BP 180
How often do you remember that you have the same Spirit within you that was in Abraham, Moses, David, Daniel, Jeremiah, Hosea, Peter, Paul, and Mary the sister of Lazarus? The same God of grace who inhabited those jars of clay as they lived their years on this planet over two thousand years ago now inhabits your heart. You are family with them, connected, forever one with them. All of you are declared righteous through faith by grace.
The same God of grace inhabited them. The God of grace. Grace. Grace was theirs and grace is yours. We will all walk together on the other side of death because of grace.
What is grace anyway? Is it a commodity? Is it a person of the Trinity? Is it merely a theological concept?
I believe that grace is a beautiful nectar not available to those who are strangers to God, and it is an “acquired taste” for believers (even though it is available to them at and after the rebirth). The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines an acquired taste as “something or someone that is not easily or immediately liked or appreciated.”
I want to add, “not readily apprehended for what it is.”
Grace is incomprehensible for those who do not know God–for the “natural man.” However, grace is something that has been freely given to those who believe the good news of the gospel and can be increasingly understood and enjoyed by those who have the mind of Christ. As 1 Corinthians 2:9ff says:
“’What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him’”—these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things but is himself to be judged by no one. ‘For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.’”
Grace is not referred to specifically here, but certainly it would be included in that phrase, “the things freely given us by God.”
A passage that refers directly to grace is Ephesians 2:1ff:
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”
Grace, then, is the medium by which we are saved, the vehicle in which we are brought into God’s presence, an aspect of God’s character we never would have tasted of if we had not been enslaved to sin and Satan without hope of escape in our own power.
When I referred to grace earlier as an “acquired taste,” I meant that it grows sweeter to us as we increasingly comprehend it not just in our minds but in our hearts. We have been given complete grace through the death and resurrection of Jesus, but we need a journey to absorb it fully. Our understanding of and affection for grace is not immediately internalized—at least not in its entirety. It is too high above our human ken and too expansive for our hearts to receive it fully in one single point in time. We learn it over decades; more accurately, over centuries and millennia.
If there are essential pillars/foundations of the Christian walk (God’s character) that quiver with the weight of glory and that you want to apprehend and love, grace is right up there at the pinnacle.
Let’s take a brief look at how some saints over the centuries spoke about grace.
“The law works fear and wrath; grace works hope and mercy” ~ Martin Luther
“Within each of us exists the image of God, however disfigured and corrupted by sin it may presently be. God is able to recover this image through grace as we are conformed to Christ” ~ Allister McGrath
“Grace is but Glory begun, and Glory is but Grace perfected” ~ Jonathan Edwards
“The Cross is the lightning rod of grace that short-circuited God’s wrath to Christ so that only the light of His love remains for believers” ~ A. W. Tozer
“Grace is not simply leniency when we have sinned. Grace is the enabling gift of God not to sin. Grace is power, not just pardon” ~ John Piper
“Grace is the free, undeserved goodness and favor of God to mankind” ~ Matthew Henry
“One who has been touched by grace will no longer look on those who stray as ‘those evil people’ or ‘those poor people who need our help.’ Nor must we search for signs of ‘loveworthiness.’ Grace teaches us that God loves because of who God is, not because of who we are” ~ Phillips Brooks
“Our righteousness is in Him, and our hope depends, not upon the exercise of grace in us, but upon the fullness of grace and love in Him, and upon His obedience unto death” ~ John Newton
“Grace is the very opposite of merit… Grace is not only undeserved favor, but it is favor, shown to the one who has deserved the very opposite” ~ Harry Ironside
“Grace means undeserved kindness. It is the gift of God to man the moment he sees he is unworthy of God’s favor” ~ Dwight L. Moody
“Those who believe they have pleased God by the quality of their devotion and moral goodness naturally feel that they and their group deserve deference and power over others. The God of Jesus and the prophets, however, saves completely by grace. He cannot be manipulated by religious and moral performance–he can only be reached through repentance, through the giving up of power. If we are saved by sheer grace we can only become grateful, willing servants of God and of everyone around us” ~ Tim Keller
