Grace Life Part 13 – Lawson And Barbara Perdue
Grace Life Part 13 – Lawson and Barbara Perdue
The Grace Life Part 13 with Pastors Lawson and Barbara Perdue. In this episode of Grace For Today you’ll learn the gospel equation. Jesus + Nothing = Everything!
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The Grace Life Package includes some of our favorite teachings from Pastor Lawson and Andrew Wommack, about living a life full of the Grace of God. This bundle consists of Grace Life and Revelation of Grace in your choice of CD, USB, or as a Digital Download:
Grace Life Part 13 Transcription
Friends, I’m so glad that you tuned in today and we are sharing today on the gospel equation. Praise God. You don’t wanna miss this broadcast. When I got this revelation, it literally changed my life. That Jesus plus nothing equals everything, but Jesus plus anything equals nothing. So, open your heart and receive the word of God.
We’re so glad that you’re with us today. I have my beautiful wife, Barbara. God is so good to us. We’re talking today from Galatians chapter five, and we’re gonna be talking about the gospel equation. And when you get this, it’s so simple. It took me years and years actually to get this revelation. And one of my boys that grew up in our church in Kit Carson, his name was Sean, he went to a Bible school. Later he was down in the Phoenix area, Mesa, Arizona. He went to a church there and the pastor taught this beautiful message on Jesus plus nothing. In fact, I don’t have that series in the package that we have today, but I have it in other packages and we have it. It’s a teaching on the book of Galatians, Jesus plus nothing. And when you begin to understand this, it will literally change you. And I actually taught this at Bible school for a period of time and we had an instructor at Bible school. He was a great man. He loved God. He operated in the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He was a good man, but he did not understand the gospel. And I was that way for a period of time. And I actually took this series, Jesus Plus Nothing. I got a copy from that church and I went and put it on this man’s desk. And then, I told Andrew Wommack. I said, you know so-and-so, I put this series of teaching on his desk and Andrew said, Lawson, do you know who taught that pastor that message? I said, no, I don’t know, but it’s a great teaching. He said, I did. And he said, Lawson, he said, I’ve taught the grace of God all around the world. And he said, I am convinced that if God doesn’t give you a revelation of grace, you won’t get it. And that’s really exactly what the Bible says. It says in Second Corinthians three where Paul’s talking about the glory of the long glory of grace. Verse 17. Now God is that spirit and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. It takes the spirit of God to give you a revelation of grace. There is freedom. And when we understand that, he says in Second Corinthians chapter three in verse 18, but we all with an open face beholding as in a glass, as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord are changed from the same image. He says, from grace to grace, even as by the spirit of the Lord. So, we, from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord. So, we go from the glory of the law to the glory of grace by a revelation, from the Holy Spirit, from the spirit of God. It takes the Holy Spirit. And I actually was pastoring for six years before I got a revelation of grace. Barbara, you said it really changed me. We’d been married 10 years at the time, 1994. We got married in 1984, started pastoring in 1988. And it wasn’t until 1994 that I got a revelation of grace. Talk a little bit to the people, how that changed me and how that changed our relationship.
Well, I believe like what we’ve been talking about, the relationship you have with Jesus is really ultimately what helps us and helps us with our relationships with other people. But again, people, we had mentioned it in a previous broadcast that a lot of times people get into the law and we talked about why do people hang onto it maybe for pride or maybe they might be insecure or you know, just different things. You said, some people glory in it. And the main thing is when we are around people who don’t quite have that revelation of grace, we can pray for them. And ultimately my peace and joy came for my relationship with Jesus Christ.
You’re very secure in your relationship with God. And that helped you for a lot of years because I was kind of hard to live with. And praise God, you’re secure in your relationship with Jesus. And you know, if you study Ephesians chapter five, it talks about the husband and wife relationship. It compares us to our relationship with Jesus. And when it talks about it, it says, husbands love your wife. Love your wives, love your wives. Love your wife as Christ love the church spiritually speaking, unconditionally. Love your wife as your own body. Physically, you’re to care for her. You’re to nurture her. Right? And then he says, love your wife as yourself emotionally. And all those three areas we’re supposed to love our wives. It’s his wives. Respect your husbands. Now, let me tell you the key to all this. If Barbara tries to get her sense of being loved only from me, she’s gonna be disappointed because I can’t love her enough. If I try to get my sense of self-worth only from Barbara, I’m gonna be disappointed. Now, we don’t wanna work against that because the greatest need in a woman is to be loved. The greatest need in a man is to be respected.
