Berean Grace Church

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"Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ" Philippians 1:2. We are an independent Bible church located in Genoa City, Wisconsin. Our Sunday School for ages 4 thru adult begins at 9:00 AM. The adults are currently in 1 Corinthians. The morning worship service begins at 10:15 with the book of Colossians being presented in the sermon. Guests are always welcome! Contact us by e-mail or call for more information.

What is a Berean?
As the apostle Paul traveled in his missionary journeys he went to many cities. When he preached, he got a mixed response to his message. Paul traveled to the city of Berea and preached there. The people in Berea actually looked in the Bible to see if what Paul was saying was true. Acts 17:11 says, "These (the Bereans) were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so". A Berean is someone who listens to the Bible being preached and then opens their Bible to see if what they heard was true.
What is Grace?
The word Grace means favor that is undeserved, merit that is unearned. It is used to speak of the manner of our salvation (Ephesians 2:8,9), and of the way that we deal with one another (Colossians 4:6). We believe that God's grace is to govern and motivate us to live and serve our Lord. This is very different from the approach that is generally used today.
What is The Church?
The word church has the basic meaning of a called out group. We are a group with a twofold purpose: 1. Whenever we assemble, we encourage one another in spiritual growth. We do this through preaching, teaching, and sharing of God's Word. Also we provide an environment for fellowship and Christian service. 2. We also have a message to preach the Lord Jesus Christ as the only Saviour for all mankind. We endeavor to do this in a clear and loving manner.
What is The Gift?
People give and receive gifts all the time. Sometimes they are given for special occasions, such as birthdays and Christmas. At other times they are given just to show affection and friendship. Gifts are given freely to the recipient. A gift costs the one that receives it nothing. That is the nature of a gift. If there are conditions or strings attached to the gift, then it really isn't a gift at all. However, the one that gives the gift incurs a cost to himself. The giver pays for the gift.
God says in his word, that he gives eternal life as a free gift. Romans 6:23 says, "the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."
First let's talk about the issue of sin. Sin is anything that is contrary to the will and nature of God. In Romans 3:23 we find that "all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." If we are honest we would have to admit that we have not always done things the way God would want them done. We sin because it is our nature to sin. The wage that sin pays is death. Not only physical death but eternal separation from God in the Lake of Fire, as well.
How many people have worked and struggled at being religious thinking, because they were told by someone, that they had to do something to cancel out their sin and earn eternal life.
The problem with that idea is that we have such a debt of sin that a life time of good works and church going could never erase it. God says in Romans 4:4 "now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace but of debt." Our effort to please God only builds up the debt, it doesn't cancel it out. We find that God isn't interested in our religion and good works. So we stand guilty before a completely righteous God who doesn't judge on a relativistic scale but according to absolute justice. If we are really honest with ourselves we would have to acknowledge that we all have a problem. We are hopeless on this basis.
That is the bad news. The good news is that God has provided a remedy to this situation. God is not only a God of justice He is also a God of love. He looks at the hopeless condition of mankind and provides a solution to the problem of sin. That solution was the cross of Jesus Christ. Christ came to Earth and went to the cross. God punished Christ for our sin. On the cross Christ paid the debt of sin that we owed to God. He paid the debt completely and totally. He did not leave one sin unpaid for. 2 Corinthians 5:21 says that Christ was made sin for us so that we could be made the righteousness of God in Christ.
The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Christ has done all the work needed for us to obtain eternal life. Now God is giving eternal life as a gift to those people who will stop trusting in what they can to do to please Him and trust in what Christ did.
How about you? Are you trying to earn eternal life? Are you certain that you have eternal life? If not, put your faith in the work of Christ on the cross and God will give you eternal life as a free gift.
What is The Key?
Many people struggle to understand the Bible. There is a simple key that can unlock your understanding of the Bible. That key is to realize that God dealt with different people, in different ways, at different times. He dealt with the nation Israel under the law in the Old Testament. Today he deals with the Body of Christ, a separate group of people from Israel, under Grace.
To really understand this we must recognize that the ministry of Paul the apostle was a totally separate ministry from that of the apostles that were a part of the earthly ministry of Christ. The ministry of Paul was a completely new thing, not the continuation of what the 12 earthly apostles started.
In 1 Corinthians 9:17 Paul says that a "dispensation of the gospel is committed unto him." The word dispensation means household law or household administration. From God's point of view it is a dispensing out something. From man's point of view it is received and we are made stewards of the thing that God is dispensing. God committed to Paul the responsibility of dispensing the gospel. The gospel that Paul dispensed was the gospel of the Grace of God, which sometimes Paul called "my gospel."
Ephesians 3:2 "If ye have heard of the dispensation of the Grace of God which is given me to you-ward: how that by revelation he made known unto me." Paul says that to him was committed the household law of this present age.
God has had different household laws or dispensations at different times. We live in the dispensation of the Grace of God. Our instructions for the time that we live in are found in the epistles of Paul, not in the Gospels that deal with the Earthly ministry of Christ.
In verse 3 Paul says that by revelation God made known unto him the mystery ... which in other ages was not made known.
There was information that God had, that he did not reveal in any other age until he revealed it to Paul for this present age. That means that Christ didn't speak of these things during his earthly ministry. Peter did not speak of them in the early chapters of the book of Acts. It was not until the salvation of Paul and the ministry committed to him that this information begins to be revealed.
When people understand this, the Bible opens up in a most wonderful way. Many things that seemed to contradict now make perfect sense.