October 3, 2005
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GRACE
Philip Yancey, the popular Christian author, included the following story, of which I was recently reminded while reading an online newsletter, in his book “What’s so Amazing About Grace?”
“During a British conference on comparative religions, experts from around the world were discussing whether any one belief was unique to the Christian faith. They began eliminating possibilities. Incarnation? Other religions had different versions of gods appearing in human form. Resurrection? Again, other religions had accounts of return from death. The debate went on for some time until C. S. Lewis wandered into the room. “What’s the rumpus about?” he asked, and heard in reply that his colleagues were discussing Christianity’s unique contribution among world religions. In his forthright manner Lewis responded, “Oh, that’s easy. It’s grace.”
After some discussion, the conferees had to agree. The notion of God’s love coming to us free of charge, no strings attached, seems to go against every instinct of humanity. The Buddhist eightfold path, the Hindu doctrine of karma, the Jewish covenant, and the Muslim code of law—each of these offers a way to earn approval. Only Christianity dares to make God’s love unconditional.
… By instinct I feel I must do something in order to be accepted. Grace sounds a startling note of contradiction, of liberation, and every day I must pray anew for the ability to hear its message.”
When I read Yancy’s statement it resonates deeply . The pervasiveness of peformance-based orientation in our relationship to God has always impressed me. When we come to Christ we hear that mankind is flawed, sinful, and inherently unable to meet God’s standard. God, in His mercy, provided a proxy; the perfect sacrificial Lamb Who willingly paid the awful price for man’s rebellion. When one becomes a Christian, it’s based on acknowledgement of one’s utter inadequacy to meet God’s standard, and an acceptance of the FREE, UNEARNED,UNMERITED gift of God ( forgiveness, imputed righteousness, and life) through Christ.
The next common step is insidious…the Christian soon begins to ( in gratitude, usually) want to do as much for God as they can…wonderful. What begins to creep in, though, is the feeling of performance pressure. “Am I doing as much as the next believer? Am I progressing in “ministry” enough? Am I progressing in faith fast enough?” Focus on self replaces focus on the Giver of the Gift….soon we are striving to perform adequately for the One we accepted by admitting our inadequacy.
Yancy is right. Nothing frees me so much to joyfully “perform”; that is, to function as I was designed, as the regular reminder that the God Who is love gives GRACE; UN merited favor, and that
“…the FREE GIFT of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ”
Rom 6:23b, NASB
Grace to you
Jim
Comments (26)
And peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Very true.
(I feel a bit weird saying this, it being out of place, but where did you get that juke box modlue?)
“to joyfully perform as I was designed…”
I was designed to adore. Little more. Jesus adored His Father. I adore them both. I am in once more drawn into silent awe as I sit at Jesus’ feet and adore Him, adore with Him.
RYC: Thank you for your comment on my site
This is a beautiful post, Jim, and a beautiful reminder too. GRACE. Amen.
THANK YOU JIM!!! That is just what I needed to hear today! (love DCTalk BTW!) Have a great week!
Joan
April & Joan….Thanks; I’m glad this blessed “y’all”. (not a term in wide use in Michigan, but fun to throw out there once in a while)
…Jim
Breath_of_Dawn: Amen and AAMEN!! I was actually going to leave the “GRACE” header, to which you so swiftly added that wonderful extension of blessing, up for a day or so, then had a change of mind (and a burst of energy).
Hmmm…just noticed, per your comment, that I used the word “perform” to refer to fulfillment of purpose…perhaps a little editing in order. I agree wholeheartedly that at the core, we are designed to worship and adore God; it’s a big reason that I especially enjoy worship music..I participate. By the way, I finally made it to “the Barn” prayer center yesterday, and spent some time in silence at the “feet of Jesus”…it was really, really good…I needed that so much.
blessings…Jim
Grace and Peace to you! C.S. Lewis said it perfectly… GRACE. It’s only by His grace that I am saved, and I’m thankful EVERY day! I know about “performance” pressure… but the truth of the matter is, NOTHING seperates us from the love God… NOTHING! Thanks for the reminder!
