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on Calvary and arise the third

day for our justification.

GOD ALONE IS THE

SOURCE OF SALVATION

Salvation was initiated in heav-en as God's plan. Man was notcounseled concerning it. In fact,

man had nothing to do with itsinstitution other than being the

object of it!

"God so loved the world that hegave his only be-gotten Son,

that whosoever believeth in him

should not perish, but haveeverlasting life" (John 3:16).

"God, who is rich in mercy, for

his great love wherewith he

loved us. . ." (Ephesians 2:4).

"For ye know the grace of our

Lord Jesus Christ, that, thoughhe was rich, yet for your sakes

he became poor, that yethrough his poverty might be

rich" (II Corinthians 8:9).

From these verses the role of

grace in salvation is evident

grace initiates salvation.

FAITH AND OBEDIENCE

ARE MAN'S RESPONSE

Faith takes God's grace, mercyand kindness and appropriates

it to an individual's own life."For by grace are ye saved

through faith" (Ephesians 2:8).Faith is the agency in the heart

of a man that receives the mes-

sage of God's great grace, ap-plies grace to his own condition,

and sees a way out of his lost

This is a controversial subject,

yet, one that must be facedBiblically and head on for Jesus

made it clear in John 3:5 that,"Except a man be born of water

and of the Spirit, he cannotenter into the Kingdom ofGod." This is not what is com-

monly taught in today's church,and is a matter of Heaven or

Hell for church members who

blindly accept an unbiblicalmodel for salvation. In an edito-

rial one minister declared,

"There is nothing that can beadded to grace to bring salva-

tion to a soul. "Grace," hewrote, "wrought salvation with

no strings attached." Another

minister stated, "Grace plusnothing equals salvation."

Is this biblical? Have theseministers gone farther than theScriptures go? Must not the

recipient of salvation take somecorresponding action in re-

sponse to grace? If there is

nothing that one can do, or if noresponse is necessary, what

about the scriptural passages

that call for action?

When guilty sinners asked,

"Men and brethren, what shallwe do?" the Apostle Peter re-plied, "Repent ..." Acts 2:37-

38). When Saul of Tarsus in-quired, "Lord, what wilt thou

have me to do?" the Lord an-swered, "Go into the city, and itshall be told thee what, thou

must do" (Acts 9:6). After adevastating earthquake, while

springing into the crumbled

ruins of the prison in an at-

tempt to take his own life, thePhilippian jailer heard the

voice, of Paul call out, "Do thy-self no harm, for we are all

here." He was sure his prisonerswould be gone. When he discov-ered them yet present, he

turned to Paul and Silas andcried out, "Sirs, what must I do

to be saved?" Their answer was,

"Believe on the Lord JesusChrist, and thou shall be saved

and thy house" (Acts 16:25-31).

In each of these scriptural inci-dents, action was demanded of

the inquirer. The first was,

"Repent"; the second, "go"; thethird, "Believe." All three called

for action, the action of the will.A command was issued in each

instance. It was not "Grace plusnothing equals salvation." Itwas "Grace plus faith plus obe-

dience equals salvation"! Or"Grace plus obedient faith

equals salvation."

GRACE IS GOD'S ACT

Grace is the unmerited, unde-served favor of God bestowed

on a person through the atoning

sacrifice of the Lord JesusChrist. Grace is the source of

salvation. Grace means thatGod initiates salvation. It in-

cludes every act on God's partthat brought salvation to man-

kind. God's grace caused Him to

manifest Himself in flesh asJesus Christ, assume human

limitations, freely give Himself

Grace + 0 = Salvation?

Miracles in Action

January 2012Volume 1, Issue 1

Water From the Rock

Miracles in Action

Dr. Larry and SheliaYates

1819 S. 8th Street

Ironton, OH 45638

740-237-4548

740-237-9847

larrylyates@hotmail.com

sayfaithis4ever@yahoo.com

Miraclesinaction.weebly.com

larrylyates.wordpress.com

We desire not only tosee believers live victo-

riously, but to help

them become rooted

and grounded enough

in Gods Word to reach

out and teach others

these same principles

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Who We Are

Mission Statement

The mission of Miracles in Action is to boldly proclaim the Apostolic Mes-

sage, teaching believers everywhere the True Nature of God, as well as

who they are in Christ-equipping them with the knowledge necessary to

live a life characterized by righteousness, freedom an true spiritual power,

while exercising their God-given authority and dominion and operating

fully in their Covenant responsibilities, rights and privileges.

