GRACE ALONE

I Was Just Thinking About – BY GRACE ALONE.

Over the years, books and hymns have been written, blogs have been posted, sermons have been delivered on the subject of the grace of God. Grace is defined and understood as the freely given and unmerited favor of Almighty God. It requires acceptance and acknowledgement that it is all of grace found in God alone and bestowed by Him in one’s life. It is never based upon the works of man or his self-promotion. There are countless events when grace is exhibited where the response could’ve innately been one of vengeance or vindictiveness.

The Apostle Paul was very precise when he address the subject of God’s amazing grace. Ephesians 2:1-10 (NASB) states a person’s condition apart from amazing grace, namely, being dead in trespasses and sins (verse 1). That which makes the distinctive and defining difference is found in two words used by Paul. He emphasized: “God who is rich in mercy” (verse 4) and “by grace you have been saved through faith” (Verse 8). When thinking about the rich mercy of God and His grace, some words from hymns come to mind…

Wonderful Grace of Jesus, Greater than all my sin.

Marvelous grace of our loving Lord,

Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt.

I was lost but Jesus found me,

Found the sheep that had gone astray.

Threw His loving arms around me,

Drew me back into His way.

Paul (when his name was Saul) had a personal and memorable experience of the meaningfulness of the grace of God when he was confronted by a vision of Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-9, NASB). A summation of his experience and encounter is given in verses 3 through 5, “Suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him; and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him: Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? And Saul said, Who are you, Lord? He said: I am Jesus who you are persecuting.” This would result in the conversion and transformation of Saul from being a persecutor of the church to a proclaimer of God’s grace to the church and to as many others with whom he was given opportunity to share the Gospel. Later on, Paul would share his commitment to the Gospel and his ministry when he gave his testimony and statement of commitment to the elders and believers in Ephesus. He is preparing to leave them. He did not know what was ahead of him in terms of risk and danger. He exclaimed to the brethren (Acts 20:24, NASB), “I consider my life of no value to myself, if only I may finish my course and complete the ministry I have received from the Lord Jesus—the ministry of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.”

The underlying and undergirding of all ministry is to emphasize that it is by grace alone, in Jesus Christ alone, and received by faith alone. During the scope of his ministry and care of the churches, Paul had the opportunity of speaking to the Corinthians believers about tithing and offerings (Second Corinthians 8 and 9, ESV). His powerful and conclusive statement is given in 9:8, “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.” The thrust is obvious. God’s grace will abound to you so that you may abound in every good work. We are to be conduits of God’s abounding grace so that it will touch and impact other lives to seek and abound it in as well.

In John Bunyan’s book (1795), Grace Abounding To The Chief of Sinners, he wrote about his personal struggle with temptation and fear. For an extended period in his life, this was a spiritual struggle. One day he came to a resolve and wrote: "Being now ready to sink with fear, suddenly there was, as if there had rushed in at the window, the noise of wind upon me, but very pleasant, and as if I heard a voice speaking, Did’st thou ever refuse to be justified by the blood of Christ? and withal, my whole life of profession past, was in a moment opened to me, wherein I was made to see, that designedly I had not: so my heart answered groaningly, No.  Then fell, with power, that word of God upon me, See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh.  Hebrew xii. 25.  This made a strange seizure upon my spirit; it brought light with it, and commanded a silence in my heart, of all those tumultuous thoughts, that did before use, like masterless hell-hounds, to roar and bellow, and make an hideous noise within me.  It showed me also that Jesus Christ had yet a word of grace and mercy for me, that He had not, as I had feared, quite forsaken and cast off my soul…"

Prayerfully – consider these things with me.