“You are coming to a King, Large petitions with you bring, for his grace and power are such, none can ever ask too much” ~ John Newton
“Here is a spiritual principle: We cannot exercise love unless we are experiencing grace. You cannot truly love others unless you are convinced that God’s love for you is unconditional, based solely on the merit of Christ, not on your performance. Our love, either to God or to others, can only be a response to His love for us” ~ Jerry Bridges
“When I hear Christians say, ‘I don’t do this, and I don’t do that, and I am following a set of rules,’ I immediately recognize that they know very little about the grace of God. They are trying to live the Christian life in their own strength. But Paul says, ‘Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” ~ J. Vernon McGee
“Grace does not depend on what we have done for God but rather what God has done for us. Ask people what they must do to get to heaven and most reply, ‘Be good.’ Jesus’ stories contradict that answer. All we must do is cry, ‘Help!” ~ Phillips Brooks
“The bridge of grace will bear your weight, brother. Thousands of big sinners have gone across that bridge, yea, tens of thousands have gone over it. Some have been the chief of sinners and some have come at the very last of their days but the arch has never yielded beneath their weight. I will go with them trusting to the same support. It will bear me over as it has for them” ~ Charles Spurgeon
The main reason I am writing about grace this week is because it is an attribute of God’s character that often is difficult for believers to believe. Yes, we talk about the grace of God as if we believe it, but then we dwell on sin, shame, and our own failings. Like Adam and Eve, we then hide from God in the thick gardens (jungles) of our hearts.
Many daughters and sons of the God of grace seem to feel unforgiven or that they must somehow atone for their sins when Jesus has already died for them. Others appear to embrace the law of being good to earn God’s favor instead of embracing God’s undeserved favor. Even many pastors preach about grace, but the tone in their voices drips with anger, disappointment, and even condemnation.
My primary point about grace is that even as believers, the message and “heart” of grace is opposed. Satan, our own flesh, and possibly even human voices from our past like parents or teachers speak opposing messages in our hearts. So, we end up looking at and studying our own badness and thereby avoid gazing in wonder at God’s love and undeserved favor.
The next time you feel bad, condemned, ashamed, are tempted to hide, feel on the outside of God’s love, believe you are less than other Christians around you, sense that you are disqualified from God’s grace, take your eyes off you and look at Him. Grace will never come from Satan or your own heart. Grace only comes from the heart of God. So, look to Him.
Yes, sin is a serious thing. However, some people rehearse their sins and sinfulness to the exclusion of learning grace. They actually become self-centered as they examine their disobedience and loathe themselves as if these behaviors are somehow pleasing to God.
Child of God, next time you sin or feel shame and badness, don’t hesitate. Immediately look at Jesus and “then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that [you] may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” ~ Hebrews 4:16.
Grace, God’s undeserved favor opened to us by the loving actions of God in His Son, is never embraced and internalized when we are looking at ourselves.
Grace is one of the most psychologically healthy rewards of faith in God on which to meditate. If you would simply dwell on grace (continue to apprehend it in your mind and sense its presence in your heart), you would sin less, love more, experience less shame, depression, and anxiety, and feel such a great affection for Jesus that you would think about Him all the time with praise and thanksgiving in your heart!
Of course, such apprehension of grace does not occur overnight, and it often is attainted only after identifying and removing many obstacles in the heart and mind. Remember, the sweetness of grace is tasted more and more every day for an eternity.
I am persuaded that as you look at Jesus and take in what He has done for you and how He loves you unconditionally, you will increasingly know grace.
So, simply said, experiencing and learning grace is about gazing in the right direction. . .
Vertically.
“[God] saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel . . .” ~ 1 Timothy 1:9
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth . . . from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” ~ John 1:14, 16-17.
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