We don't just try God. We receive the Spirit within us. We don't test and try. We don't just try faith. We're either in faith or we're not in faith. We either believe God or we don't believe God. There is the scripture concerning tithing that says test Me, prove Me and try Me in this and see if I won't do as I promise (paraphrased).
There are many "if you do this, then I'll do that..." conditional blessings God makes available for us to take advantage of. However, we cannot try the foundational truths of God. We're either saved or we're lost. We're either in faith or in fear. We either accept the grace or refuse it. There is no middle ground.
Let me ask you something. How are you judging your faith? Are you judging it on whether a storm came or not? Are you one who would say, "I believed God would take care of me. Then I went out and got in my car and the engine threw a rod. I guess faith just doesn't work"?
Well big deal! Your car throwing a rod has nothing to do with faith. Faith has to do with how you react when your car throws a rod. Faith has to do with whether you kick it and cuss and act like a fool. Faith is when you say, "Father, in the name of Jesus, I ask for Your grace to get my transportation lined out. Thank you for giving me Your grace."
God will give you grace. Then you've got to believe He gave it to you. That's where faith comes in. He can give you the grace, but you will make the grace of no effect if you don't believe and walk in faith. Some people say, "Well, I tried grace." Grace is not something you try. You accept it by faith.
"And with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And great grace was upon them all" (Acts 4:33). Where do you think that power came from? It came from the great grace of God. It's nothing they worked up. They didn't just decide they were going to be spiritual hot shots and go around and heal a bunch of people.
They didn't get their heads together and say, "Look at that guy over there. Wouldn't it be cool if we went over there and healed that guy." No, they were led by the Holy Spirit. The grace of God moved upon them and they received the power to do the things God wanted them to do.
"Therefore they stayed there a long time, speaking boldly in the Lord, who was bearing witness to the word of His grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands" (Acts 14:3). Wow! He was bearing witness to the word of His grace. So don't worry; just be led by the Spirit. God will not fail you! He has great, unlimited grace for you.
When we are born again, we are born righteous. We are made righteous and we work toward holiness. Being righteous gives us the right to stand before God. When we get saved (born again), we are entitled to go to God, stand in the presence of the Father in the name of Jesus, and make our petitions known.
How do we become righteous? We become righteous by being born again. When we're born again, we are born righteous.
Hebrews 5:13 says, "For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness…." What does that mean? Being unskilled in the word of righteousness means that you do not understand you became righteous when you were saved, so you try to accomplish righteousness through your works. It means you don't understand that you can go boldly before the throne of grace and say, "Father, in the name of Jesus, I ask for Your grace in this situation."
If you do not know you are in right standing with God, if you do not know you can go before the Father and He will by grace meet your need, then you are unskilled in the word of righteousness.
This is an excerpt from Larry Ollison's book "Discover the Power of Grace in Righteousness, Copyright © 2000.
All rights reserved. Used by permission.
