who are ready to boldly share the pure Gospel as righteous sons and daughters of God. We’ll study several passages in Galatians.

Session 9 is “Entering the Holiest” where we’ll go verse-by-verse mainly in Hebrews 10 to immerse ourselves in consciousness of Jesus and learn about His eternal blood which has washed our sins away forever.

Session 10 will be “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” and my absolute favorite teachings about rest and peace. Once you have the revelation of God’s grace, you will find rest for your soul and live in peace – shalom – nothing missing, nothing broken.

My Testimony

READ 9 PAGES FROM UNVEILING JESUS BOOK, INTRODUCTION, MY TESTIMONY:

Several years ago, I was “successful” in ministry according to any-one’s standards of measurement. I wrote Bible studies on deliverance and prayer and led conferences that thousands of people participated in. The numbers were good, the momentum was strong, and there was no reason to doubt that the future would be bright. At least that’s how it appeared. Yet, with the prospect of such a promising future how and why had I become so discontented? 

I was frustrated … stirred to the point of almost exploding … so miserable and burnt out … struggling with my thoughts and desperate for the joy of my salvation to return … Fasting, praying, worshipping, serving God and the church more and more, trying to fix myself…

And then someone shared a song with me entitled, “Not Guilty Anymore” by Aaron Keyes. The first time I listened to it, something amazing began to happen: my heart began to soften as the truth captured in the song washed over me. Some of the phrases from the song that touched me so deeply said: 

It doesn’t matter what you’ve done; 

It doesn’t matter where you’re coming from;

Doesn’t matter where you’ve been;

Hear me tell you I forgive. 

You’re not guilty anymore, You’re not filthy anymore, 

I love you, mercy is yours, You’re not broken anymore.

Can you believe that this is true?Grace abundant I am giving you.

(Keyes, Aaron. “Not Guilty Anymore.” Revive. Integrity Music, 2009)

The lyrics of the song went on with a similar theme to remind me that I am spotless, holy, faultless, whole, righteous, blameless, pardoned, and His forever. I listened to that song hundreds of times over the coming months. No exaggeration, I listened to the song in the car. I listened to it at home. I sang it from the top of my lungs everyday. It was so much a part of all my daily activities that I made everyone else listen to it, too. In fact, it became the theme song of my ministry during that season. I played it at every prayer meeting, every planning meeting, every training meeting, at the conference. But the song was mostly for me. My hard heart was breaking. All my own efforts to “fix myself ” were beginning to crumble as I began to understand who I was in Christ. 

As weeks turned into months, my heart became more pliable and I was encouraged by what was happening in my life. I was starting to feel alive again spiritually, not realizing that all of this was only preparation for what was ahead.

Then … a few months later, it happened: an encounter with the Lord like I had never had. I was on the beach walking and praying after listening to a message called, “Let’s Put the Amazing Back into Grace.” Someone had shared the CD with me before I left for my vacation. Normally I wouldn’t even have listened to this message — people were always giving me stuff to listen to or read and I never “had time,” but God had another plan and this time I listened. The message was on grace, and I had never heard the clarity of the Gospel taught like this before. So much of what I heard in that message was what we would say in church, and it was terminology I had used my entire life as a Christian. Yes, the words were familiar but the message was different … very different.

At that time in my Christian life I was in the habit of praying what was called the “Tabernacle Prayer Format.” It’s a method of praying where we would symbolically start at the “gate” and end up in the “holy of holies.” There we could experience the presence of the Lord. It was “seven steps to the presence of God” and was patterned after the Tabernacle system of priestly sacrifices in the Old Testament. The prayer format included lots of confession of sins and asking for forgiveness, and praying things like, “Search me and know my heart, Lord. Let me know if there is any wicked way in me.” After listening to the message on grace, my eyes were beginning to open to this marvelous revelation on the Gospel, and somehow I felt ten-sion in my prayer format. Were there seven steps to the presence of God? I asked the Lord, “Where is the moment of encounter with the Spirit of Grace in my prayer format?” I was getting very close to the encounter with Jesus that I had been waiting for my entire forty-five years of life. 

I could sense the presence of the Lord walking with me on the beach, and I heard Him say, “Start at the brazen altar.” Eager to obey, I did that. I saw my sin being punished in the body of Jesus. 

