YOU QUALIFY! | Living In The Balance Of Grace And Faith By Andrew Wommack

YOU QUALIFY!

Understanding God’s love would solve your theological problems. It would get rid of this thinking that God is the One causing earthquakes, hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, and other bad things to happen to judge people. That’s not God!

Religion has been misrepresenting the Lord. They will preach the Gospel to a degree. They sing the song, “Just as I am, without one plea,” and preach grace for sinners to be born again. That’s why it’s so easy to be born again. Grace is presented, and faith is simply your positive response to what God has already done.

Suppose salvation had been presented differently: “Jesus might forgive your sins. He might come to this earth and die for you if you will repent and pray hard enough. If you promise never to do anything wrong again and live holy, then God might save you.” You would never have gotten saved because you would have thought, It will never work for me. But the reason it was easy for you to receive salvation is because it was presented as already provided.

This is good news, not good prophecy. It’s already happened. It has already taken place. The news is supposed to tell you about what has already happened. The reason it’s easy to get born again is

because you’re told that Jesus already died for the sins of the world. He’s already commended His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, He died for us. It’s news. So you say, “Well, if it’s already happened, I’ll receive it.”

It’s easy to reach out and receive something that’s already done. If it’s already done, then there’s no element of doubt in it, no wondering if God will really do it. That’s the reason you get born again relatively easy. But then you run into the same problem as the Galatians.

“O FOOLISH GALATIANS”

The Galatians received the Gospel and were born again, but then shortly afterwards, religious Jews came in and started saying, “Faith in Jesus isn’t enough. You also have to be circumcised, keep the law, and observe the feasts. You have to start doing this and stop doing that.” These religious people started perverting and changing the Gospel. They said, “You may get born again by grace, but God won’t bless you, answer your prayers, or move in your life until you start living holy.”

Paul responded to this perversion of the Gospel by writing his letter to the Galatians. It’s his most aggressive, vicious attack on this false teaching found anywhere in the Bible!

O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you… ?

Galatians 3:1

The word translated “foolish” literally means “stupid idiots.”

Paul is saying that this teaching is demonic. He was telling them, “You’re living in deception!”

But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him he accursed.

Galatians 1:8

Some of Paul’s readers must have thought, Oh, that’s too hard. He couldn’t have meant that. So the next verse says:

As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.

Galatians 1:9

Paul didn’t want anybody to misunderstand what he was saying or the fervency behind his words. This is where the body of Christ is today. They’re preaching salvation to a degree, saying that you get born again

by grace. We sing, “Just as I am without one plea,” but then after you’re born again, we start singing, “Just as I’m supposed to be.” We’re consumed with trying to live right, wondering, Oh God. Have I done enough?

PERFORMANCE

People come up to me by the thousands saying, “Why hasn’t God healed me? I fast and pray. I study the Word and pay my tithes. I attend church and read the Word. I’m doing everything I know to do.

Why hasn’t God healed me?” You just told me why you aren’t healed. You never pointed to what Jesus did for you. You’ve pointed to what you have been doing, which reveals that your faith is in all of your doing, thinking that God responds to your faith. That’s not a balance of grace and faith.

Faith doesn’t move God. God has provided everything for you, independent of you. All faith does is reach out and appropriate what Jesus has already done. If you’re pointing to your goodness, then you aren’t putting faith in God’s grace. You’re putting faith in your efforts and performance.

It’s good for you to do all these things—pray, fast, read the Word, attend church, tithe—but don’t do them to affect God. God’s love for you isn’t based on what you do. He didn’t save you because you were

worth saving. He didn’t save you because of some goodness in your life. It was His grace that commended His love toward you while you were yet a sinner. Your holiness, or lack thereof, does not change God’s heart toward you. God loved you before you were holy. Now that you are semi-holy He doesn’t love you any less, nor will He love you any more.

But your holiness will change your heart towards God. You need to study the Word to change your heart, but not because God is looking at your heart to reward you and answer your prayers now that you’ve been good enough. You need to attend church because it helps you. Meeting with other believers helps you as you hear the Word of God and fellowship with other people. You need to come to meetings where people are expounding the Word of God, speaking the truth, and displaying the power of God. You need to hear testimonies of people being healed, tumors being dissolved, and miracles happening. It’s good for you. It helps you.

But none of this makes God love you any more. He’s not keeping a record of your church attendance and you can’t cash in so many meetings for one answered prayer. If you never go to church again, God would love you exactly the same, but you’re foolish if you don’t go to church. We’re being bombarded with unbelief constantly. You need someplace where you can go hear the truth. You need to be around people who will love you and turn the other cheek when

you do something wrong. You need to be in the fellowship of believers. You’re foolish if you don’t go to church. But God loves you anyway! His love for you is based on His grace, not your performance.

NOT A PROBLEM

I can try to have a positive self-image, thinking that I’m never wrong and everybody else is the problem. It’s never me; it’s always somebody else. But eventually, I just have to look in the mirror and see that I do some dumb things. I make mistakes. It blesses me to know that God’s love is not conditional.

Just recently, I was sharing with my partners that we’ve made the biggest expansion we’ve ever made in our ministry We took a huge step of faith and went on the second largest television station in America. It costs us nearly $70,000 a month to be on this station and I’ve been on it now for eighteen months. We’ve put nearly $600,000 more into this broadcast than what’s come out of it, so I’ve had to take a step back. Some people just can’t handle that. They panic at the thought of making a mistake. Well, this wouldn’t be the first one I’ve ever made. They say, “I don’t know if I can cope with that.” It’s not a problem for me.

Some people think that when God touches your life, you immediately become perfect. That’s not been my experience at all. It’s more like this: I’m moving in the direction that God wants me to go, but I’m not

doing everything perfectly. God could have picked somebody better than me. He could have chosen someone with a much better grasp of the English language and much more charisma than I have. I’m definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but praise God, I’m seeing good things happen just because I know that God loves me in spite of me and not because of me.

There are very few “perfect” people who think they are the greatest. Most of us deal with feelings of unworthiness and wonder, God, why did You choose me? I’m not qualified. If you follow people in the Bible, you’ll see that every person the Lord called, said, “God, I can’t do it!” They struggled for a period of time.

For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.

1 Corinthians 1.26-30

God has not chosen many mighty or noble people who just have it all together. God chooses the base things of the world, things that are despised and things that are nothing, to bring to naught things that are.

APPLY WITHIN

If you’re a loser, a nothing—you qualify to be used of God! God isn’t against people who have all of these great abilities and talents, it’s just that all of your abilities and talents compared to God’s are nothing. You have to come to the end of yourself and say, “Oh Lord, it’s got to be You.” God says, “If you’re a nothing, if you are base, if you’re despised—apply within.” You must come to the end of yourself and realize that it’s not about you.

When you understand grace, you recognize that it’s not based on any goodness of your own. It’s just based on God’s love. He loves you in spite of who you are, not because of who you are. God loved you before you were born. He loved you before you sinned. He loved you even after you had sinned. He commended His love towards you. Now that you’ve accepted Him, He loves you even more than He ever loved you before because now you have made Jesus your Lord. You are a part of Him. The grace—the blessing—of God is in your life unconditionally.

That’s what I received from that experience in 1968. For the first time in my life, I saw that I was a zero with the rim knocked off. I had no confidence in and no satisfaction with myself, whatsoever. Upon this recognition of my worst state, God’s love flowed into me. I just knew His love had nothing to do with me. I knew that God loved me because He is love. That’s what changed my life.