So in saying that, the best place to get that from is Jesus, our relationship with the Lord.
So, you get your sense of being loved, you’re very secure in the love of God from Jesus. I get my sense of self-worth from Jesus. And that helps us build strength with strength.
Because I wanna remind people, I actually love that your teaching decided to talk about this too. I love in Genesis where you, when you think about whose idea was marriage anyway, it wasn’t Adam. Adam wasn’t, you know, going from bar to bar in the garden of Venus looking for his soulmate. He wasn’t lonely. It doesn’t ever say that Adam was lonely and begged God for somebody in his life. He was not lonely. He did not have that feeling or sensation of loneliness. ‘Cause, he was totally fulfilled in his relationship with God. It was God who said, I will make a helpmate for the man or for Adam.
Right? You know, this is great because some people teach that in marriage we complete one another. Now, I believe we compliment one another.
Yes.
But you are not who completes me, and I’m not who completes you.
[Barbara] That’s a lot to put on someone else.
Right? You are complete in Christ who is the head of all principality and authority. I am complete in Christ who is the head of all principality and authority and is two complete wealth, strong people. We have great authority when we move into that.
Amen.
Praise God. We better get into lesson or we won’t get through. But we’re gonna talk about the gospel equation right here in Galatians chapter five. Paul says, standfast, therefore in the liberty where with Christ has made us free and do not be entangled again with the yoke of bondage. He calls legalism and law keeping, a yoke of bondage. In Acts chapter 15, when the leadership of the church at Jerusalem met together, they came together and they said, why are you trying to put a yoke of bondage on the Gentiles law keeping, which we as Jews were not able to bear? You couldn’t save us before Jesus. And it can’t save us since Jesus. So, he goes on and he said, I tell you, I Paul tell you, if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. Now, what’s he mean by that? I think Paul means that you’re gonna miss out on the blessings if you are trusting your performance.
Right.
Rather than trusting Jesus for your salvation, for your blessing, for your healing, for your provision, for your peace, for whatever, for your freedom, whatever it is, you must simply trust Jesus.
Yeah.
He goes on and says this in Galatians five, three, for I tell you again to every man who is circumcised, if you’re trust and circumcision, that’s what this question was about, keeping the law. He is a debtor to the whole law. Now, James chapter two, verse 10 says, if you offend the law in one point, you are guilty of it all. Nobody’s ever kept God’s law completely. And so, he says, Christ has become ineffective of no effect to you.
My translations has become estranged from Christ.
Yeah.
Who,
Wow.
You, who attempt, I like this word too, attempt to be justified by law. You have fallen from grace.
Yes. Now let’s talk about this.
What that means. Huh?
Falling from grace. I just saw this and it ticks me off. I have to be honest with you, I’m still a human and we love these people and they have some great teaching, but I just saw this email come out a while back in it. Just like, you know, people are falling from grace and they’re talking about people with major sin issues, right? Committing adultery, living like the devil. That’s not what falling from grace.
Is talking about here.
Falling from grace is talking about legalism, it’s talking about performance. And these people that are preaching this are some of the most legalistic people in the bunch.
Well, they’re saying the only way you can keep from falling away is keep learning how to fear God more and more. And this is totally what the opposite.
It has become more about performance. And I believe in the fear of God because we need to respect our relationship with God. But I’m not afraid of God, so to speak it.
No.