I saw the enormity of His sacrifice and the absoluteness of God’s forgiveness. I was touched more deeply than ever before as I let this truth penetrate my heart. After years of teaching others, I was finally getting it myself! I said, “Lord, is this it? Is this the encounter with Grace?” I was a blank slate, and it was as if I was starting all over.

He said, “No, the brazen altar is My mercy. I took the punishment that you deserved. Go on to the laver.” The laver in the Old Testament tabernacle was a large bowl, lined with mirrors and filled with water that stood outside the entrance to a tent, which was comprised of two parts, the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies. So the priest would have to wash in the laver before he could take one more step towards the presence of the Lord.

I started my routine “approach-the-laver” prayer: “Search me and know my heart and let me know if there is any wicked way in me…”  However, it seemed inappropriate to pray that way because I had just seen the Lamb of God take away my sins at the brazen altar. The Lord said, “STOP praying that, and just look down in the bowl.”  

I stopped and looked down and was blown away. It was the most  pivotal moment of my entire life — and continues to be even to this day! I felt like I was born again at that moment! The joy of my salvation returned in an instant! As I looked down through the water into the mirrors of the laver, I saw what Jesus saw: perfected, blameless beauty. It was glorious. And then I was speechless. “But Lord, (and I motioned back to the brazen altar) but Lord! Look at all my sin! This can’t be!” He smiled at me. 

I looked at Him and I said, “I don’t deserve this. This can’t be right! This is the most unfair thing I have ever seen!” All of a sudden my first love returned, and I exclaimed, “I love You, Lord. I love You! I will do ANYTHING for You. I want to live for You forever.” His response: “Tricia, I just want you to rest.” All of the pressure I had felt disappeared. All the heavy burdens fell off, and I felt so free that it seemed almost like I could fly. For me at last there was no more “HAVE to” … no more duty-bound obligations. The need for man’s approval, all the exhaustion, the do-do-do mentality, the need to please the Lord all dropped off of my shoulders. With that freedom came the realization that He was pleased with me and had been all along. Nothing else mattered to me at that moment except His love, His acceptance, and His approval. 

On the beach that day, Jesus gave me revelation of the great New Covenant reality: by His blood all my sin has been removed. All of my condemnation was nailed to the cross. Now I was like Him, raised and seated in heavenly places. I had known the theological facts, but I encountered the Person of Grace, and my spiritual eyes were opened. In that glorious moment my life changed forever.

Every day since then has been a more amazing day than the one before. Each day has been full of joy explosions on the inside — even when I have messed up, even when I have had trials, even when I have been hurt by others. Ever since that day, I have been hidden in the secure, peaceful wings of my Father. I am under Grace. I am not perfect in my behavior, but I can say this: I am learning what it means to love Jesus with all my heart, all my mind, all my soul, and all my strength as I experience His love for me. However, I am no longer laboring to convince Him or anyone else of that. I love Him that way because I now know that He loved me that way when He took all my  sins away and died in my place, and He continues to love me that way every second of every day. I am in a forever season of gratefulness. 

Now I know there is only ONE step to the presence of God: the cross of Jesus Christ. The veil has been torn, and I’ve entered into God’s presence. Now I’m inside … forever.

Colossians 1:22-23, NLT – Yet now He has reconciled you to Himself [past tense] through the death of Christ in His physical body. As a result, He has brought you into His own presence [right now!], and you are holy and blameless as you stand before Him [present tense] without a single fault. 23 But you must continue to believe this truth and stand firmly in it. [Let’s Keep the Amazing in Grace!] Don’t drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News

A flash of light

This truth  came as a flash of light, and what I saw I can never unsee ::: I was perfect in His eyes.  Jesus looks at me and says,

Song of Solomon 4:7 — You are all fair, my love, And there is no spot in you.

When I look in the face of Jesus, I see what I have become in Him. You see, Grace is not just a doctrine to me. Grace is a Person and His name is Jesus. If you want to know who God is and what His will is, then, look at Jesus! It’s impossible to see Jesus healing the sick, feeding the hungry, and delivering those in bondage, defending those who have been accused and rejected, and then wonder what the Father’s will is.

John 14:9 – [Jesus said] “He who has seen Me has seen the Father.”

