How God's Grace Teaches Christians to Live

Grace does teach us. Paul wrote to Titus stating, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age,” (Titus 2:11–12).

Grace teaches us to reject evil and secular desires. Grace has a verb form that the New Testament uses twenty-three times in the New Testament. In Colossians 2:13, the act of grace is translated “forgiveness” for all of our trespasses, and that forgiving grace is to be given to one anther (Col 3:13). However, that forgiving grace teaches Christians even more about facing temptations and denying ungodliness.

What does Jesus’s forgiveness teach His followers about sin? Christ has saved believers from sin for more than forgiving Christians, but also to save His followers from being enslaved to sin. God’s forgiveness teaches Christians not to continue in the sin of which Christ released them. “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not!” (Rom 6:1–2a). If we continue in sin, then have we allowed God’s grace to teach us?

The Christian must see God’s grace as more than salvation from past sins, but also a deliverance from coming temptations. Christ forgives believers from past sins to keep them from future sins. Christians must see the extent of personal sins, and the loving grace that forgave a few sins is as great as the grace that forgives many sins (Luke 7:40–43, cf. 2 Cor 5:14–15).

Jesus died so that His followers are moved more by Christ’s love and forgiving grace than by selfish and fleshly desires that enslave so many. Those who are enslaved to sin obey such evil because sin is allowed to reign in the moral body (Rom 6:12). However, the mind set on Christ is taught by grace and is compelled by love to overcome all temptations to willfully sin (Rom 8:5–7).

This is why Paul wrote to Titus that, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age,” (Titus 2:11–12).