Ps 31 8 You have not handed me over to the enemy

but have set my feet in a spacious place."

The christian faith is a message of grace and warning. But if we fail to describe sanctification according to Gods covenant it can become a message that focuses on mans ability in his performance. But the gospel is not a warning to Gods elect who must hold onto salvation. So the gospel must be described on the standard of Christ obedience and acceptance instead of being reduced to trust in mans power to be saved. Once we begin to make the gospel a bad prophetic message we have stripped it from its ends for which Christ has obtained salvation. We must always be aware in teaching sinners that the glory of the gospel is that it changes us by focusing on imputed righteousness.

It is true that the we are required to exercise our faith and obedience in order to reveal that we possess saving faith. Some people teach that if we have faith then it will be shown by our works. I heard and read this repeated that if we are saved and we have Christ obedience it will automatically translate into our obedience. Can salvation be successful as a one time gift that carries over into christian obedience? Is all the grace given to us when we first receive salvation? Or do we experience grace through transfusion? In other words if the entire amount of grace was given to us as the beginning then technically we could say that saving with will automatically result in works. In other words there is nothing that will oppose our success in showing works. But if the grace is given in each act that we do in a transfusion then we are facing opposition. In other words we need something that we do not have at the time of doing the required act that is strong enough to overcome the opposition. So we can say that having saving faith does not automatically translates into works.

This is what the bible teaches. That faith can be strong or weak. We must understand that grace is not a substance that we get that makes us obedient. Grace is an undeserved favor that is given to us. This is why grace is ability that starts when the corruption dies. Grace is powerful because it is the only reality where recreation comes out of death to sin and corruption. This is why the apostle says Shall we go on sinning in order that grace my increase? In other words we cannot see grace as a substance that opposes sin. Then the apostle says by no means ..we died to sin. in other words the new life starts after every corruption is dead. So grace reality that will never fail in the christian. Because it silences the opposition to Christ. If everything that is corrupt is dead it ends the power of the opposition. So when the apostle is speaking of grace it is the same thing as the curse of the law being successful in overcoming all opposition. We can say grace is killing all opposition.

The problem is that we are unable to overcome anything in our own power because we are still corrupted. We not only need to kill the opposition to Christ kingdom but we must silence the opposition that dwells in us. That is in our flesh. So we can try to obey the law with our own ability. You have examples in the scripture where saving faith did not translate into success. Peter is an example. He possessed saving faith but he denied Christ three times. But even tho Peter was disobedient yet he did not lose his faith. Not because God accepted Peters rejection . But because Christ overcame Peters rejection by taking Peters place and paying the penalty to kill Peters sin. This is the same thing as grace. This is why the Apostle says that there was nothing that he did in himself. It was all the grace of God.

We are taught in this Psalm that God leads us to the spacious place. The Psalmist uses all of these words like grace, unfailing love, faith, refuge and rock as the terms of salvation that are carried over into the nt. He is using these terms by always pointing to Psalm 18 in all the other Psalms. Psalm 18 is describing the great wonders of God in subduing Davids enemies. This Psalm is repeated in the narrative of David more that any other Psalm. Its really a testimony of Davids life.

We must understand that salvation is compared to a battle field in which God has silenced the enemy. God has completely destroyed every person opposing Israel in the war. The picture of salvation is walking in between the bodies and knowing that the war has led to peace and a return to Israel as the glory of God.

In Psalm 18 God comes to the rescue of Israel or they would be silenced. They would be the army that was spread across the battle field. This is what the Psalmist is describing as the life of grace. He is giving us these pictures of Christ coming to our rescue in order for us to perform in the christian as the soldiers performed on the battle field. This is why we miss apply the disposition of the gospel . Because we have taken it from the seriousness of a life and death battle. Its described as half man and half God. We are describing the christian experience outside of the culture that it comes from.Because most people have not fought in a war. So we pray that God will strike us to make obedient. We talk about God bringing us pain to change us. But the Psalmist focuses on salvation being the same as when Israel has fought and they enter the part of the battle where it is in danger of turning in favor of Gods enemies. The victory starts when man is reduced to being destroyed if Christ does not intervene.

This is why the Psalmist says that the success in our christian lives are a result of God being gentle to us in leading us and pulling us out of the pit. Because we fight in our own strength and he comes to us when we have no strength left. Thats the picture of growing. We must understand that grace being the death of the opposition is the entire realm of the kingdom of Christ . There is nothing that we accomplish unless the circumstances of kingdom success are what we are walking into. In Gods kingdom there are no half tries, no sliding scale. Its total destruction and death. This is the life of grace.