Step 3: Surrendering to a New Life
October 16, 2016

Step 3: Surrendering to a New Life

Preacher:
Passage: John 14:6-9

“Life Change from the Heart” is a sermon series on how God changes us from the heart through the gospel. Step 1 is admitting that we are powerless to fix ourselves. Step 2 is about a quest to find power greater than ourselves to help us. Now, step 3 is about surrendering our lives to God.

Kevin shared a message from Ephesians 2:1-10. That passage tells us that we can go from powerlessness to a changed life. But, how does that happen? The passage tells us that it starts with grace, which leads to faith, which leads to work. Grace comes first. Grace means an undeserved gift. Grace has the power to wake us up. Grace is God kissing us when we were in a death sleep. And faith is our response to God’s grace. It is grabbing hold of the one who kissed us, the one who woke us up. But, it doesn’t stop here. It is only the beginning. Faith now leads to work. We are God’s masterpiece in progress. When we put our faith in the grace of Jesus, we don’t get zapped into perfection. It is only the beginning of the process in which God change us. How does God change us? That’s what steps 4-12 are about. We go through the process of self-examination, confession, repentance, and experiencing God’s grace. This is the start of living by the Spirit. When we live by the Spirit and start bearing the fruit of the Spirit, God calls us to do good work, which he has prepared in advance for us to do.