You know, when I understand how much God loves me and that I’m a child, it produces, it’s like Hosea and Gomer. You know, it doesn’t produce unhealthy, what grace will do however, if your heart is not right, preaching grace will actually reveal what’s in a person’s heart. So, if you preach grace to a person and they have the wrong things in their heart, they’ll go haywire and it’ll show them they need grace. They need to get saved. And it’ll show, because I think there’s a lot of people in religion that have never really been born again. And what I like to relate this to is the saying of Jesus in Mark 11:25 and 26, where he says, when you stand praying, forgive if you have ought against any. Because if you don’t forgive others there trespasses, then your heavenly Father will not forgive you. Now, does that mean God doesn’t forgive a forgiveness? Well, if he didn’t, there might be a lot of people, a lot more people in hell, right? I don’t believe that’s what that’s, I believe what unforgiveness does, it kind of clogs up. You know, the channel between us and God and unforgiveness, envy, strife, bitterness, unforgiveness. You wanna stay out of it, honey.
That’s right.
Because it will hinder you in receiving from God. And so, as we begin to look at this in right here in Galatians five, verse four, you read it in your translation, I’m gonna read it from the King James. Christ is become of no effect to you, whoever of you are justified by the law, whoever of you, if you’re trusting your performance, if you’re trusting anything except Jesus, you are fallen from grace. You’re gonna miss out on the blessing. I think that’s what this talking about. I don’t think it’s talking about a major sin. A preacher. And I know Barbara, you don’t like this example, but a preacher and a prostitute. I saw this on Time magazine years ago, a major leader in the body of Christ, you know, just went crazy, did something real stupid. And they put a, you know, a picture of this minister of the gospel on Time Magazine and wrote across that fallen from grace. What’s really not talking about that, it’s talking about legalism. By the way, this man was a very legalistic person. He had really turned away from preaching a lot of these things that I’m teaching now that he actually once shared. And he had went back to his old denominational, legalistic mentality. If you heard him preaching about certain aspects, you would say, oh, he would preach so hard. One of my friends when this first came out, we were actually in Bible school, it was in 1988. He said, surely he loved this guy. Surely this is not true. I had another minister in the denomination, full gospel denomination that we had been ministering in, told me, you should go to this church. Why? Or go to this Bible school, this man. He said, why aren’t you going there? I said, because Jesus didn’t tell me to go there.
Right.
You know where you need to go to Bible school where Jesus tells you to go to Bible school?
That’s right.
You need to be connected where Jesus tells you to go. You need to go to church where Jesus tells you to go. And so, many people are led by a lot of other things than the spirit. But he says, Christ has become ineffective to you. Whoever you are justified by the law, you are fallen from grace. That is not talking about a major sin, that’s talking about legalism and legalism will kill you. And some of these people preaching it, they’re the most legalistic people in the boat. I mean, I believe they’re saved, but they’re preaching you so much about performance. And listen, you can’t be saved by your works before you, before Jesus. And you can’t be saved by your works since Jesus.
There’s no hope in that. And I like the story that you always share about a windshield in your car. And even just one little, or even a glass window, just one little crack. Whether it’s completely broken or just a little BB gun hits it, it’s broke.
Yeah. It’s how I got a revelation of grace. Andrew Wommack in 1994 was ministering in our church in Kit Carson, big town of 300 out in the wilderness. And he made a statement. And when he made this statement, he said, it doesn’t matter how much you’ve broken God’s law, it’s like a plate glass window. It doesn’t matter whether you drove a Mac truck through it and destroyed it, shattered it, or you shot a BB through it. The only way that you can make perfect is you have to replace it. And so, it’s not about, and so much of the preaching that we hear in the body of Christ is about self-help programs and so on. It’s not about that. The true gospel is really not about that. It’s about Jesus. Jesus did for us what we could never do for ourselves. And he didn’t come to make Lawson a better Lawson. Believe me, Barbara didn’t need a better Lawson.
Right.
Barbara needed a new Lawson. Praise God. Amen. And I was born again. I was saved. You were born again. You were saved. My challenge was my thinking. So, we’ve gotta change from this legalistic mentality.
The legalism will really hold you back from receiving everything that God has for you. Because ultimately your eyes gonna believe in your heart that you’re not worthy to receive your healing or worthy to receive prosperity or worthy to receive peace or worthy to receive joy because you continue to fall short.
Yeah. You continue to fail. And a legalistic mentality will do that. It’ll bring you into condemnation. So, the gospel equation is this, Jesus, right? If you be circumcised Jesus plus circumcision equals nothing.
