The Gift of Grace

I have received a lot of really cool gifts in my life.  Some were very expensive.  Some were very thoughtful.  I have a couple of pictures hanging in my office.  They were both gifts.  One of them is a picture of George Washington kneeling in the snow and praying at Valley Forge.  It’s one of my favorites.  I’m sure it cost a little bit of money.  The other is a set of three pictures in one frame.  Each picture is of a different soccer team full of grade-schoolers.  What makes it special to me is that each one of my kids is in each picture.  I coached all three of them when they were little.  It’s really cool, and it’s really thoughtful.

As we continue looking at salvation as it’s presented in Romans 3:21-26, we read where Paul talks about another gift.  He says we, “are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24, ESV).    Our gift is justification.  Basically said, to be justified is to be made right with God.  I heard someone say years ago that justification means “just as if I never sinned.”  That’s simple, but good.  We’ll run with that.  After pointing out the fact that we cannot be saved by keeping the Law and reminding us that all of us are sinners, Paul tells us how to be made right with God.  We are justified as a gift.  It’s given to us.

What makes us right with God?  Can we work for it somehow?  No.  Absolutely not.  The Bible tells us, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9, ESV).  We are not capable of earning salvation.  It is all made possible by His grace.

Do I deserve such a lavish thing?  Have I earned it in some way?  No.  We don’t earn a gift.  We earn payment.  We have earned death and judgment.  Later in Romans, Paul writes, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23, ESV).  Our sin deserves punishment and condemnation, but God declares us righteous.  That’s what grace is.  Simply stated, grace is God giving us something we don’t deserve.  We haven’t earned it.  We can’t work for it.  We aren’t good enough or religious enough to get it.  Salvation is all made possible by God’s grace.  

God in His grace redeems us.  He buys us back from the captivity and the condemnation of sin.  The payment to set us free is Jesus.  His death on the cross is the means of payment.  God’s grace is the account it’s drawn from.  Paul writes that Jesus, “gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works” (Titus 2:14, ESV).

When we stop and realize that God has given us everything, it’s a sobering thing.  It should stop us in our tracks.  From the moment we truly begin to contemplate the meaning and the depth of grace, we should be shaken out of our complacency.  We should burn with a passion to serve a God who has given us everything.  Grace makes for an awesome gift.  ”Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift” (2 Corinthians 9:15, ESV)!