SUPERABUNDANT GRACE
Romans 5:20
I. GRACE
A. The word “grace” is one of the most precious words in Scripture.
1. A Greek scholar said, “It is hardly too much to say that the Greek mind has in no word uttered itself and all that was in its heart more distinctly that in this word .”
2. The Greeks were lovers of beauty, in nature, in their architecture, their statuary, their poetry, their drama.
3. Anything which called out of the heart -- wonder, admiration, pleasure, or joy, was designated by this word, grace.
4. The word came to also signify the doing of a favor--graciously, spontaneously, a favor done without expectation of return but arising only out of the generosity of the giver.
B. When we take the Greek word for grace over into the NT, we can apply a similar definition:
1. “It is hard too much to say that God has in no word uttered Himself and all that is in His
heart more distinctly than in this word, grace.
2. God’s grace is that matchless, wonderful, marvelous, act on His part when He out of the
spontaneous infinite love of His heart steps down from His judgment throne in heaven
to take upon Himself the guilt of our sin and the penalty which is justly ours, doing this
not for His friends but for His enemies.
3. Here the word “grace” goes infinitely beyond its meaning in pagan Greece.
II. ABOUNDED AND ABOUND
A. “Abounded” =
1. The word “abounded,” is from a different Greek word than that which is translated “abound.”
2. Abounded means “to exist in abundance.”
B. “Abound” =
1. Abound also means “to exist in abundance”
2. It also carries with it the added idea that that abundance is more than enough..
a. The thing exists beyond what is required or sufficient,
b. To overflow
3. Illustration of related use in ancient letters:
a. in a letter dated A.D. 108, “More than enough has been written.”
b. in a letter dated A.D. 117, “I count it superfluous to write at greater length.”
su·per·flu·ous (s‹-pûr“fl›-…s) adj.
Being beyond what is required or sufficient, to overflow.
4. Paul’s particular meaning
a. Paul puts a preposition to the word which means “to be over and above”
b. TRANSLATION: “Where sin existed in abundance, grace was in superabundance,
and then some more added on top of that.”
III. SUPER-ABOUNDING GRACE
A. Illustration of the sun.
God created the sun to give light and heat to the earth upon which we live.
But only a very small fraction of that light and heat ever reaches our globe.
The rest is lost in space.
BUT we never need to be concerned that the light and heat of the sun will fail us.
God has made an oversize reservoir to serve us.
See Genesis 8:22
B. Grace
1. There is enough grace in God’s heart of love to save;
2 There is enough grace in God’s heart of love to keep saved for time and eternity;
3. There is enough grace in God’s heart of love to keep saved for time and eternity, every
sinner that ever has or ever will live.
4. AND THEN THERE WILL STILL BE enough left over to save a million more
universes full of sinners, were such to exist, and then some more.
CLOSING
There is enough grace to meet and cope with all the sorrows, heartaches, difficulties, temptations, testings, and trials of human existence, and more added to that.
God’s salvation is an oversize salvation.
It is shock proof, strain proof, unbreakable, all sufficient.
It is equal to every emergency, for it flows from the heart of an infinite God freely bestowed and righteously given through the all-sufficient sacrifice of our Lord on the Cross.
Salvation is all of grace.
Trust God’s grace.
IT IS SUPERABOUNDING GRACE.