That’s right.
Christ will profit you nothing. So, Jesus plus circumcision or Jesus plus the problem is you don’t stop with circumcision plus law keeping or Bible reading or prayer or giving or church attendance. Now, I do all those things, or Jesus plus, right? Church going and law keeping and circumcision and prayer and giving or Jesus plus not cussing, not drinking, not dancing, not playing cards, not watching television. I’ve seen it all, right? Jesus plus anything equals nothing. But Jesus plus nothing equals everything. That is the equation of the gospel. We’re gonna be back right after this break. So, stay tuned. Blessings, love you. 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 I 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. You know, I’ve done the other one is the Revelation of Grace with Andrew Wommack, blessing. Friends, I’m so glad that you stayed with us. We’ve been talking about the gospel equation and how Jesus plus nothing equals everything. Glory to God. We get everything just because of Jesus. He saved us, healed us, freed us, filled us. It’s marvelous what Jesus has done for us.
You know, you were talking before we took the break, how people try to add so many much of their works. And well, if you do this and if you do this and what you were saying is a lot of those things you want to do. But one thing I believe that really helped our children when they were little, growing up in a pastor’s home, I’m always amazed how people are so surprised that all of our children grew up loving the Lord and are saved and are actively involved in their own churches. But one thing we always told our children, because we did spend a lot of time at church and doing a lot of different things and reaching out to people and ministering to people, we always told our children that we get to do this. We get to love God. We get to worship him, we get to pray, we get to spend,
Amen.
Time with him, we get to fellowship with him, we get to go to church. We get to be with other people of like-minded faith and,
Amen.
And so, we came from the aspect of we get to do this now, we never told our kids, you have to because you’re preacher’s kids. It was always, we get to do this.
Amen. You know, we get to give. You know me, I love to give. Man, I just sometimes get a little crazy with it, which is amazing. And I don’t know what’s happened to me, but.
Well, praise God. You know, I always bring this example up that even a farmer or a simple gardener understands the principle. If you plant a seed, it will grow. You will have a harvest. So, praise God.
Yes.
When you give, there will be a harvest.
Yes. Now, when we read on through here, Paul really talks about these things. And he’s talking about how legalism won’t free you, but grace will.
[Barbara] Amen.
And he says in verse five, we threw the spirit. Galatians five, verse five, wait for the hope of righteousness by faith, for in Jesus Christ, neither circumcision unveils anything. It’s not law keeping or uncircumcision, but faith, which works by love.
I like that.
And you know, this is not talking about our love for one another. Our love for one another will grow out of a revelation of grace. But it’s like when you understand the grace of God, when you understand the great love that God has for you, your faith will work. I like to say faith comes alive in the presence of God.
[Barbara] Amen.
And he talks then in verse seven, and we’re gonna try to get through this in the rest of this broadcast through verse 15, about how legalism hinders the gospel. And he makes a statement here and he says, you did run well. Who hindered you that you should not obey the truth? Legalism is hindering the gospel. Legalism is hindering the truth. You know, it’s our knowledge of the truth that sets us free. Jesus said, if you continue in my word, you’ll become my disciples. You’ll know the truth, that the truth will make you free. But legalism hinders the truth of the gospel. Legalism hinders freedom. And he says this persuasion does not come from God who calls you. So, a number of reasons to get out of this legalistic mentality, this performance mentality, number one, it hinders you. It will hinder you.
That’s true. As a believer, you know, I was legalistic and it hindered me.
Right.
Number two, it’s not of God. God is not the author of legalism. He’s the author of grace.
[Barbara] Amen.
Praise God. He gave the law. But there was a reason for the law was to show us our sins. So, we’d believe on Jesus and trust Jesus. It wasn’t to try to justify us. Because again, if you’re justified by the law, you’re fallen from grace. He goes on, he says this, eleven in verse nine. Galatians five, nine. Leaven is the whole lump. The problem with legalism, it is contagious. You get somebody with the legalistic mentality and it’ll just run through a group of people. And people get so judgmental over the littlest things. Listen, I grew up in legalism. I know all about it. Those church grandmas say, my dad, what’d you do feed that kid? Baloney sandwiches.