Colossians 1:15 – He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God…

Hebrews 1:3- He [Jesus] is the radiance of His [God’s] glory and the exact representation of His nature.

The Gospel – Romans 1:16-17

Now  – the “Gospel” – 

Romans 1:16 – [Paul said -] For I am not ashamed of the gospel [the good news] of Christ, [I am not ashamed to say that my standing with God has nothing to do with my performance.] for it is the power of God [power – “dunamis” in the Greek from which we get the word “dynamite,”] to salvation for everyone who believes, [for everyone who puts their full hope, trust, and confidence in it (pisteo)] for the Jew first and also for the Greek.

Salvation – the noun “soteria” in the Greek – same root as the verb “sozo” – is not only your “get-out-of-hell-free card, it’s your peace, wholeness, provision, health, and deliverance. The Gospel is not about what you can do for Jesus. The Gospel is what He has already done for you.  The Gospel is that Jesus knew me before I were born, Jesus loved me before I loved Him, Jesus came as me, Jesus died as me, Jesus rose as me so I can be as He is – seated at the right hand of God as a perfectly righteous daughter of God. That’s the Gospel. Jesus served you. He came down, stooped down, and made you one with Him.

Romans 1:17 – For in it [the salvation that comes from believing the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed [not our own righteousness, the gift of Christ’s righteousness.] from faith to faith; as it is written, “The just [the righteous] shall live by faith.” [not by works, by faith]

“RIghteousness” means right standing and relationship with God. To believe that you are in right standing with God all day every minute of every day takes faith! WHY must it be by faith? Because every day you will look into the mirror see evidence to the contrary. That’s why it must be revealed by the Holy Spirit from faith to faith. Grace doesn’t make sense to the natural mind. All we understand is deductive reasoning which says, “Do good, get good, feel good about yourself. Do bad get bad, feel bad about yourself.” 

Every religion believes that we should get the good we have earned and the bad we deserve. Only the Gospel of grace tells us that 

• we get the good we could never earn, and 
• we never have to get the bad that we deserve. It’s scandalous. 

Grace tells us that when we fall flat on our face in our failures and sins, Jesus’ perfect performance  on our behalf gives us the freedom to stand back up, brush ourselves off, look to Him, say “thank you,” and then keep on moving forward. God’s children are not perfectly behaved people. God’s throne is called “grace.” Grace is undeserved favor. So the only criterion to receiving it is realizing that you need it and you can’t earn it! If this offends you, then this study might not be for you. But I assure you, I will not be making light of sin because grace doesn’t make light of sin. Grace makes much of Jesus.

If you think that sin is a small matter, look at the cross. Only the horror of the cross can give you a true estimate of the cost of of sin. Christ crucified. Think about it – what did mankind think of God’s only begotten, beloved Son? They put Him on a cross – suspended between heaven and earth, not considered worthy of either. But What did God think of man? He sent His Son for us! So unfair!!!! It should take our breath away! That’s why – 

1 Corinthians 2:2 – For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. [two things: the Person and the finished work of Jesus.]

Woman caught in adultery

That day in 2010, my heart broke wide open, and I felt like I was born again again. Light flooded into my heart, and I felt alive again after many years of burn out.  God did that. I did nothing, but come to the end of myself.

2 Corinthians 4:6 – For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 

Light – revelation – the ability to spiritually see Jesus – who He is, what He has done, and who we are in Him – is what I have been praying for the last 3 years. That’s almost all I’ve done. I pray, “Father, will You command Light to shine out of darkness?  Will You shine the Light of the knowledge of Your glory in hearts across the world? Will You open our eyes to Jesus?”

What does the glory of God – the goodness of God in the widest sense – look like? It looks like the face of Jesus Christ. What is in the face of Jesus? In His face is the Light that reveals the grace of God.

In John 8, Jesus identified Himself as the “Light of the World” in the context of the account of the woman caught in adultery – a woman who saw the glory of God in the face of Jesus. Jesus demonstrated with her that He didn’t come to shine a light on sin, but to reveal His grace.  The pharisees drug this woman in the street in front of Jesus, and they tried to back Him in a corner to see if He would obey the law and command that she be stoned. 

John 8:6 – But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear.

Think about what He was doing – writing on the stoney ground of Jerusalem. Where is the only other place you see the finger of God writing on stone? It was God writing the 10 Commandments! (Ex31:18; Deut. 9:10).

