baldtheologian God's Radical Grace

I’m Baaaaaack

I’m baaaaack! I’m not sure how many missed me in the weeks since my last article, but I’m back at my keyboard refreshed, full of ideas (not sure how many will make to this page), and full of thankfulness. So where was I?

In a very real way I experienced in real time God’s radical grace. No I did not get saved again (once is all one needs). No, I experienced God’s radical grace through the birth of our daughter, Rebeka Alain. She was born on May 20, 2016 after 22 hours of labor. Yes,  I wrote 22 hours of labor. Twenty-two. Wow! That was some kind of labor! Watching my most recent child arrive safely was once again an awe-inspiring experience. She was tiny at birth and still is kind of tiny. But she is a rather large reminder of how God is gracious to us every single day.

I realized how gracious God is to us every day when I was holding little Rebeka. He graciously delivered to us an little baby to our family. She is healthy though small. She is a little beauty. And a reminder of God’s graciousness to us. I shouldn’t need a reminded of God’s graciousness toward us, but I do. But isn’t that the way we all are?

Each day we wake up to magnificent sunrises or rain feeding the ground so our crops may grow. Bit still we look for God’s favor. God paints our sunsets with brilliant hues of blue, yellow, and red. He paint the sky more beautifully than any of the so-called master artists of history. And still, we look for God’s favor.

We seek to invent ways of God granting grace to us and our children but ignore the signs of grace all around us. We do this to our shame. We have become so ignorant because we have treasured knowledge rather than wisdom. We lose sight of the beauty of God’s creation in the science of botany. We analyze, theorize, and master the nuances of why the sky is painted with brilliant colors and lost the simplicity of appreciating the One who painted the evening sky.

We have eyes but we don’t see. We have ears, but we don’t hear. We read, study, memorize, and regurgitate things but we lack wisdom. All these things happen because we choose to do them. We make choices each day that blind us to the simple – yet radical – grace of God.

I have decided to try as much as I can to slow down and actively recognize the many ways God displays His grace to me. Today (Sunday) He shared His grace with me through the humility of my Pastor. I’m not sure how He will display it tomorrow but I do know I will be seeking to recognize it.

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When you recognize God’s grace – His radical, loving, undeserved grace – in your life, it changes you. Please share your grace experiences with me in the comments or through email. There are many out there…if we only choose to recognize them.

baldtheologian God's Radical Grace

Go!

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God calls us to exercise faith in Christ’s sacrifice of the cross.

 

Do you like leaving home in the middle of a moonless, starless night? I don’t. But I did exactly that when I was in Boot Camp aboard MCRD Parris Island, SC. I was in Individual Combat Training at an old airfield aboard Parris Island. This was to simulate a night movement when in combat. It was also meant to develop trust between us as recruits and in our leaders, the Drill Instructors.

We were roused from our sleep by one of our Drill Instructors. We had to break camp, pack our backpacks and form up along a road all in the pitch black darkness of night. It was so dark I could not see more than six inches in front of me. It was dark! I was able to tell where we needed to go by holding onto a strap on the pack of the recruit in front of me. It was this way for everyone. We had no idea where we were going but we had to go and we had to believe the one leading us knew exactly where he was going.

We went through the woods, up hills, down hills, around bends, and finally arrived at a resting place. But it wasn’t just some old resting place, it was Elliot’s Beach. What’s there? Gas Chambers. We had to enter a gas chamber, experience being blinded by that gas, and then trust the instructors to get us out of the gas to safety. That was a lot of fun. We then continued to march to our final destination. Throughout this ordeal, we would march at a near run (it was called a force march) clutching tightly to the strap on the recruit on front of us. We simply had to go where we were led. We had faith that the leaders would lead us where we needed to be. In essence, we were led by the grace of the leaders where we needed to go.

We had to exercise faith to get where we needed to go. We had to make a choice. God’s Radial Grace is a lot like this experience.

God’s grace leads us where we need to be. You can bet that if God has shown you His Radical Grace and bestowed it on you, He will take you where you need to be. Do you need an example? Would that help? Lets turn to Genesis 12 for what I believe is a wonderful example of just how God’s Radical Grace is guaranteed to take us where we need to be.

Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father’s house, To the land which I will show you; And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing; And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” – Geneis 12:1-3 NASB

In this passage we see the beginning of God’s plan to bring salvation by grace through faith into the world. While this passage pertains specifically to Abram, there is application to us today. Let’s unpack this and see what God wants us to learn about His Radical Grace this week.

 

It begins with a command

Verse one begins with a simple command that must have been difficult to hear: You go! God told Abram to leave the only place he knew as home, leave his family, his surroundings – Abram was told to leave.Basically God told Abram to leave all that he knew. Leave it all behind. That is no easy task. But surely God had something good in mind and would share that with Abram. Well, not really. Continuing with the passage, God chooses not to tell Abram where he is going at the moment. There is only a promise that God would lead Him to that place and reveal it to him at some later date. My journey in darkness in boot camp was a  lot like this. “Just follow me” God tells Abram. But this wasn’t all that was happening.

God made some specific promises to Abram if he did indeed leave and go where God was graciously calling him. God promised to make Abram into a great nation, God would bless Abram, God would make Abram’s name great, and Abram would be a blessing. Now those are some really good promises. Surely Abram had to do something to earn those things. Well sort of. But it isn’t what you are probably thinking.

