Generous Grace

As I thought more about the massive furor over the issue of grace (or what some people are calling hyper-grace), I began to wonder why some people are so resistant to the idea.  Of course control is a major issue, which I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, Dis-graceful Conduct.  But as I thought about it more, I began to wonder why some people—good people, godly people, including friends of mine—were so rabidly and viciously coming out against the idea of the full grace of God.  I asked myself why they couldn’t accept God’s generosity.

That’s when it dawned on me: they have trouble accepting God’s generosity because true generosity is so very rare these days.  They don’t trust generosity in their fellow humans because it rarely comes without a price-tag of some sort.  So along comes God into their lives, and His generosity is so immense that they simply cannot bring themselves to believe it.

Think about it: God offers us eternal life with Him in Heaven, a place that is so wonderful and beautiful that it defies description (1 Corinthians 2:9).   And all we have to do is to repent and believe.

But the sweet by-and-by is not all that we get.  We also get real and practical help throughout our life here on earth (Matthew 7:7-8).  And all we have to do is to ask, believing.

But that’s not all we get.  Every day as we live in the continual outpouring of God’s love, we become more and more like Jesus (2 Corinthians 3:17-18).  And all we have to do is follow Him, believing.

And that’s not all we get.  The Holy Spirit gives us gifts for ministering to our fellow humans so that we can live together in harmony as the Body of Christ here on earth (1 Corinthians 12 & 13).  And all we have to do is follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, believing.

But that’s still not all we get.  Someday—and it’s going to be soon!—Jesus will come rapture away His church to escape the Tribulation and instead enjoy a 7 year wedding feast: ours to Jesus! (Matthew 25:1-13 & Revelation 21).  And all we have to do is keep doing the work He has given us to do, believing.

So it’s not all a control issue.  Plus, I think that it’s not only a matter of looking for the hidden price-tag on God’s Generous Grace.  As I dug a little deeper, I realized that some people have trouble accepting even a compliment from a friend.  Compliments don’t often come with a price-tag, so why would people have trouble accepting compliments?  Because they don’t feel like they deserve it.  Likewise, they have trouble with the full generosity of God’s Grace because they know that they don’t deserve it.  Of course they don’t!  None of us do!  The definition of grace is unmerited favor.  When we are born-again, we are given what we don’t deserve because Jesus took the punishment that He didn’t deserve.  And all in the name of Love.

Grace is powerful.  It can transform lives by the power of love.  His love for us transforms us from strangers into daughters and sons of the Most High God.  And our love for Him transforms us into victorious overcomers as we live to please our Generous God.

Grace is generous—mind-blowingly generous.  Man’s generosity comes with a price-tag.  God’s generosity also comes with a price-tag: come and die.  But then He promises that if we lose our life for Him, we gain it (Matthew 10:39; John 12:25), so that in the end, the cost of enjoying God’s generosity has been paid for us, and all we have to do is live it out, believing.  Trust God!  Why?  Because God is good!

Stop Complicating the Simple Things!

Day Eleven

We are such silly, irrational creatures sometimes!  We complicate the simplest things.  There’s water, for example.  Ask for a drink of water, and the question comes back: “Still or bubbly?”  How about water from the tap?  Most everyone in the developed world has indoor plumbing, and no city could survive if its tap water was undrinkable.  The water sold in bottles is from a tap, for crying out loud!  And now they’re saying that refilling the plastic bottles will give you breast cancer.  If that were really so, then they wouldn’t sell it in plastic bottles to begin with.  P. T. Barnum would have loved to see the pigeons we’ve got today: “Egress!  This way!”  Suckers!

Matters of faith, like water, are really the simplest concepts that exist.  From the cross, Jesus said, “It is finished!”  Grace, from that moment, is freely given to all mankind—it’s the ultimate “Get Out of Jail Free” card.  But just as the GOJF card does you no good if you don’t pick it up and use it in the game of Monopoly; if you don’t accept the salvation and power of grace, it will do you no good in eternity.

Some people (sincere people) read the Old Testament and realize that they are Commandment-breakers (aren’t we all?) and they add the law to grace, hoping that it will help them to make real and lasting changes in their lives.  Nothing could be farther from the truth!  Adding human effort to God-given perfect grace makes grace of no effect.  Take a look at Galatians 3:16-18:

The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,” meaning one person, who is Christ. What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise; but God in His grace gave it to Abraham through a promise (emphasis mine).

This is that famous chapter that begins: “You foolish Galatians!  Who has bewitched you?”  The Galatian church is the only church that Paul did not give a friendly greeting.  He warmly greeted the Corinthian church, and they had issues of incest and drunkenness during Communion.

Mixing law and grace is the reason why Paul confronted Peter for refusing to continue eating with the gentiles when some prominent Jewish believers arrived (well, that and hypocrisy – Galatians 2:11-13).

Some church leaders worry about people using grace as a license to sin.  Actually just the opposite is true.  The person who genuinely loves God and is filled with the Holy Spirit, following Jesus may sin from time to time, but the desire to continue in a lifestyle of sin melts away.  John explains how this works in the short book of I John.  Will some use grace as a license to sin?  Of course, but those people clearly don’t know God—and they never did or they wouldn’t continue in a lifestyle of sin.  Don’t throw out grace just because some people understand it all wrong.

We’ve got to quit complicating the simple things of God.  You can have grace, in which all your sins—past, present, and future—are forgiven forever by the finished work of Jesus on the cross.  Or you can have the law.  But remember that if you choose the law, you’re saying that you are capable of keeping the whole law.  It’s tantamount to saying to Jesus: “No thanks!  I’ll get myself into heaven.”  (Psst!  Here’s a hint:  you can’t!)

Grace is amazing!  And God is good!