Grace Life Part 15 – Lawson And Barbara Perdue

Grace Life Part 15 – Lawson and Barbara Perdue

The Grace Life Part 15 with Pastors Lawson and Barbara Perdue. In this episode of Grace For Today you’ll learn how the Grace of God is reflected in our lives.

Grace Life Part 15 Transcription

Praise God, friends, I’m so glad that you’re here today. I have my wife, Barbara, on the program. You know what? God has been really good to us and He’s no respect for persons. He’ll be good to you too because He’s a God of grace. And today, we’re gonna be sharing on how grace is reflected in our life. The gospel, the grace of God has changed my life, and it’s good. It’ll change your life too because God’s good, blessings. Friends, I’m so glad that you’re connected with us today. I have Barbara with me. I’m so excited, we finally are finishing up today, the Grace Life.

Isn’t it neat that when you talk about the Grace Life in the scriptures in the Bible that there is so much information to talk about? That is a lot of good news that sets people free.

You know, the gospel sets people free. And that’s what Paul said in Galatians 5:1, he said, “It is for freedom that Christ set us free.” Another translation says, “Christ set us free to live the free life.” And so we wanna live in this freedom. And when we really experience this freedom to walk in the love of God, to walk in the spirit that he’s talking about in Galatians 5, he talks about how it manifests itself, how grace manifests itself. And if you really have a revelation of grace, I believe you’ll see these things that we talk about in Galatians 6 revealed in your life, and the first one is graciousness. When you receive the grace of God, you’ll become gracious. You know, the Bible says this about love. In 1 Corinthians 13, “Love is not rude.”

Oh, that’s good.

So it’s gracious. So let’s read about this.

I like what you keep saying that it’s gracious ’cause you talked about how in our marriage, you weren’t, you know, living maybe by grace when we first married. But I would say you have become much more gracious, you know, and one of the things, I’m just gonna bring out, I love sharing some personal stories of what it looks like and how it affected us. But one thing that you even mentioned this, you know, past Christmas, you know, when we were first married, you acted like you didn’t really like Christmas, and now you are so into it, you’re very gracious. I mean you’re like, can you say crazy? I mean you’re like so gracious. So this is different areas that you really see a change in people, and I like that you said gracious because before, you just didn’t act like you were into it. And, of course, I love it and now you’re way overboard and it’s great.

You know, my grandfather, Daryl Perdue, if he had a revelation of anything, he had a revelation of grace. And he really lived, my dad died when I was just 17 and then I worked for my grandfather. I worked for my grandfather really from the time I was eight until the time I was 23 when we went to Bible school together. And my grandfather really did understand grace. His favorite scripture was Ephesians 2:8, “For by grace are you saved through faith.” And he really demonstrated that grace towards my grandmother, towards our family. He was a very gracious person. My dad said this, now my dad had a swearing problem and I kind of inherited it. So it took me a long time to get-

I don’t think you inherit that, but anyway.

Well, people say that it is a learned trait.

Yes, learnt behavior.

So, but that’s what I’m meaning, I’m not talking about generational curses . So no, not that.

Okay.

I’m not making excuse, I’m just saying. So it is a learned behavior. But my dad said he worked with my grandfather almost his whole life, and so, you know, my dad went home to be with Jesus when he was 40. But my dad said he never heard my grandfather say a swear word in his whole life. Now, he hadn’t, my grandfather’s a very godly, very good man. He did have a neighbor that accused him one time. We had this pump that we shared water out of a lake, and we also had irrigating water that came in a canal under the Fort Lyon Canal, the longest canal in the State of Colorado. And this neighbor accused my granddad of stealing water. And my grandfather told him, he said, “You better get outta here right now or I’m gonna throw you in the lake.” And my dad said, “That guy got outta there right now, he left immediately.” I also heard this story about my grandfather when he was a younger man, a neighbor moved in, and his farm, if you went across the field, it was about 400 yards, about a quarter mile. If you went by the road, it was about 600 yards. But this neighbor that moved in and bought this farm made a pass at my grandmother. And so my granddad went over to his house, called him out, the guy came out, you know, of the door out in the driveway. And my grandfather beat the fire out of him, and the guy sold the farm and moved away. Now that might be old school. I heard Deion Sanders the other day said it might be old school. You might call me an old fool. But you know what? My grandfather loved my grandmother. They spent nearly every day that they were married together, except for, I think, when my grandmother had her children.

