The Most Thrilling Ride
What’s the most amazing ride you’ve every been on? It isn’t really a ride, but I’ve been skydiving 3 time and it was terrifying in the best possible way. Imagine reverse sky diving; being ripped from low to high, from the Dead Sea to Mt. Everest like a rocket ship. What a thrilling ride that would be! But it wouldn’t come close to the ride that Ephesians 2 takes us on. In verses 1-3, we are at the Dead Sea, at the lowest point possible. And then, in a few words, we are ripped from death to the highest possible place. It’s an amazing ride! What’s so amazing about it?
A Free Gift (not dependent on our goodness)
Ephesians 2:8 says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” This sounds great! A free gift! Who wouldn’t want that? Well, a lot of people apparently. The gospels are full of people who didn’t want the free gift that Jesus was offering, but wanted to earn something from God instead. From the rich young ruler to Jesus’ stories of the prodigal son’s older brother and the Pharisee coming to the temple to pray, we see that we as people can be very, very confident in our own ability to work for God’s blessing. But what we see clearly in Ephesians 2 is that we can’t earn it, even if we try. It’s a free gift, and no one is going to boast that they earned it from God. How exciting is that?!? If you’re striving, clawing, working every single day to try to earn God’s favor, the good news for you is that there’s not enough good that you could even do to earn God’s gift! It’s free, or it’s nothing.
God’s The Gift Giver (and He’s super rich)
Ephesians 2:4 says, “But God, being rich in mercy…” We know what it means to be rich; God is loaded, overflowing with something that’s enough for everyone. What is it? It’s mercy, and grace. God’s loaded with it. I once heard a podcast host say, “Well I decided a long time ago that there wasn’t a big man upstairs so even if I’m wrong, after the way I’ve lived my life for the last 20 years, he wouldn’t want anything to do with me!” What he doesn’t realize is that, even though he really is guilty of a ton, God has more mercy than any of else have guilt. In fact, everything in the world depends on God having more mercy than we have guilt. We can never be to broken, our life be too messy, our relationships be too drama-filled, our past be too sketchy, or our hidden sins be too ugly for God not to have mercy and grace for us. He is super rich in them, and He’s giving them out freely.
There’s No Catch (except our joy)
I’m sure you’re thinking, “This sounds great and all, but what’s the catch? What do I actually have to do?” When most people hear about God’s “free gift” of salvation and forgiveness through Jesus, they assume they know the catch. They think the catch is that they have to give Him their whole life right now, right? They have to stop doing certain things and start coming to church all the time and hanging out with goofy church people in their living room playing Settlers of Catan. They have to start giving my money to the church, and serving, and eventually the pastor’s going to come up and ask them to be on some leadership team and plant a church and be a missionary and die poor in Papua New Guinea. That’s the catch, right? Romans 11 says, “But if it [salvation] is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.” This tells us that if we try to work for it, to work it off, or work to keep his free gift, then it’s no longer a gift of grace. The good news that there’s no catch with God. There are no strings attached! He’s not looking for a repayment. BUT, he does want our lives. He wants us to surrender our entire life to him. That sounds like obligation; like repayment. But look at Psalm 16:11, “You make known to me the path of life; in your present there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” God has made known to us the path of life, it’s Jesus. And through Jesus, we get to God. And with God, there is fullness of joy and pleasures forever.
This is an amazing, thrilling, unparalleled ride! It takes us from death to life, from bondage to freedom, from misery to joy, from lost to saved. Is this a ride you’ve taken? Have you experience the thrill of receiving God’s free gift of grace and mercy through Jesus? Nothing will make you happier, nothing more content, nothing more fulfilled than believing in Jesus and giving him your life.