Oh no.
Boy, my dad was, you know, he was kind of rough around the edges, but he didn’t like religion. And it helped me, praise God when we got, we did respect the Bible. So, when Andrew Wommack came to our town and had a Bible study and held, you know, really taught the full gospel, the word came alive to us. Let’s go ahead and go through this really quickly. He says, I have confidence in you through the Lord that you will be none otherwise minded, but key that troubles you will bear his judgment, whoever he is. So, all these reasons that legalism doesn’t work, it hinders you. It’s not of God, it’s contagious. It hinders those who share it. Legalistic people. Man, I’ve watched them over the years and they’ll end up, you know, in their own mess. It is not good. So man, if you get a hold of grace, do not go back,
Right.
To legalism.
And people do for various reasons, but it is deadly. Legalism is deadly. He said, I brethren, if I preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution then? Is the offense of the cross ceased. Legalistic people again, will persecute people.
Like Saul did.
Yes. Well, like Paul, I mean, yeah, who was Saul,
Right.
He persecuted people and he said, you know, we ought to throw out those because they’re persecuting others and it causes the cross to be offensive. He says, finally in verse 12, I would that they were cut off. Who trouble you? Now, there’s a couple ways to look at that. You can look at it like this. Well, listen, if circumcision works so well, then go the whole way. Just castrate them. You know, and I’ve, listen, I’ve seen some sins sometimes and I say, listen, what they need is a rope and a knife and a gun. Let’s hang them, castrate them and shoot them. I mean, I don’t like sin, right? And I don’t like sin and people who are claiming to be saved and living another lifestyle. But at the same point in time, I don’t think God likes sin. You know, I don’t think really, there’s another way to look at this. And I think this is the proper way. And Paul talks or in numbers, Moses talked about this numbers 19:13 in verse 20 talks about separating them from the congregation. Paul says, I wish these legalistic people were separated from the congregation because they’re causing such a distraction and they’re actually hindering people in their relationship with God.
It’s interesting, it says, the little Leaven’s, the whole lump, because you have people like what you’re saying, that want to try and preach or have a message of both preach grace, but then preach law too.
[Lawson] Yes.
And that’s not what the Bible says. That’s not what you’re supposed to do.
And so, ultimately it is love that is the fulfilling of the law.
Amen.
We’ll come back and really talk about how love fulfills God’s law in tomorrow’s broadcast and how the spirit works. You know, we’ve received the grace of God, we’ve received the love of God. And when you let the love of God work, number one, when you understand God’s love for you,
Right.
It causes your faith to come alive. But then the love of God is shed abroad in our heart by the Holy Spirit. And when you let the love of God work through you, then it’s just a natural outgrowth of those things. You begin to, you know, walk in the goodness of God, walk in the grace of God.
It’s sure a lot easier that way. Isn’t it?
Oh, it’s so much easier. You know, the other way, it just doesn’t work.
Right.
And that’s what’s Paul’s saying. He’s saying, legalism doesn’t work. Barbara, pray for the people here.
So, dear Heavenly Father, we just rejoice and thank you in your word that we have received it with gladness. And Lord God, I thank you for the revelation of grace. We just praise you and thank you, and are so grateful for sending your son Jesus. You demonstrated your love by sending the best. Lord again, we speak blessing over everyone in Jesus’ name, amen.
You know, I’m so glad that you’ve tuned in to be with us today. I want to say a great thank you to all of our partners. You know, it cost us actually hundreds of thousands of dollars to preach the gospel and have a staff and do all these things. But we’re receiving just, you know, thousands of people are connecting with us around the world. And so, thank you for your partnership with us. If you need prayer personally, if you wanna become a partner, just give us a call today. Blessings. Friends, I certainly hope that you’ve enjoyed the program today and it’s ministering to you to move into that which God has for you. And I want to say a great big thank you to all of our partners for helping us share this gospel across the United States and across the world. It’s because of our partners that we can take this message of grace and faith around the world. If you would like to join our partners and receive that blessing, give us a call today. Blessings.
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