How long were your grandparents married?

You know, my grandmother died when she was about, you know, 67, and they probably got married when she was about 27. So about 40 years before, you know, my grandmother died a little bit younger.

But your grandfather was very gracious. So I love how this talks about this in the Bible.

And we need to be gracious. I believe the more that we understand grace, we’ll operate in grace. And so he says, “Brethren, if any man be overtaken a fault, you who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness and consider yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill all the law of Christ for from man thinks himself to be something when he’s nothing, he deceives himself, but let every man prove his own work and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone and not another, for every man shall bear his own burden.” So I believe the first really aspect of when you get a revelation of grace is you become more gracious. And Romans 15, Paul kinda says the same thing. Romans 15:1-3, and he said, “We who are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let every one of us please his neighbor for his good to edification for Christ pleased yet not himself, but as it’s written, the reproaches of them who reproach you fell upon me.” And so, you know, I believe if we’re spiritual, just like it says here in Galatians, if we’re mature, right? He says, “If someone’s overtaken in a fault, restore that person.” Restoration is the heart of God. Restoration is the heart of, you know, a true believer. Jesus said, “If your friend sins against you, you go to them, right? You talk to them and you forgive them, right? If he repents, if he doesn’t hear you, you take a brother with you, you go to him.” But, you know, he says if he doesn’t hear your brother, then depending on what it is, you take it before the whole church. Now I’m very careful about doing things like that. In fact, I’ve heard about people who’ve done things like that, I think are just terrible sometimes. So you have to be very cautious about how you approach that. I’ve had people that had dreams about other people in the church and there is absolutely no evidence, there is no opportunity that we even know of. And they want us to go make charges against these people. I’m talking about terrible things.

You know, I like that we’re talking about grace, and in the Bible, it’s story after story really of how Jesus always brings restoration and life to any situation. And a lot of times-

[Pastor Lawson] When people believe him.

When a lot of times, he really reached out. It happened to be women that he really reached out to and lifted up.

[Pastor Lawson] Some of his-

In a lot of his stories in the Bible, it’s amazing.

Yeah, the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery, John 4, John 8, Mary Magdalene, who may have become the first evangelist of the resurrection, out of whom He cast seven devils. You know, Jesus ministered, I mean Matthew, a tax collector, publicans, people that were rejected by the religious world.

[Pastor Barbara] Isn’t that something?

Were accepted by Jesus. And I believe that we have the spirit of Jesus.

You know, there’s something interesting that happened when we were pastoring in Kit Carson, and I know you remember this, but one of the farmers that had lived in that area a very long time, they didn’t come to our church, but they knew us because our kids went to school together. And I loved what the mother, the women said, she’s like, regarding you and I, she’s like, “You both love everybody.”

[Pastor Lawson] Yeah.

Not just everybody in-

When we moved to Kit Carson, so she’s in a family, one of the, we didn’t know this, we had no idea, but she was in one of the wealthiest families in the State of Colorado. They owned thousands and thousands of acres, but we didn’t know, we’re just young, right? We were new in the community. They had people in the state government in the State of Colorado, all these different things. And when we first went there, I went to a school board meeting because we had kind of a crazy liberal teacher and, you know, talking about how the cow manure was letting off methane gas so you shouldn’t be eating beef. I mean you’re talking in a community where almost everybody owns a cow.

Right.

You know, I think Aaron told me there’s one volcano that puts off more greenhouse gases in a week than the whole world does in a year.

Mm-hmm.

And so some of these liberal nuts are just crazy and they’re just trying to destroy our economy in America. And that’s another story, I don’t wanna get on it. But I went to that meeting and she kind of attacked me and she said, “If you and your church don’t like this, then you can just start your own school.” And, you know, I was 23, 24 years old, probably 24 then. I said, “Well, as far as I know, me and the people in our church pay taxes in this community just like everybody else.” So the word got out in the community that I really put her in her place, you know, this young preacher, and I didn’t know, but later, she grew to love us and she wrote us a note after we moved to Colorado Springs because our kids were in the same classes and she saw us. I mean you don’t hide yourself in Kit Carson, everybody knows you. I recently went back there. I had friends who were Catholics, Methodist, you know, from all the different churches talking to me. And we had a good, you know, I believe there’s people who know God and know Jesus in every church that preaches the truth about God and Jesus. And so I don’t believe it’s about being Pentecostal, or Baptist, or Methodist, or Presbyterian, or Catholic, it’s about knowing Jesus.