It was as if He saying, “You presume to tell Me about the law? I’m the One who wrote the law. Let Me give you the purity of the law!” The purity of the law shuts every mouth. The purity of the law makes everyone guilty!

John 8:7-8 – So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.” 8 And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. [I guess the older they were, the more guilt they had piled up.]

Being convicted in their conscience of their hypocrisy, they fled. The Light of the World showed up, the stones dropped and darkness fled.  And then there were only two people left – the woman and Jesus. There is only one Person who could have thrown a stone at her – the One without sin – but He did not. Jesus COULD have, but He wouldn’t. The pharisees WOULD have, but they couldn’t.

John 8:9-11 – And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 10 When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, “Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?”  [I think He asked her that because He wanted her to hear herself say out of her own mouth] 11 She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.” 

So many believe that if you just stop sinning, you won’t be condemned. But that’s backwards. Jesus puts no condemnation first! Man tries to put no sin first. But what God puts first, let’s not put second.

The power to “go and sin no more” is in the “Neither do I condemn you!” The power to go and sin no more is in the Gospel of grace!!! If people knew there is no condemnation when they fail – that in Christ there is no judgment, no shame, no reproach, then they will go and sin no more. Think of this as you ponder this story: Jesus didn’t use the law with this woman. He didn’t bring up the commandment, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” He didn’t use the ministry of death and condemnation as Paul called it. in 2 Corinthians 3. He was preoccupied with her freedom from condemnation, not her sin.

John 8:12 – Then Jesus spoke to them [the people] again, saying, “I am the light of the world. [In the context of defending this woman and running off her accusers who were wielding the weapon of the law, He identified Himself as the “Light of the World.” In other words, “I have come to reveal to you the heart, nature, and will of God and who He really is.” Then Jesus said – ] He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”

Where was Jesus headed? If they followed Him, where would He lead them? He was on assignment from His Father, headed to the cross, where He would bear our sin and shame. All of our sin and shame would go in the grave with Him, and He would rise again without it, and then He would carry us from darkness to light.

Colossians 1:13-14 – He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.

Jesus was saying this: the place of no condemnation in Me is the place of light! And you don’t need to be afraid of that light anymore because when you step into that light, it doesn’t show your sin. It only shows the power of the blood of Jesus to remove your sin.

In John 8:12 the phrase “shall not” in “shall not walk in darkness” is the Greek phrase “ou mē” meaning  “He who follows Me to the cross and is crucified with Me can never, certainly not, ever, by any means, shall not walk in darkness.” Today for the believer who is in Christ, it is impossible for your spirit to be in darkness because your spirit is forever joined to His. As long as Jesus doesn’t sin and Jesus doesn’t die, you are joined to Him in the Spirit. You have already been conveyed into the kingdom of God’s beloved Son. We may sin in the flesh, and we may participate in the works of darkness, but that does not mean our spirit is in darkness. It just means we have forgotten who we are!

Ephesians 5:8 – For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. [That’s who you are!] Walk as children of light.

Under Grace

My goal for all of us in this study is to receive and keep on receiving the greatest love gift in the history of the world: the gift of Christ’s righteousness which brings us into union with God, and the superabundance of His grace so that we will reign in life.  Under Grace, you will be freer than you could ever imagine. You will have – 

• nothing to hide,
• nothing to prove,
• nothing to gain, (Why? because you have it all in Jesus!)
• nothing to lose, (you won’t care about your reputation anymore)
• no one to convince, (God can handle that!)
• no one to impress. (Because the only One who matters thinks you’re pretty awesome)
• You don’t need followers because you are secure in Him
• You don’t need man’s approval.
• You don’t need a position or a title.
• You are filled with joy
• You are marked with peace.
• You are resting in the finished work of Jesus
• You are free to serve and free to love
• You ares confident in your identity in Christ
• You are free to succeed because you’re free to fail. There’s a safety net of grace, and His name is Jesus.

And the biggest one is this: you are free to hear the voice OF the Holy Spirit for yourself!  The gospel of grace transforms us into eagles who soar!

Copyright info: All scriptures in the New King James Version unless otherwise noted.

• (NKJV) New King James Version. Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.
• (NLT) Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright ©1996, 2004, 2007, 2013 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.