George Carlin was a well-known comedian back in the ‘70’s who did a piece on the "7 Dirty Words you cannot say on TV"; and to hear many professing 'Christians' chime in these days, you might wonder if they think George should have included an 8th word, ‘obey’.

When and how did the word ‘o-b-e-y’ become such an inappropriate word to be taken seriously by all those ‘believers’ who claim to be ‘saved by faith through grace, and not of works, lest anyone should boast’? (Eph. 2:8-9).

To hear some explain it, obedience equates with ‘legalism’ which automatically throws you into the category of Pharisees and other ‘religions’ where the multitudes think they can ‘save themselves’ by their ‘good deeds and works’.

God made it known through Samuel long ago: “Does the Lord have as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than a sacrifice, And to pay attention is better than the fat of rams.” (1 Sam. 15:22)

When did God change? “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” (John 14:15)

Christ became the source of eternal salvation to all who ‘obey’ Him. (Heb. 5:9)

Friends, I’ll be honest with you here- I am no ‘theologian’, nor am I entertained by engaging in ‘theological debates’. I am not ‘well read’ by most people’s standards when it comes to studying ‘theology’... so I can’t quote lots of impressive sayings by many of those beloved authors who are out there today. What I will tell you though is in the past 6 years, I have spent much time buried in this Bible of mine and have learned more in the past few years than I did the previous 40 years after first picking up a Bible. And if I’ve learned nothing else, I’ve discovered there is a whole lot of ‘other verses’ in there that we who profess to believe this is God’s word...would do well to go back and re-examine. I’ll also add I feel like I’m barely scratching the surface of what I’ve learned.

I shared with you the past two days, a good number of those verses as I challenged us all to ask two very important questions regarding our ‘theology’ or our personal beliefs. The first question was - Do you believe we can separate this idea of Jesus being our ‘Savior’ and ‘Lord’, where the ‘lordship thing ‘is some kind of holy option for super saints? I suppose another way of saying this would be - does ‘believing’ factor in more with our faith than ‘doing/obeying’? Has it not dawned on us yet that maybe ‘obedience is the fruit of our faith’, if Hebrews 3:17-19 counts for anything?

The other question I posed was a spin-off from the sobering qualification Jesus made as to who would enter the kingdom of heaven, and He said it wasn’t about ‘saying or believing’, but rather all about ‘doing’ the will of God (Matt. 7:21). Which led me to ask- ‘what is the will of God’? (Yesterday’s message). And as promised, I said I would address the question many who might be reading find themselves asking...’where and how does ‘faith and grace’ figure in to all this? That’s a great question, especially if you have tattooed (figuratively) Eph. 2:8-9 into your brain. I made reference to that passage in the second paragraph above.

Before I discuss this idea of ‘grace’, it might help us to better understand what it means to be ‘saved’ (or what we are ‘saved’ from); and to better define what ‘salvation’ actually means. If you are in the camp that understands ‘salvation’ to mean you have secured a reservation in heaven after you die...because you have ‘trusted Christ’ or made a ‘profession of faith’, affirming that you believe Jesus is the Son of God who died on a cross for your sins and was raised from the dead three days later...then you might want to consider another look at what salvation means.

All of humanity was under a ‘curse’, because of sin, and the wrath of God was upon us all, hence our need for a Savior. (John 3:17-18, 36; Rom. 5:12; Rom. 3:23,6:23; Eph. 2:1-3).

Jesus came to save us from the wrath of God (Rom. 5:9).

And may I state ‘for the record’... all of us are/were incapable of ‘saving’ ourselves... no matter how hard we try or how sincere we may be. It is only by His grace that any of us are, or can be ‘saved’. The problem is, many, many people have been misled to believe that ‘grace’ was/is some sort of mystical ‘covering of immunity’ that God kindly bestowed upon a select group that made one immune to His wrath, regardless of what they did or failed to do, when it comes to ‘sinning’.

Paul even warned of the plethora of ‘other gospels’ that would arrive on the scene and deceive people in the same manner in which Eve was deceived by the serpent (2 Cor. 11:3-4). Remember that story? Satan basically convinced her that she/they could still eat off that tree (sin) and they would ‘surely not die’ (Gen. 2:17; 3:4), regardless of what God may have told them previously.

Here's a novel idea to consider: What if ‘grace’...instead of it being some invisible cloak that made you invincible towards God’s wrath, was actually a ‘secret super pill’ that empowered us as followers of Jesus to overcome all sin, to walk free of sin, so that the ‘enemy could not touch us’ (1 John 5:18)...since sin ‘brings death’ and can open the door for ‘worse things to happen to us’ if/when we do sin. (John 5:14; Matt. 12:43-45; 1 Cor. 11:30-32)

If that is the case, then clearly...without this ‘super pill’ of grace, we would all be doomed since ‘all have sinned’. But if we could actually be freed from the grip of sin, which the Bible clearly indicates...then it makes sense that it is only by His grace we could go and ‘sin no more’, therefore escaping the wrath that still comes when God’s laws are broken, which is what ‘sin’ is. (1 John 3:4; John 5:14;Rom. 4:15)

“For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law but under grace” Rom. 6:14. But let’s not forget...in order for this ‘super pill’ of grace to work, you have to follow Jesus, which means ‘do the things’ He tells us to do. (Gal. 5:18; Luke 6:46; John 2:5; 10:27).

Imagine that!