Vision

Miracles in Action is an Apostolic teaching ministry dedicated to sharing

the Apostolic Faith, the revelation of our full salvation and the realities of

the New Creation to lost and hurting humanity through a basic understand-

ing of the truth and reality of Gods Word.

"And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their syna-

gogues, and preaching The Gospel of the Kingdom, and healing every

sickness and every disease among the people...Verily, verily I say unto

you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and

greater works than these shall he do, because I go to the Father. And what-

soever you shall ask in My Name, that will I do that the Father may be

glorified in the Son. If you shall ask anything In My Name, I will do it."

Matthew 9:35, John 14:12-14

Restoring the Vision of Apostolic Christianity-Declaring Your Destiny

through the Word of Faith

nal salvation unto all them thatobey him" (Hebrews 5:9).

The truth about salvation can

be illustrated by a checkingaccount. The account in thebank is the source of the moneyand corresponds to grace. Acheck written on that account isthe means of receiving the mon-ey and corresponds to faith. Theact of cashing the check repre-sents obedience.

Let us suppose someone wantsto give you a gift of $1,000. Hewrites a check for that amountand instructs you to cash it. It isyours; you have the check inyour hands. But the money is

still in the bank and not in yourhands until you cash the check.

Your act of cashing the check isthe required obedience, and thisobedient response is needed ifyou are to enjoy the benefits ofthe bank account and check. Ifyou do not act, the bank retainsthe money in the donor's ac-count and you do not get it! Soit is with God. The donor is God,the check is faith, and obedience

state. In other words, faith ap-propriates salvation.

Finally, obedience steps upon

the scene and becomes the activeagent, motivating one to act onwhat grace has provided andfaith appropriated. Actually wecan view obedience as includedin true biblical faith and notsomething apart from it. Sincemany people think of faith asmerely mental assent, we muststress that saving faith doesinvolve obedience. At least nine-teen passages in the New Testa-ment adjure obedience to salva-tion. In short, obedience acti-vates salvation.

"And we are witnesses of thesethings; and so is also the HolyGhost, whom God hath given tothem that obey him" (Acts5:32).

"But God be thanked, that yewere the servants of sin, but yehave obeyed from the heart thatform of doctrine which wasdelivered you" (Romans 6:17).

"He became the author of eter-

cashes the check.

The doctrine referred to in Ro-mans 6:17 is explained earlier in

that chapter. Romans 5:20-21depicts the wonderful grace ofGod that always abounds morethan sin and that leads to eter-nal life Then Romans 6:1-7describes the means by whichgrace is applied. Specifically, theRoman Christians died to sin,were baptized into Jesus Christ,thereby being baptized into Hisdeath and being buried withHim in baptism, and arose towalk in newness of life.

In other words, they obeyed thecommand to repent, be baptized

in the name of Jesus Christ, andreceive the Holy Spirit. Thisexperience identified them withChrist's death, burial, and resur-rection, thereby bringing tothem the abounding grace ofGod's provision. Their obedi-ence, which was faith in action,was the channel through whichthey received God's grace.

No, it is not "Grace + 0 = Salva-tion." Rather, "Grace + Faith +

Grace + 0 = Salvation? (cont)

Were on the Web

miraclesinaction.weebly.com

Obedience = Salvation." If a person doesnot obey, then he does not truly believe,and if he does not believe then he has notreceived the grace of God. Acts 2:41

depicts the proper attitude that we musthave towards the revelation of God'sgrace: "Then they that gladly receivedhis word were baptized; and the sameday there were added unto them aboutthree thousand souls."

After hearing about the grace of God, thecrowd believed by receiving Peter's wordand immediately obeyed by being bap-tized in the name of Jesus Christ. Like-wise Saul immediately obeyed whenAnanias told him what to do (Acts 9:17-18; 22:16), and the Philippian jailerobeyed after Paul and Silas had ex-plained the way of salvation to him (Acts

16:31-34).

Obedience is the criterion of faith. Wemust respond in obedient faith to receivethe grace of God in our lives. We mustnot be misled into thinking that no re-sponse on our part is necessary for us tobe saved. We must obey God's Word. Wemust believe and obey the messagepreached by the apostles and received bythe crowd on the Day of Pentecost: