Beginning several years ago, every time I would hear it preached or taught that God wouldn't heal Paul of his thorn in the flesh, something grieved me in my spirit. Deep down inside I got a sick feeling.

You see, God leads us by our spirits. God's Spirit bears witness with our spirit to lead and guide us into all truth. "Those that are led by the Spirit of God, those are the sons of God."

Every time someone said that God's grace meant that God was saying no to Paul, something went off in my spirit man and said "That's not right! God is not saying no."

The Lord began to deal with me to begin studying God's Word concerning grace and to get understanding of exactly what God's grace is and how we appropriate it. The Holy Spirit is our greatest teacher.

Jesus sent us the Holy Spirit to lead us and to guide us so that we can know the truth and have understanding. The Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit and reveals the deep things of God to us.

One day I was driving down the interstate highway between Kansas City and St. Louis. I was praying in the Spirit (in other tongues) and meditating on the Word of God.

I had just preached a message earlier that week on God's grace and I had a desire to get an even better understanding of it. Suddenly the Spirit of the Lord began to speak to me and teach me about God's grace.

Now the Lord had already taught me some things about grace, and I had learned many things about grace from the Word of God but on this particular night the Holy Spirit gave me clarity of understanding on the subject. This is what the Holy Spirit taught me.

The Lord told me that:

Grace is the container that contains or holds everything that God has already freely given us. Everything that has already been freely given to men by God is contained in His grace. The Holy Spirit told me to picture a box; a gift box if you will, and picture everything Christ did for us at Calvary put in this gift box. Salvation from sin. Salvation from sickness. Salvation from poverty.

The Holy Spirit told me that everything He has already freely given to man is contained in that gift box of grace. He said that not only is everything that He has already freely given us contained in His grace but that everything He does freely give individuals is also contained in His grace. These gifts, that He does freely give individuals, would include ministry gifts, gifts of the Spirit, and other special gifts that God gives to individuals at His discretion. The Holy Spirit said that faith is the hand that reaches in to the box to take out and take possession of what God has already freely given us.

So you see, ALL the promises in the Word of God that He has already freely given us are contained in His grace. The baptism in the Holy Spirit is contained in His Grace. Salvation is contained in His grace and is a door we must walk through before we are eligible to receive many other things that are contained in His grace.

Christ provided physical healing for us at Calvary. It is contained in His grace. Jesus gave us authority over demonic forces. This is also contained in His grace.

We are going to journey together through God's Word and find out just exactly what God has already freely given us by His grace and what we need to do to take hold of all that God has freely given us.

We can do what God says we can do through his Holy Spirit. We can be what God says we can be. We can have what God says we can have. So if God says it's ours, let's take it.

Source: God's Grace Land by Mike Mings
Excerpt permission granted by Faithsays.com Publications