 

The syntax here in Genesis 12 is interesting. There is what is termed an indirect volitive chain. I don’t want to bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that this chain is a way of guaranteeing the outcome for an obedient heart. These syntactical devices begin with an imperative, followed by a series of other verbs.  This combination demonstrates that whenever the action that was commanded is performed, then the promises made in the following verses of the chain are guaranteed to pass.

So what was God doing? And what does this have to do with God’s Radical Grace?

God was implementing His plan to bring salvation into the world. Remember that salvation is by grace through faith. In a very real way, God’s Radical Grace gets its first publicity here. God is proclaiming His intention to save by grace by extending a gracious call to Abram. 

Look at what is promised to Abram. a great nation, a great blessing given, fame, and Abram would be a blessing. But how is all this somehow gracious of God?

Abram was descendant of Noah’s son Shem. He was polytheistic so he obviously didn’t share the same faith as Noah. He was just another one of many who believed there were many gods who controlled everything. But God chose to intervene in this one polytheists life and change the course of history forever. God graciously interrupted Abram’s road to nowhere, placed him on the road to heaven, and in the passing of time brought salvation to the world. Through the journey that Abram took once he left his homeland until he died, God graciously provide for his needs. Does this sound familiar?

God calls us to exercise faith in Christ’s sacrifice of the cross.

God further states that if we exercise faith, our destination is secure and waiting for us – eternity with Him in heaven. All we need to do is obey that call. There is no promise that the road we will walk is going to be easy. There is no promise that we will not experience sadness or challenges. God promises that our destination – heaven – is sure. God promises to show us that place one day. Until that day we need to hang on to God as He graciously leads us to Him.

God chose to bring us to Him. God chose to bring salvation to the world even though the world rejects Him. God chose to love us in spite of our being unlovable. Just like Abram, we were on the road to nowhere good and God intervened and interrupted our lives to offer us a way out. A way to spend eternity with Him as His friend.

God did all this, just like He did with Abram, by His grace.

God’s grace. It is radical!

 

 

 

baldtheologian God's Radical Grace

God’s Radical Grace

 

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Have you ever thought about the nature of God’s grace? We don’t often do that but we should. We should contemplate what He has done for us. We should think about the effect it has on us. We should recognize the fruit it bears through us. But we don’t.

Grace has been described as amazing, wonderful, and matchless. But have you ever really thought about God’s grace? Most, sadly, have not. Many in the Church have figured out what grace is and is not. Usually this is done through consulting a lexicon. Grace is defined as unmerited favor. Well there ya go! Grace is simple and direct. Unmerited favor. Let’s move on to something more interesting.

Grace isn’t one of the sexy doctrines. If grace was a piece of art, it would be perceived as a simply line drawing. Simply black ink on a white sheet of paper. Nothing more, nothing less. We see this in the teaching of the church. We tend to teach about the exciting things – missions, tongues, etc. but rarely do we go deep on God’s grace. Why is grace found to be so boring?

One reason is we may think we have it all figured out. We define it, grasp it, and then move on. But in our hurry to declare ourselves wise regarding grace, we show ourselves fools for having missed out on one of the deepest, most beautiful doctrines and actions of God. When we define it simply without attending to the meaning of it, we see God’s grace as a simply a vehicle to get us from sin to righteousness. It is a black-and-white drawing of a map. That is all. Next, much more exciting doctrine is next.

Grace is not a punchline and it isn’t simple. Grace is not a shallow doctrine to be understood with simple phrases and trite sayings. Grace is not a simple drawing. No, God’s grace is a masterpiece. It is an oil painting, full of contrasts that seem incongruous until the Master’s intent is revealed in the totality of the painting.

Grace is full of wonder and awe. Grace touches every part of our being. It rules and reigns supreme in a life that has been touched by it. A person who has been touched – truly touched – by God’s grace is never again the same. A grace-touched person is like his  Master. The grace touched person is a one who simply is a certain way, defying the simple definitions

Grace affects every facet of life. It changes us and remakes us. Learning about God’s grace – more importantly living God’s grace – is a revolutionary thing. Being touched with God’s grace makes me and you different.

Grace is often misunderstood and misapplied. Confused with a license to sin, grace gets a bad rap. Grace is also abused when it is used to excuse bad behavior and fail to hold everyone accountable to God’s standards.

Grace is ignored by others, opting for rules and regulations where God’s grace has provided freedom. Yes, God’s grace is not simple…but is is simply beautiful!

Grace is vibrant. Grace is alive. Grace is the way we live and have been enabled to live. Grace is beautiful, freeing and restraining as well.

Grace is amazing, wonderful, and matchless. And God’s grace is…

 

Radical.

God’s radical grace saved a sinner such as I. God’s radical grace is something worth understanding. Understanding grace is worth the effort and the struggle.

To understand God’s radical grace – a tall order to be sure – is to get a peek into the very nature of God. Experiencing God’s radical grace is the starting point for each Christian. It is also a main ingredient in the portrait God is painting of each Christian’s life.

Are you willing to give trying to comprehend God’s radical grace? Are you willing to join me on a journey to understand and appreciate God’s radical grace? I hope so. But be warned. To begin this journey is to begin a journey on being radicalized. For no one who experiences and understand God’s radical grace ever returns the same person.

No one.