[Pastor Lawson] Yes.

That’s what’s so important. Now, I went back there and all these people, they were asking about us, asking about the children. Some of ’em were hugging me and weeping, you know, even from different churches because we made a difference in that community. But this lady wrote us a letter after we moved here and said, “You loved everybody in the community no matter how rich they were or how poor they were. I believe that’s the heart of Jesus. I believe that’s how we’re supposed to be.” And so, but we should be gracious. Now, the next thing, I believe that if we really have received grace, we become generous. You talked about how it’s changing me at Christmas. You know, I used to wait till Christmas Eve to buy a present and I’d only buy one for you. I let you shop for everybody else. And I didn’t want you spending too much of my hard-earned money, of course, we didn’t have a lot some of those days. And I went the other day on one day and I bought you four, I got overwhelmed, I found great deals. I got four probably for less than the price of one, so it was a really good deal. But at the same point in time, you know, you can give ’em away or give some other stuff away or do something, but it, you know, thank God we become generous people and generosity is the heart of God, God lives in us. You know, I thank God for our partners that are generous. You know, it takes us hundreds of thousands of dollars to preach the gospel around the world. And we literally have thousands and thousands of people connect with us every month in different ways from all around the world that are receiving the gospel. So I believe that Charis Christian Center is good ground if you wanna sow some seed. I believe you’ll get a good harvest, I believe you’ll get more than you sow. But at the same point in time, generosity is the heart of God. Look at what he says in verse six through 10. “Let everyone who’s taught in the Word communicate to Him who teaches in all good things.” Giving, giving is the heart of God. For he’s who sows to his flesh shall have the flesh reap death, corruption. But he who sows to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. Let us not be weary and well doing for in due season, we shall reap if we do not faint. He says, “As we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, especially to those who are of the household of faith.” You know, when God lives in you, the more that you get to know God, God is a giver. You know, 2 Corinthians 8:9 says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, even though He was rich, yet for our sakes, He became poor that we through His poverty might be rich, might become wealthy.” You studied that out in the Greek and you see what it means. It means Jesus had everything, He was completely wealthy. In heaven, He was creating all things, yet for our sakes, He became poor as a beggar. That was Jesus on the cross taking our sin, taking our sickness, taking our anxiety, taking our poverty that we through His poverty might be made rich to become wealthy. We become wealthy spiritually, we become wealthy emotionally, we become wealthy physically, and I believe God wants to make you wealthy financially. Look at the Jewish people, they have a covenant with God. They’re some of the most wealthy people on the planet. You know, 2 Corinthians 9:8, that was 2 Corinthians 8:9 says this that, you know, God of all grace, He’s the God of all grace, you know? I have to go over there and actually read that scripture. Barbara, why don’t you tell ’em a story about giving or provision while I’m getting over here to 2 Corinthians 8:9.

[Pastor Barbara] Giving or provision, I’m sorry, but that’s more, where were you? You like to share.

Oh, you’re great, you just wrote a post the other day, it was awesome, and talked about how, you know, God’s blessed us. I’m here so I’ll read it. He says this in 2 Corinthians 9:8, “God is able to make all grace.” He’s talking about giving and receiving, sowing and reaping. God is able to make all grace abound towards you. You know what? If you don’t get involved in sowing and reaping, giving and receiving, there may be some grace that you miss out on abound towards you, abound, that you always having all sufficient, I love that. We always have all sufficiency, you know? I got a new financial administrator, he sent me a report yesterday, said, “We had $750.” Well, praise God, we had $750. Now you don’t realize how much I spend every week just to keep the wheels turning there, but I’m like, “Woo, Jesus.” Now that was in available cash, that’s not in investments and different things, but anyway, He says, “That you always having all sufficiency in all things.” You know, you talked about in your post how we started out, we didn’t have a lot, but we’ve given away houses, or not.

We’ve helped.

We’ve helped people buy houses, we’ve given away vehicles, we’ve given away clothing, we’ve given away food, I mean.

Furniture.

Furniture. And yet we have so much, you know? I have a rule, if I buy a shirt, I get one in my closet and take it to the, you know, Salvation Army and give it away. And if I buy a pair of pants, I give a pair of pants away because I’ve got so much, I don’t wanna have anymore. You know, I’m full and running over and it’s easy for that stuff to run over. But I don’t have a lack mentality, I got plenty. I could take half my stuff and give it away and I’d still have plenty. So He says, but that’s how it works. When you start taking care of other people, you start investing in other people, you start investing in the gospel, it comes back to you. Jesus said, “Given it will be given to you, good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over shall men give unto your bosom for with the same measure that you meet.” If you do it generously, it’ll come back to you. You’ve been praying a scripture for me in Proverbs. Tell people what that is.