Jim: What a good post~ thank you for taking the time to write it so well. The ideas you processed here seemed to bring comfort on a deep soul level~ Grace, what a wonderful reality. I read a quote by C.S. Lewis that goes with this, something like, There are only two types of belief systems in the world, one teaches that man must be worthy to be saved, the other, true Christianity, believes that God saves the unworthy.
Look at the meaning of grace in your concordance. You will find that it has empowerment in it.
Heather
This post is still working on my mind:
“Other religions had different versions of gods appearing in human form. Resurrection? Again, other religions had accounts of return from death.”
” The Buddhist eightfold path, the Hindu doctrine of karma, the Jewish covenant, and the Muslim code of law—each of these offers a way to earn approval. Only Christianity dares to make God’s love unconditional.”
This reminds me of:
John 1:17:The law was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. (Jn 1:17)
It took God in Jesus to bring Grace and Truth. Hmm. Why was that, do you suppose?
Hey. I don’t have but a moment, but I thought I’d come by and “grace” your Xanga.
You are so TAGGED: Post 5 Weird and Random facts about yourself, then at the end list the names of 5 people who are next in line to do this. Also leave a post on their xanga to let these people know.
I hope you don’t mind.
Hey, all..I’m out of town for a few days…be back soon to post…thanks for comments…Jimmish
Heather: A quick word search for “Grace and Power” yielded, among other things, this from Betty Miller, in her “Overcoming Life” study series, on Bible.com, from one of her workbooks:
Under the New Covenant, the Law or God’s standards are “written on our hearts” (Romans 2:15), which means we have the Holy Spirit within us to remind us of right and wrong. Once we are saved, we have the power to overcome sin through the Holy Spirit and can receive the blessings of Abraham under the new covenant (Galatians 3:14). This is called “living under grace.”
However, since the time of Adam and Eve, God has dealt with mankind in two ways: love and mercy (grace) when one seeks Him or wrath and judgment for those who reject Him. Grace can be defined as “undeserved favor.” Also, it is the ability to keep the law, which is called “divine enablement.” GRACE GIVES US POWER OVER SIN, according to Romans 6:14, because we now have the “Covenant Maker” within us.
Grace does not mean being able to break the law and get away with it. Grace does not mean that God looks the other way when we sin. It does mean that if we fail and break the law, forgiveness is immediately ours when we repent. The blood of Jesus already covers us. We can still overcome, although we may not yet perfectly be conformed to His image. WE HAVE THE POWER OR GRACE TO BECOME THE SONS OF GOD.(John 1:12).
Well, it’s good there’s something, or you’d have the same religeon, with a different name, and you would have blood over it too. It’s good to know that. Grace is a great excuse.
Actually, now I think about it, when you consider the crusades it’s quite ironic that grace is the unique property about the Christian religeon.
I attacked your daughters site with unnessisary comments about socialogy.
Glad to be back.
Breath_of_Dawn: ”It took God in Jesus to bring Grace and Truth. Hmm. Why was that, do you suppose?” Yow!! That one left me speechless for a minute…answers like…”because God chose to do it that way” don’t seem adequate (but do seem to the point, if not being well fleshed-out). I think we could also explore the thought that although man has tried, mightily at times, to be gracious, just , and to find or define truth, God is the embodiment of all these; in fact they are defined by HIM, so only He could show us what this meant in the living demonstration /living lexicon of Godliness which was given to us in the incarnation. Man literally gropes in the dark to find truth without God’s light..we need the multisensorial input of God’s word plus the tangible demonstration which was Jesus to help us understand with limited minds.
