The God of Grace

It is a good thing that our God is a God of grace. We need grace more than the air we breathe! Our need for God to supply us everything necessary for life and right living is endless, because we will certainly need Him to go on supplying all things to us throughout the endless reaches of eternity.[1] Yet, this is apparently what God loves to do: give freely. He gives without measure, without reserve, apparently without our qualification and often without our cooperation. He gives until there is no need left to fill, and then He overfills—just to make sure that our joy begins to match His.[2]

And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace,  who has called you to his  eternal glory in Christ, will himself  restore, confirm, strengthen, and  establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen. 1 Peter 5:10-11

All scripture citations are from the English Standard Version (ESV) unless otherwise noted.

God Gives Grace

One of His Names actually is the God of All Grace. Don't you love that? If you are crushingly aware of your sins or sinfulness, if you are desperately aware of your needs and weaknesses, you just have to love this Being who calls Himself the God of All Grace. That is exactly what we need!

An old Pentecostal preacher once said that all preaching can be summed up with these two ideas: humanity's need and God's supply. We are the endlessly needy ones and yet the greater tragedy of our need is that we have nothing to give in exchange. Grace means that God's supply comes to us as a never-ending, undeserved torrent of giving.

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence. 2 Peter 1:3

Grace is not merely an attribute of God as great as that would be. Grace is a "code name" for the Father who loves us, Jesus whose Blood saves us, and the Spirit who helps us. Whenever you experience a moment saturated with grace, you have just had a close personal encounter with your God! You can look at God and His grace this way:

1. Grace as undeserved love comes to us from the heart of the Father who created us.

2. Grace as undeserved mercy comes to us through the “work” of Jesus at the cross.

3. Grace as undeserved help comes through the “work” of the Holy Spirit in and around us.

Let’s see how this “plays out” in terms of the new life God is so freely offering us through our faith in Christ.

A Life Sustained by Grace

Perhaps the best way to understand grace is to try to remember what it was like to be a child, on those good days when no one and nothing was hurting or oppressing you.[3]  In those early “sunny” days of life you easily emerged into freedom. You rarely ever thought of yourself, except at those times when you got a boo-boo or required a bottle. You simply headed out into the world with a reckless abandonment to life.

As a young child you were a confident, bright-eyed explorer of your little world. You were so “brave” you would have crawled off tables or stuck your finger into sockets, if adults didn’t protect you. You readily and freely played with other children. No one had to teach you how to play. No one had to teach you how to be absolutely beautiful and loving, endlessly fascinating to the adults around you. No one that is expect the Holy Spirit who was your secret, unrecognized Teacher.[4]

Did you ever stop to worry if you would ever learn to walk, or crawl, or talk, or feed yourself? No! You went at growth in every area with delight and determination. You couldn’t be stopped! Did you worry about your brain, or your looks, or your body parts, or how the world works? No! You just plunged ahead with an inner conviction that the world was your oyster—given to you for you to enjoy and explore.

A Life Made Possible by Trust

In short, you trusted and loved freely. This made you a marvel to behold! If you lost any or all of this (as most kids do), it was because you have an invisible enemy whose kingdom relentlessly worked to “beat” it out of you through the sins of others, your own sins and the failings of a fallen world.

A child’s whole approach to life is initiated and sustained by the Holy Spirit—without the child ever realizing it or knowing Who to thank! God was doing everything important and necessary for you to be able to be a happy, delighted child. All you had to do was keep trusting, keep loving and keep exploring. Grace made even your part in all this seem natural and easy. Jesus says that the new life requires becoming childlike again!

And He called a little child to Himself and put him in the midst of them, and said, “Truly I say to you, unless you repent (change, turn about) and become like little children [trusting, lowly, loving, forgiving], you can never enter the kingdom of heaven [at all].” Matthew 18:2-3 AMP

Our part is to keep trusting (our God of grace), keep loving (God, others, self), and keep exploring what it means to follow Jesus one step at a time. The new life is literally meant to be child’s play, with a smattering of battles mixed in where we have to take down the old nature of our former self, so that we can keep entering into the peace of Christ through our trust and obedience.[5]

Grace Is Indestructible

Since God is asking us to bet our lives on His grace always being there for us, He has shown us how powerful it is.[6]

1. Grace is an unchanging part of the very nature of God.

Giving grace may seem unnatural for us (hence we have a hard time trusting ourselves to it), but it comes naturally to God. It is the way He is. He is not about to change. That's grace.

2. Grace is backed up by the written promises of God.

God knows that to us He's invisible. It isn't that He is truly invisible; it's just that we are blind. To help us He has given us the visible evidence of His Word. The Father has sworn by His own Word, Jesus has testified to the truth of the Word, and martyrs throughout the ages have given their lives in witness to the Word. That's grace.

3. Grace is demonstrated by the Blood of His Son.

Before we even knew we needed mercy, God sent Jesus to the cross. The Blood Jesus shed is a vibrant demonstration of the Father's love and a visible proof (to our eyes of faith) that our sins have been fully covered.[7] That's grace!

4. Grace is guaranteed by the gift of the Spirit.

The Holy Spirit has freely chosen in love to live within us. Not only that but He has volunteered to be united to us as a guarantee of the good things to come, as sure and certain evidence that we are being saved.[8] All of the help He gives us is His gift of grace to us, whether it is comfort, joy, encouragement, understanding of the scriptures, love of the truth, hope, strength to persevere, correction, guidance or empowerment for ministry. That's a whole lot of grace!

All this incredible outpouring of grace raises at least two daunting questions. First, how is it possible that God would want to lavish such boundless love and mercy on us? The simple answer is that He does, so let’s just get good at receiving it and never stop being amazed by it. That lovely mystery leads us to a second one. Just Who is it who’s loving us? We’ve seen a Father who gives us life, a Son who redeems our life and a Spirit who helps us live our life. It seems we have not One, God of All Grace, but Three. What’s going on?

More Divine Discoveries

Knowing About God  Just as a person in love wants to discover everything they can about their beloved, we too desire to learn all we can about the One who has so thoroughly captured our hearts. Now that Jesus has “introduced” Himself to us through our faith-conversion, we know that we are on very solid ground in seeking to gain true knowledge of God through the pages of scripture. The Living Word will help us understand His written Word to us. As good as that is, it is only one of the ways...

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Scriptures on Grace

Then he said to me, "This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of 'Grace, grace to it!'" Zechariah 4:6-7

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John bore witness about him, and cried out, "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.'") And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. John 1:14-17

But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. Acts 20:24

And now [brethren], I commit you to God [I deposit you in His charge, entrusting you to His protection and care]. And I commend you to the Word of His grace [to the commands and counsels and promises of His unmerited favor]. Acts 20:32 AMP

For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. Romans 3:22-25

That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. Romans 4:16

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Romans 5:1-2

If, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. Romans 5:17

And 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. 2 Corinthians 9:8

But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 2 Corinthians 12:9

In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. Ephesians 1:4-6

For by grace you have been saved through faith. Ephesians 2:8

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Philippians 1:2

Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word. 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Hebrews 4:16