Well you have to tell me which one.

Telling me, “I’ve been praying this for you that he who is generous, right? Will receive.” Or what is that? He who waters others.

Yeah, he who waters others will water, and in other words, you’ll have blessing heaped upon you and you’ll have favor. And, you know, through our entire marriage, sorry, I was just having a little bit trouble keeping up with where you are going. But yes, that scripture, I love it because I’ve seen you in our entire time of being married, you’ve always been giving. We first got married, we made $800 a month and, you know, our trailer payment was 200 a month, but, you know, we just always gave, we gave to God first, paid all of our bills on time and then, you know, if there’s people that needed help, we help. But I’ve just watched you over the years just pour yourself out and give and give. And so, you know, I love that we can stand on the Word of God ’cause it says, “When you water others, you’ll be watered. You’ll have blessings heaped upon blessings in favor of God.” And so that’s what I have been praying over you.

So graciousness is the heart of God.

Amen.

And generosity is the heart of God. And when you’ve really received grace, I believe you become gracious and you become generous. We’ve just got a few minutes, but we got a short break. We’ll come back and talk more about how grace is reflected in our life, blessings. Friends, I’m gonna be talking about in this series about how grace has revolutionized my life. And you want to get this because I’m telling you, it changed my home, changed my marriage, changed my children, changed my church, changed my business. Grace has changed about everything about me, and not in a negative way, in a super positive way. My wife, Barbara, says, “I’m not even like living with the same person,” and not negatively, positively. She said, “I don’t know how we would’ve went on if you would’ve continued on the way that you were going.” But thank God grace changed me, and do you know what? God is not a respecter of persons, He’s a respecter of faith. But I believe that the grace that’s changed me will change you as you believe the gospel. And I’ve got two things that we’re making available as a package during these teachings. One is my series, it’s a 10-part series on the Grace Life. It’s the most in depth. The other one is the “Revelation of Grace” with Andrew Wommack, blessing. We’re right here today in Genesis or Galatians, excuse me, chapter six. And we’re talking about how grace is reflected in our life.

And I have another story, we’re talking about when you’re gracious and when you have grace, you are a giver, gracious and giving. And we talked about, you asked me the scripture I’ve been praying over you and we shared that he who waters others would be watering himself. And do you remember that time? I said, just for fun, this is a number of years ago, I’m like, “Let’s just, you know, go to the mall and go to a store.” And so we were at a store and we were actually just trying shoes on. You know, we’re having some fun together and just doing something. And I don’t think we had a great need, but I had actually grabbed a handful of shoes and some of them were really high-end shoes and they were all on sale. But what was fun is as I was trying ’em on, you know, I was bent over so my hair was in front of my face, I wasn’t even paying attention. But there was a woman, an older woman walking around up and down the aisles, and in the store saying, “They told me I could give my pair away free. They told me I could give my pair of shoes away free.” What the deal was that day was if you bought a pair of shoes, you would get another pair free. And this woman didn’t want two pairs of shoes. So I guess the clerk said, “You know, you can find someone else and let them have that free pair of shoes.” So guess who got the free pair of shoes?

Yeah.

I did because you started talking to the woman.

This is a whole department at a big store. There was no less than five ladies in there shopping, maybe 15, a bunch of people.

[Pastor Barbara] No, there’s a bunch of people.

It’s the Dillard’s outlet, and, you know, the lady was buying a pair of ECCO shoes, I mean they are nice shoes. Now they are discounted substantially, we get really good deals, that’s amazing.

But what was interesting is-

But you were trying on a pair of ECCOs the same price. I asked her how much ’cause I didn’t wanna cost her any money, but you were bent over, you weren’t even looking around. She came over and poked you and got you and went and bought your shoes. And we said, “Listen, we’ll pay you. We’ll pay you for these shoes. We’ll pay you.” She’s like, “No, I wanna give ’em to you, I got plenty.”

But what was neat is out of everybody in the mall or everyone in the store.

Listen, we got the favor of God, we got the blessing of God. Supernatural stuff comes to us all the time. Man, you can’t out-give God.