Then there’s that other part…only God in Jesus could provide the sacrifice in the flesh which satisfied His demands for holiness, thereby satisfying justice, and allowing mercy and grace to be freely given.
mercy and grace to you…Jim
Hey, nice to see you back again.
Yeah, I have lots of questions like that. I’m simply not satisfied with pat answers. I know……… I just KNOW there is so much more we haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of. We look at things of God with purely (though not pure) anthropomorphic eyes, try to relate Him (or relegate Him) to things we can handle with our hands, see with our eyes, understand with finite minds.
No, no, and a thousand times no! God is more than we can handle with our hands, see with our eyes, hear with our ears, or understand with finite minds. But in Jesus we are able to understand more than we would have. Had He not come, the embodiment of God in the flesh, people would still have gone on teaching out of their fleshly minds and hearts: endless domination, endless condemnation, manipulation, justifying every evil under the sun in the name of God, as many have done since He came.
What did Jesus say to Nicodemus? Are you a teacher in Israel and you don’t know these things?(of the spirit) If I tell you earthly things and you don’t believe/understand, how will you believe/understand if I tell you heavenly things?
No, Jesus had to come and show us who and what God was really about – the God of love, not the God of condemnation and vindictiveness, not the God who arbitrarily chooses one nation or person to bless and gives them license to destroy others in His name. He is not the God of death- physical or spiritual, but the God of life. He is no respecter of persons. He makes His sun shine on the just and the unjust. Everyone is free to choose or reject Him.
Jesus never coerced or frightened anyone into the Kingdom of God. He left all men free to choose, and He knows our hearts. He merely proclaimed the Kingdom of God and let God work through Him to show men the Kingdom of God. There were those who did not see, those who did not want to see, and those who saw and still rejected it, rejected Him. As He said, if you reject Me (standing here in the flesh for all to see, the obvious works of God here for all to see) then you reject God.
Well, this wasn’t intended to be an entire post within a post.
Grace and peace to you and yours.
great thoughts all around.
we often fall into telling others, or ourselves “you can do it” when in fact…we can’t. “I believe in you” when in fact, our faith should be in Christ. “Ya gotta start somewhere” when in fact, there is no where to start, because it wont do any good.
But the truly awesome thing is, this Love that compells us inwards towards the Center, propells us back out and moves through us. We find ourselves “doing it” and “starting somewhere”, and having confidence and etc etc. How often do we fail to remain awakened to the mystery of ages now revealed? Too often…me thinks.
::stoker
Breath_of_Dawn & Bill: I’m on my way out the door, so I’ll be VERY brief and say more later, but I am enriched by your comments, both!( Feel free to “post within a post” anytime! I’ll elaborate later, but your post dovetailed exactly with some remarks by an author/minister I just heard interviewed.)
blessings…Jim
Every time I think if God’s unconditional love and grace for us, I can’t help but praise Him and want to live for Him more!!……It’s a natural response if you’ve experienced His love and grace.
Oh man!! It was submitted twice!! Feel free to erase one of them.
Done!! I did the same thing yesterday on another’s Xanga.
even if slightly off topic (ok…it’s greatly off topic)…what style do you play? I’m just about finished with my first project, i’ve been working for such a long time trying to get it done. but have had numerous obstacles. anyways, i was just curious. :: stoker
Breath_of_Dawn: “Jesus never coerced or frightened anyone into the Kingdom of God. He left all men free to choose, and He knows our hearts. He merely proclaimed the Kingdom of God and let God work through Him to show men the Kingdom of God.”
I was listening to the radio yesterday, and they were interviewing an author who has written about “Authority Abuse” in the context of church leaders. He was Good, but as I said, a light went on when I read your post… our example for use of authority, Jesus, was anything but coercive or manipulative.
“…Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” Philippians 2:5-8 ESV
Even more to the point, we’re clearly instructed to do the same; the beginning of that passage is:
“Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who….”
Jesus Himself was clear..”He who would be greatest must be a servant of all.”
blessings…Jim