The Grace We Can Accept

I think we are like a bunch of people at the beach.  Some of us like to watch the lapping waves from our towel havens or lawn chairs.  Some of us like to play near the foam.  Some of us like to get our feet wet.  But usually, we see a couple of people way out in the water.  Maybe they're on surf boards.  Sometimes they get lost between high waves.  Sometimes water-shy beach bums like me get really nervous seeing people bobbing around far from shore.  I don't like it.  It makes me uneasy.

God's grace is like the ocean.  We've seen it from the beach and we think we know what it's like.  We touch our feet to it, and think we've experienced it.  We get in waist deep, and think we know all about it.  We love it, and are drawn to it, but we are sometimes just so afraid of God's full-force grace. 

Sometimes we want to control it.  We stick to the tide pools because they seem safe.  We sometimes even take shovels and dig them deeper, and when we play there we imagine the real deal.  We love grace, and we are drawn to it, but we have not ever experienced the whole of it. 

Sometimes we treat God's grace like the ocean.  We develop property along it's edges.  We build piers over the waves.  We build boats to travel the surface, and drop our hooks in its depths.  But it is more than we can ever fully take in.  It is more than we can understand.

In 1862, Frederick Faber penned the following hymn of grace: 

 

There’s a wideness in God’s mercy, like the wideness of the sea;
There’s a kindness in His justice, which is more than liberty.

There is welcome for the sinner, and more graces for the good;
There is mercy with the Savior; there is healing in His blood.

 

Was there e'r a kinder shepherd half so gentle, half so sweet,
As the Savior who would have us come and gather at His feet? 

It is God: His love looks mighty, but is mightier than it seems;
’Tis our Father: and His fondness goes far out beyond our dreams.

 

But we make His love too narrow by false limits of our own;
And we magnify His strictness with a zeal He will not own.

For the love of God is broader than the measure of our mind;
And the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind.

 

 

Let us take the time to praise our adoptive Father for His great love and grace, larger than the ocean and beyond our understanding!

Receive the Free Gift Freely

Just imagine you give a friend a box all wrapped up with a ribbon bow.  He asks what the special occasion is, but you just say you wanted him to have something special.  He opens it and finds a highly valuable rare coin that he has only seen in magazines.  Amazed he asks if you are sure it is for him?  You tell him it is a gift. 

But he asks if you want any money for it because he knows how much it is worth.  You say, "No money.  Just enjoy it.  It's a gift."

But he tells you he wants to give you his signed football you were admiring a couple years ago.  You tell him again, "Thanks, but no thanks.  When I saw it I knew you would like it and I wanted to give it to you free and clear.  It's a gift." 

Persisting he begins to wear on your nerves, and asks, "Well, can I wash your car?"  You finally say, "I guess so, if you really want to wash my car."  He thoroughly washes your car with the best of attitudes and goes home singing into the sunset. 

You see him a few days later at a party and he is showing off the coin, and someone asks where he got it.  To your amazement you sadly hear him proclaim he earned it washing a car.

It is so hard for some people to accept the free gift - God's grace! 

You can't earn it. 

You can't trade a commitment for it. 

You can't promise enough promises for it.

It is totally undeserved by the receiver at the most cost to the giver - beautiful, free grace!

In Romans 3:22-24, Paul writes through the Spirit that the righteousness of God "is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, 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." 

In other words, no degree of law keeping, striving in good works, or anguish over your good work that you are going to do for Jesus will ever bring you into right standing with God according to His requirements.  Praise God for sending Jesus to be that payment once and for all to atone for the sins of the world.  The real question is, "Do you know this grace?  Do you have the free gift of redemption that only comes through Jesus?"

Is It That Big a Deal?

I have heard it said that when we come to the point of decision, where we know that we need salvation, that it is like our arms are completely full, and that we cannot accept salvation until we release the things we are carrying.  This puts the emphasis of obtaining salvation on the seeker, not on Christ. 

I think a Biblical perspective of the human condition at this point is more like someone coming to Jesus, and they are completely bound in spiritual chains.  (Jesus said in John 8:34, "Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.")  The chains cover them from head to foot with many locks binding them.  Shall we tell that soul to drop his chains if he wants salvation?  What a frustrating dilemma for a seeker!  Will Jesus say, "I will freely give you eternal life if you ask for it.  Just drop your chains first."  That is not what he said to the woman at the well. 

In John 4:10, Jesus says, ""If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, 'Give Me a drink,' you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water." The woman He was talking to was a Samaritan, and all Samaritans were despised by the Jews.  So by talking to her, Jesus was making a statement that He didn't think she was a dog.  But even among the Samaritans, this woman was an outcast because she was living with a man to whom she wasn't married.  That is why she was found alone by Jesus at high noon (around the sixth hour).  Everyone else got there earlier when it was cool.  It is true Jesus addressed her most urgent sin condition.  He asked her to go get her husband and bring him to Jesus.  She rightly said she didn't have one, and in her words Jesus told her all that she ever did.  But He never put a requirement for her to change in order to receive salvation. 

The Elephant in the Room

Lately, I have been fighting an internal theological battle, but I am keeping it inside no more.  This mental wrangling revolves around a debate about what is required to be saved.  Are we saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ or is it by totally surrendering to Christ's lordship?  Yesterday I read a Facebook post that assumed a girl was a Christian because she wore a cross necklace.  Then they went on to condemn the girl for wearing tempting clothing!  Then they said, "there is no such thing as a carnal Christian!"  (1 Corinthians 3 and Gal 6:1 describe carnal Christians)  This self righteousness is invading our churches and it is destructive. 

If you are in a church that teaches that you are saved by keeping certain requirements or by totally surrendering, listen to the message carefully.  Either we are saved by believing in God's unmerited favor given through Jesus, or as they say, all that plus "total surrender".  It reminds me of a verse out of the Book of Mormon.  In 2 Nephi 25:23, it says, "For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do."  That phrase, "after all we can do" is resonating now from protestant pulpits all over our nation.  It is developing self righteous condemnation of those who don't look saved enough to be called brothers or sisters.  In Ephesians 2:8-9, it clearly states that it is "by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast."  Yet this message is being heard less and less as something called Lordship Salvation is taking hold. 

In 2 Corinthians 5:21, we clearly see that God made Jesus "who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."  It is by Him that we are able to meet God's righteous standard.  It is not by what we can do for Him to be good enough to deserve His grace!