Grace

Grace I really struggled with this devotional today. It took me longer than most any other I have written. I found grace to be such a difficult concept that my thoughts would come out very unorganized and I would stare at the screen praying for God to bring my words into the focus that I needed, but then finally realized that I should give myself a little grace in the spirit of the devotional, and just let the thoughts flow. It is in the spirit of giving myself a little grace that I give you today's devotional. I truly hope that you can see the beauty of God's grace in today's writing. I have been pouring over every scripture related to grace this morning. As I find them I type them out so they are all in front of me in order to help me make connections as I write. I have 3 full pages of bible verses in front of me. This is more than I found for courage, stillness, and strength. Over and over these verses are informing us that “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us. - Ephesians 1:7-8 ” Lavished. What an amazing word that really captures the luxury that grace is. The bible clearly outlines that God's grace is a gift that is bestowed upon us because of the sacrifice of Christ Jesus. But what does that mean for us? What is grace? Of course there are multiple meanings for grace, but what does grace mean to the Christian? Grace, according to Miriam Webster Dictionary, is defined as unmerited divine assistance given to humans for their regeneration or sanctification, but also mercy, pardon, and favor. A more secular definition would be a charming or attractive trait or characteristic or pleasing appearance. When I read that I realized how fitting even that meaning is and how truly attractive and beautiful God's grace is. It may be a secular definition, but how pleasing is it to see someone bless someone else with a mercy, especially when it isn't deserved? Our divine grace is so beautiful. The thought that we did absolutely nothing to warrant an unconditional pardon for our sins defies human logic. We on earth tend to abide by basic laws of physics including cause and effect. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, right? Not with grace. Our action is small, we are asked to love God with our mind, strength, and soul and to love our neighbors as ourselves; in return we are given freedom from death and sin. These are not equal and opposite reactions! Loving God takes faith, which is difficult for some, loving our neighbors can be even harder, but quite manageable and enjoyable in both respects. However overcoming death and sin? This is an impossibility that makes the gift of it even more phenomenal. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. - Romans 3:23-24.” We don't deserve it, but it is given to us anyway. This is absolutely amazing! But again what is asked of us in return? Love God and God alone, and love your neighbor as yourself. Giving grace to others can be hard, but compared to what we are given in return it is just a drop in the bucket, which is why we should try so hard to fulfill these commands. How are you struggling with grace today? Are you struggling with giving grace to others or giving it to yourself? In order to be able to better give ourselves and others some of the grace that God has so graciously given us, let us break down the qualities of grace: Faith, Patience, Forgiveness. Let's start with faith. Faith is the catalyst for God's grace being gifted to us. I love the Romans Road for the explanation of Salvation. Romans 3:23 lets us know that we are all sinners and fall short of the glory of God. None of us have “earned” this gift of grace. Romans 6:23 lets us know that the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. We are all sinners and deserve to die, but Romans 5:8 lets us know that God demonstrated his love toward us while we were still sinners and sent Christ to die for us instead as the ultimate sacrifice. And how do we reap the benefits of this amazing sacrifice? Romans 10:9-10 goes on to state that if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead, we will be saved. For it is with our heart that we believe and are justified and with our mouth that we confess and are saved. We get one more taste of assurance of this gift of salvation in Romans 10:13 “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” That is our faith in a nutshell. Jesus paid it all to purchase grace for us though we are completely unworthy. Eternal lift for love and belief. It seems very lopsided to me. And doesn't that reveals just how amazing a gift it is to us?! We are not worthy, but he is worthy and has washed our sins as white as snow. What a beautiful, gracious God we serve. How can you bless someone's life today by sharing the gift of God's grace and salvation? Patience is a part of the virtue of grace that we need to possess when giving ourselves and others the grace that is needed to show that we are children of God. God has demonstrated amazing patience with us. We sin again and again, but He still strives to connect with us, and to draw us closer to Him. If God can show us such amazing patience, why is it is hard for us to have patience with others or ourselves? Most often, I believe the answer is weakness. We perceive a weakness in someone else, maybe they are slow and you are fast and you become impatient waiting for them. Maybe you have seen someone fail in an interaction with another human, and see this weakness as making them less worthy of your respect. Maybe you perceive a weakness in yourself, and rather than giving yourself time to learn from that weakness you become impatient with yourself for not already achieving the feat. Maybe you lose patience with your children, then mentally chastise yourself after. Maybe you became short tempered with someone in traffic and yelled at them. It is hard to see weakness in ourselves and accept it. We are always striving to be stronger, better versions of ourselves and often don't accept anything less. But God tells us in 2 Corinthians that “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.” God doesn't see your weakness as being something that is less than worthy of his grace, he sees it as an opportunity for his strength to shine through you. In your interactions with yourself, and with others, take a moment to realize that your weakness shows God's strength and see if it helps you to better grant grace through patience with yourself and others. Finally, the most difficult aspect of grace: Forgiveness. Not only forgiveness of others, but forgiveness of yourself when you sin as well. I struggle with both of these ideas, but one thing I have come to learn is that forgiveness does not equate with forgetting the transgression, it simply means the transgression no longer has the power over you to bring out negative reactions and emotions, and that freedom is such a gift. Christians do not forgive out of the goodness of their heart or because we are perfect, because as we have already determined we ourselves are not good and far from perfect. However, we are good because of Christ's perfection, and we forgive because we have been so graciously forgiven. We aren't perfect, but we are forgiven and that is truly a gift. And it is a gift that we can give to others as well as ourselves. While forgiveness may relax some burden or punishment on the transgressor, it also frees the victim from those negative emotions and the burden of anger that continues to punish the victim daily. That is a heavy weight to carry that will eventually break you. So often we feel that when we sin or when someone hurts us, that we become broken, or a less complete version of ourselves. This is why it becomes difficult to forgive because we feel a part of us was changed or taken that we can never recover. However, this is why grace is so amazing. Only those people who have that brokenness in them can truly see the beauty of His grace and how deep His love is. He takes his grace and fills those broken cracks in us with gold allowing us to shine brighter than ever as a testimony of his love to all those around us. The deeper the crack the more brightly that golden light shines. When you have been broken and can see the end result of grace in your life, you can really appreciate how amazing this gift is. Be patient and forgiving of yourself and let God's grace do its work in you. Romans 8:1 reminds us that “there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus.” If he doesn't condemn us for our sins, what right do we have to condemn those around us? Mark 11:35 reminds us, “Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions.” Forgiveness is an extension of grace that we can not only give to ourselves, but others as well. What burden are you carrying that forgiveness of yourself or someone else can release you from?