Prevenient Grace

Sermon given at Sydenstricker UMC 9/2/18

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^NRS John 15:12 "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵ I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶ You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name.

When I was younger, much younger than today, I loved baseball. I tried out every year for Little League and then Pony League and so on. Each year I waited for that phone call. The phone call that said I was chosen to be on the team. When it happened, it was a happy time around the Jamison household. One year, I tried out for the majors while playing for the minors and I did not make it. It was a tough year to stomach but I learned from it. A number of years ago, I went up for Boards in the Annual Conference to become an Elder in the United Methodist Church. After 65 pages of work and 4 hours of interviews, again the same routine, waiting for the phone call. When it came, disappointment that I had succeeded in two areas but not all three. That feeling of being chosen is a great feeling when you are and a terrible feeling when you are not. God’s prevenient grace is the answer to that phone call you are waiting for.

Grace comes from the root word “Charis” which means gift and Prevenient means to come before. From those roots, we understand that prevenient grace means literally the gift that comes before. Of course that raises the questions, “what gift” and “before what”. The scripture reminds us that Jesus choose us before we ever chose Him. Every one of us this is a sinner. I love the parody of Jesus standing on the hill before the throngs of people and he says to them, “You are all sinners!” “There is no hope!” Adam sinned and the scripture tells us that as sin came into the world through one man death has spread through all of us because we all sin. We all fight over control of our lives and struggle with replacing our will with God’s will. The truth is that we really do not have a desire for repentance or for salvation. We are here and now people, much the same as the prodigal son, before he realized his error. That is precisely what Jesus is trying to tell us in this scripture, that we are to love one another and we have been chosen.

God wants us to know that God has chosen us and is reaching out to us even now to invite us into relationship with God. Isaiah says, ^NRS Isaiah 44:24 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, who formed you in the womb: I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who by myself spread out the earth;

Our scripture today wants us to know that it is by the grace of God alone that we can receive the promise of salvation. No matter how much you work at trying to eat the right things, dress the right way, pray as is proper and give your money and time to the poor, it is never going to be enough to bring about eternal salvation. Now I know that many of us believe that if we do the right things, if we give of ourselves in the right way and we help other people that it is enough. Paul says no it is not enough and yet we cannot do enough. So let us talk for a moment about what God’s gift looks like. God could see that original sin, that desire of us to be disobedient is inherent to our very nature. In other words, we have a constant desire to want what we want when we want it and we don’t want anyone else to tell us what to do. So something, that is part of our very existence, meaning that the inherent part of our disobedience is a part of creation itself. What came through creation could only be resolved through God. God had decreed that redemption, that forgiveness comes through sacrifice and over the centuries, that proclamation of God had become law. In order to bring about the redemption of each of us, God brought God into the world as a living sacrifice. Jesus went to the cross so that each of us could find a path to redemption and through our faith in Jesus on the cross; we have received the gift of grace. But it goes further than that. Through the resurrection, we have received the gift of eternal life. That gift is called grace.

John Wesley would share with us that there are stages along the way. You know that because we believe that this whole thing is a journey is one of the main reasons that I am a Methodist. We understand that there is one Grace, a gift of God that brings about salvations opportunity. But it starts when we are in the womb. Before we are even born, God tells us in Jeremiah, ^NRS Jeremiah 1:4 Now the word of the LORD came to me saying, ⁵ "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations." Before we are born God is alreasy working on us. We call this stage of Grace as Prevenient Grace, the phase where God is courting or wooing us into relationship with God.

Prevenient grace is the grace of God that was with us from the moment we are born. We experience God’s love through events, through others and through our study of God’s Word. Even when we refuse to accept this love, it is still there. I remember when God called me to the ministry. It was my senior year in High School. I could feel it! I knew that I was chosen. I wanted something else for my life so I ran from God’s call! Many do. Then again in 1981, an accident that should have taken my life left me feeling empty inside. As I began to explore that emptiness, I began to realize that God was calling again. My life was anything but Christian in those days. I cared more about myself than family. Whatever it took to succeed was my focus. Yet God called me! But I ran again! I realized later that God had been calling all along. I had my hands over my ears so I would not hear his call. This is Prevenient grace. No matter where you came from, no matter where you have traveled to, God’s love is still there, wooing, drawing, choosing you. Will you respond?  

  

We are Methodists. And we believe that it is grace alone that brings about our salvation. In Galatians we read that we cannot nullify the grace of God, for if justification, our term for salvation comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing. In other words, if we were perfectly able to secure our salvation through Good Works and obedience to the law, why would God need to send Jesus in the first place? And likewise in Ephesians, “⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God-- ⁹ not the result of works, so that no one may boast.”

But Jesus does not leave it there. He tells us in the scripture today that we are chosen and appointed by Him, to go and bear fruit, the fruit that will last. Prevenient grace is the first step in a longer journey.

Reverend Billy Sunday, a great evangelist, passed away and found himself at the gates of heaven. Saint Peter came to the gates and told him that he could gain admittance if he could get 100 points. Well Reverend Sunday said, I have personally been an evangelist that brought over ten thousand people to Christ. St. Peter smiled and said, that’s worth 1 point. Well Reverend Sunday began to panic a bit, 1 point, only one point. SO he told St. Peter, well I tried to live a reverent and Christian life. St. Peter smiled and said that was worth 1 point. Now Reverend Sunday was truly concerned. All that is only worth 2 points. How will I ever get into heaven, he said. He cried out in anguish, if that is only worth 2 points then only by the grace of God can, I get into heaven. Ding, ding, ding went the bell and the gates opened.