That’s right.

So God’s gracious, God’s generous. And when grace is reflected in our life, we become gracious, we become generous. But here’s the third thing, we glory in the cross of Jesus. Paul says, “Listen, you’ve seen how large a letter I’ve written, there’s these legalist, they wanna make a fair show in the flesh. They constrain you to be circumcised to keep the law only less they should suffer persecution.” Really, legalistic people are mean. They’ll persecute others if they don’t fit their, you know, thinking. And he says, “But God forbid that I should glory accept in the cross of Jesus by which the world has been crucified to me and I of the world.” So we rejoice in the cross of Jesus. You know, there’s four deaths. We talked about this last week, but every believer, if you’re gonna mature, if you’re gonna really move into what God has for you, you gotta understand these. Number one, we’re dead to sin, number two, we’re dead to self. Number three, we’re dead to the law, and number four, we’re dead to the world. He says, “God forbid that I should glory accept in the cross of Jesus.” The world, it just doesn’t have to power over me that it once did. What’s motivating and compelling the world, fame and fortune and all the, it’s not compelling me. You know, it’s not motivating me, it doesn’t have power over me. By which I’ve died to the world and the world is dead to me. Just ugh, the things the world’s going after. These people that say, “Oh, the good old days when we were drinking and partying and sleeping around.” That was not the good old days, never was, never will be. That’s a sad, sorry, sick way of living and thinking. Man, the good old days are right here, right now, loving Jesus, serving Jesus, letting Jesus live His life big in us. Now, we got one more thing and that is finally that those who are the attitudes, right, that we have, how grace is reflected in graciousness, generosity, we glory in the cross. But finally, in this, we rest in Jesus. Man, this is the gospel. He says in verse 15 to 18, “For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision avails anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creation, as many as walk according to this rule, peace be onto them and mercy upon the Israel of God. From this point, let no man trouble me.” Paul was persecuted for preaching Jesus, he was persecuted for preaching grace. “For I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus, breathen the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, be with your spirit.” He comes right back to where he started in Galatians 1:6 where he says, “I marvel that you’re so soon removed from Him who called you into the grace of Christ to another gospel.” Listen, we don’t wanna move away from grace because we don’t wanna move away from Jesus. We wanna rest in Jesus Christ. There remains a rest therefore to the people of God. Hebrews 4 says, you know, the rest of Jesus, so He that is entered into His rest has ceased from His own works even as God has ceased from His. Like when God rested on the seventh today, it was finished, it was done. Jesus died on the cross. He said, “It’s finished, the work’s been finished, the price has been paid, it’s already been done.” So now just rest in what He has done. Barbara, pray for ’em quick and then I’ve got a short word to share with ’em.

That’s good news. Well, dear heavenly Father, again, we just come to you in the precious name of Jesus. And Lord, we just thank you for those who are watching. We just agree with them, Lord God, for things they’re believing for. And I know that this Word touched them today and they have received it with gladness and are going forth with this grace life in Jesus name, amen.

I just wanna say a big thank you for your being with us and staying with us today. You know, if you’d like to get these messages, you can literally get hundreds of messages free of charge on our website. This is our last day of sharing this teaching and we keep this package up that we do on TV for a short period of time. I actually sell these things for less than it costs me to produce ’em when you consider the labor and on these specials. And so you could go to our website today at CharisChristianCenter.com and you can get this teaching, you know, today. Thanks so much for tuning in and blessings.

[Narrator] Jesus is the embodiment of grace and truth, and He wants to reign in your life. Grace is what frees us from sin and allows us to accomplish God’s will. Get the Grace Life package, which includes the “Grace Life” and “Revelation of Grace” all for $39. Choose between CD, USB, or digital download when you call 719-418-4000, or visit CharisChristianCenter.com. Jesus is the embodiment of grace and truth and He wants to reign in your life. Grace is what frees us from sin and allows us to accomplish God’s will. Get the Grace Life package, which includes the “Grace Life” and “Revelation of Grace” all for $39. Choose between CD, USB, or digital download when you call 719-418-4000 or visit CharisChristianCenter.com. Thanks for watching “Grace for Today.” This broadcast has been made possible by our faithful partners. If you would like to become a partner, need prayer or have a question, please call us at 719-418-4000, or to partner online, go to CharisChristianCenter.com/Give. You can write us at P.O. Box 63733, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 80962. See you next time on “Grace for Today.”