There is a doctrine found in the Bible that is called “Prevenient Grace”. It says that before a man can seek God, God must first have sought the man.
The only reason that any man can be saved and know God is that first the Lord must have pursued that man. If today you know Jesus Christ and have a personal relationship with Him, it is because He first pursued you. At some point after hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit, you responded in faith and believed that Jesus died for you and accepted Him as your Savior. The act of finding you so that you could respond is all the Lord’s and none of ours.
John 6:44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.
If you have an urge to know the Lord, that urging originated with God, not you. This is important that we understand this basic principle in our salvation, that we “Received it” from the Lord, we did not earn it or merit it.
1 Corinthians 4:7 For who makes you differ from another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?
The entire work of salvation from beginning to end comes from the Lord, not from men. If a man is saved and has his sins forgiven, it is because the Lord gave him the ability to see his sin, repent and receive eternal life.
Ephesians 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
A. W. Tozer said that “The impulse to pursue God originates with God.
Today in the church it is being implied or openly taught that a person can work towards eternal life or achieve it by good works. If this were possible then there would have been no need for Jesus to come at all. The fact was that we were all helpless and hopeless before Jesus died for us, to do anything that could bring us into a right relationship with God.
Even more amazing to me is the fact that before God ever planned the creation of man, He knew in advance that man would sin and be hopeless and lost forever if God did not do something to rescue him.
Jesus is spoken of as being “The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world…” (Revelation 13:8)
In the plan of man’s creation, Jesus stepped forward and volunteered to be the fail-safe backup to rescue man when he failed. God did this not because man was worthy of redemption, but because He was desiring to display to all of creation His Grace, Mercy and Love.
It was not the Father’s love that saved us, it was His Mercy and Grace working together for the intended purpose of displaying who He is to all creation.
Ephesians 3:8-11 To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord,
1 Corinthians 2:7-8 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
2 Timothy 1:9 who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began…
It is clear in the Bible that God’s purpose for man was to display His great power and Mercy by creating a race of being who He knew in advance would sin, and then planning in advance to die for the sins of His fallen beings and thereby show to all creation how Marvelous and Holy He is.
If we begin to feel some sense of pride that we had anything to do with the fact that our sins are forgiven, then we are vastly in error. From start to finish, all that we have in our great Salvation came by God, through Jesus Christ to us without any effort or merit from us whatsoever.
“But I turned from my sin, I gave up my old life for Jesus, I have given up so much to follow Jesus Christ”
Really! We gave up nothing except that the Lord first drew us into a relationship with Himself that required a repentance from the past life. If He had not sent His Spirit to draw us, not one of us would ever be saved.
Von Hugel said it like this “God is always previous”. That is, God is always there long before we ever make a move in His direction to draw us to Himself.
After the Lord has done this work of drawing us to Himself, it is then our responsibility to respond to His urging.
The work of man to pursue God after God has drawn him is where the problem lies. Man does not want to pursue God. In his fallen condition he is focused on himself. All of his thoughts are upon his pleasure and his will, not the pleasure of will of God or any other person.
Today people are taught in the church that if they will just “Come to Jesus and accept Him as their Lord and Savior, they will be saved”. Now that statement is absolutely true, but there is much missing that should be added to this truth.
After a person comes to Jesus Christ for Forgiveness of sin and salvation, without further instruction to pursue God every waking moment of their life, the person is left with a sterile, mechanical process. This is the problem with religion in that it teaches men that they must come to God, but not what to do afterwards.
Today in the church “Altar Calls”, very often there is no instruction in the surrender of the old life of self. No encouragement to pursue a relationship with God with every fiber of one’s being. A person can go on loving their self and not understand that the course of their life from the point of receiving Jesus is to pursue falling in Love with Jesus.
Until a man has fallen in Love with Jesus his attempts at changing his life or continuing in a relationship with God are frustrating and tiring.
To take the time to get to know the Jesus of the Bible, who He is, what He has said, what He has done. To know the person of Jesus as a Man is the desired goal of everyone who first comes to Him at all.
Whenever we develop strong feelings for any person, we first must have spent time with that person. To know someone is to love them. To dig deep into who that person is, brings up the wellspring of emotions that unite our heart to theirs.
Mary is held out to us in the scripture as one who was content to sit at the feet of Jesus and just be with Him. Martha was like most of us in that she was focused on what needed to be done.
When Martha came to Jesus and asked Him to scold her sister Mary who was not helping her, Jesus explained to Martha that Mary had “found the good part”. To just sit at Jesus feet and partake of Him is the ultimate goal that all of us should pursue.
God is a person and as such, a relationship with Him must be cultivated and worked on every day. Not from the Lord’s perspective for He always has time for us and constantly desires fellowship with us. We are the ones who are persistently distracted and moved by things other than the presence of our Lord. If there will be fellowship with God, it must come from our movement towards Him, for He never moves from His place next to us.
Jeremiah 29:13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.
Our God waits for us to want Him. He stands still alongside us while we run to and fro over the whole earth seeking something that will satisfy us. While all the time, standing near is all that we really need, all that we are desiring.
One thing that David had perfected amongst all his other faults was that He knew where his soul would be satisfied.
Psalms 42:1-2 As the deer pants for the water brooks, So pants my soul for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?
May this week we find that all that we have in our Salvation and hope of eternal life, came by the persistent and loving and merciful work of Jesus. That the pursuit of a close relationship with Jesus should be our constant goal and direction. That if we find we are dry and empty and searching for meaning in our life, is begins with a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and no other way.
He is waiting at this moment for you to want Him… draw near and find your completion.
May the Lord continue to bless you as you seek Him with all of your heart.
Pastor Rob Robinson
