Grace Bible Church

Matthew 17:27  Not withstanding lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up: and when thou hast opened his mouth thou shalt find a piece of money: that take and give unto them for me and thee.

This passage of scripture is a most precious object lesson that our LORD is intent on instructing the disciples in. It is one of absolute grace, total liberty, and wise labor in the work our master has called us into. Those who come to know the True and Living GOD and seek to glorify Him in the ministry of the Gospel have been given by divine decree from Christ Himself an HOOK with no Bait.

As fishermen for Christ we don't seek to entrap men, entice nor flatter them, wooing them in with baits of different kinds, we are not seeking the approval or acceptance of any that we might please them. Galatians 1:10 "For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ"

So we fish as our LORD has called us to with an hook that has no bait. We preach and teach the naked Gospel of a Sovereign Christ, telling men what GOD has done without compromise.

Knowing that it will offend most, knowing that for many it is unpleasant, unpalatable, and carries the fragrance of an stinking odor, how in the world do you catch any fish with no bait?

You don't need any, the hook is enough. Rejoice with me the hook is enough! In this fishing ministry men and women designated, ordained, predestined unto life and faith in the Savior are attracted to the hook alone.

That hook is the Saving grace of God almighty by the redemption that is in His Son Jesus Christ. That hook the elect will find exceedingly attractive and will bite. Everyone else will pass it by, they have no interest in it, it has no bait.

Now in our first study I told you that our LORD was instructing his disciples and us in His absolute grace, complete liberty and wise labor in the work of our LORD. His absolute grace is that means whereby his children are made free. It is the Sovereign grace of GOD in Christ having chosen certain unworthy sinners to a full and free salvation.

Grace is no doubt the source and cause of our salvation. “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God:” Ephesians 2:8. Nothing in us could have moved GOD toward us in love and in mercy saving His sheer Grace.

GOD almighty was totally free to leave all of us in our sin and misery, and to cast us away as reprobate. To leave us to be taxed by His holy and just law, as debtors to it and as strangers to that covenant of grace, wherein the children are made free....

As owner and lawgiver GOD demands perfect obedience in his province, from all His subjects, and as sinners we have failed to comply, what will you do? The debt is divine punishment for offences committed, Such is the taxes of the law, eternal banishment from GOD. Therefore render unto GOD that which is GOD'S.

And if you are a stranger to grace you will surely pay. If you despise His grace , His SON, His redemption, His Salvation, you are a stranger and you must pay, only the children are free.

How have they become children? By the election of His grace! Chosen in His Son, from before the foundation of the world.

How can I know I'm one of the children? Do you believe the Gospel of GOD? Has the Spirit of GOD convinced you of the complete efficacy of Christ atoning work alone?

Do you believe that Christ stands as your representative at the right hand GOD almighty having redeemed you from the curse of the law, having been made a curse for you? Have you abandoned your self worth will and work to trust Christ alone?

From the heart man believeth unto ( this ) righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto (this) salvation. And by this work of grace in the heart, one may confidently KNOW that as one of the children of GOD, He is free, from all things. We will talk about that freedom next time.

Matthew 17:26 "Peter saith to him, Of strangers. Jesus saith to him, Then are the children free."

How is that glorious liberty that our LORD instructs Peter that all the children possess obtained ? Was it an arbitrary decree of GOD Almighty that declared His sons and daughters exempt from the taxes that all the people of the land must pay ? Did He simply pick and choose and pronounce to some that you must pay and others not?

Oh No! By no means. Then wicked men and women who cast the charge that a sovereign predestinating and electing GOD must be unjust, would themselves be justified in their charge, GOD is not fair, He’s not just.

But the salvation of all GOD’S elect is indeed a just salvation, Zechariah 9:9 "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh to thee: he [is] just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass."

This freedom which we possess of GOD was established in righteousness. The grounds upon which it was obtained will one day cause all men to be astonished, Isaiah 52:14 "As many were astonished at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men:".

When we preach to men and women everywhere the message of Liberty, it is not out of a spirit of mischief as if we desire to see them do greater harm and danger to their eternal soul than while they lived lives of unbridled wickedness.

Those who protest the high sounding proclamation of liberty as a dangerous message to sinners have no knowledge of the grace of GOD, are not confident in its efficacy, and have not realized that liberty is the first principle of the Gospel call. To deny men this call is to not proclaim the gospel.

You are a wicked man and son of the devil that wishes only to bind the conscience of men and women and make them servants of your system of religion and self righteousness, no matter how small an element you impose.

I understand that a criminal spirit needs to be placed in hold. And as sinners there is that tendency to use this privilege of freedom towards lasciviousness. And some men and women will profess to know him and yet by works deny him. These are not the children. They will soon pay taxes as strangers to the grace of GOD.

Math 17:27 “Not withstanding lest we should offend them, go down to the seas, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up;”. We who proclaim the Gospel must not only declare liberty to the captives. But we must also clearly and plainly set forth how that liberty was obtained, lest we offend. And here is where our LORD instructs Peter in the matter of the tribute money.

Our LORD had Peter to provide for the tributor that which was needed to satisfy his master that both Peter and Christ pay taxes. So we tell all men that we are to love GOD’S law and keep it. We pay taxes. Or rather we have already paid all the taxes do us. We have established the law. We have fulfilled its demands, and now stand owing no man, we are just persons. For Christ is the end of the law for everyone that believeth.

In Christ Jesus the children have both paid the tribute money and are free. We are at liberty in this world but we are ever mindful of its ordinances. We are freer than the heart of man can imagine and that freedom will come to full manifestation at our complete redemption from sin.

And yet we will follow every ordinance of man. We will render unto Caesar that which is his, in this life, and yet we boldly proclaim that we are NOT UNDER THE LAW.

Can you understand that? Lest we offend. Our justification and freedom is the consequence of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. Our Freedom was bought with a price, and we will glorify GOD in these bodies which are his.