Accepting Grace

I have a problem accepting the idea of grace - I can't imagine that God forgives me as readily as He says He does in His Word.

I'm one of those people who constantly feels like any slip of the tongue, any misdeed, any moment where I let my guard down and sin, is an offense against God that I must atone for immediately. That's a tough position to be in -- always feeling like I have to flog myself for any misdeed, begging my Heavenly Father to forgive me when He already has. It is also a position that is patently false.

Scripture tells me that the ultimate price for my sins was paid by Christ on the Cross, yet still this idea of a grace is so foreign to me, that I struggle with how to accept it. How do I accept His grace and live in this grace when I am still so flawed? How can I move forward in grace when I can not even move past my own misdeeds, my own mistakes, my own fears and my own guilt? I guess the question is: at what point do I truly accept the grace God has offered me by allowing myself to move forward from the past into the brightness of His future.

It's truly a battle and one that He needs to help me win.

Scripture reminds us in Psalm 103:12 that: "... as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us".

That's a pretty bold statement as to where He tosses our sins -- He scatters them such that they can never meet again, nor will He ever see them again. Pick up some sand in a windstorm and toss it into the air -- as the sand scatters and the grains go in completely opposite directions, never to be found again, so too is the same with what God does with our sins.

God also reminds us in His Word that Christ - when He died on the Cross - did so in order that we would be reconciled with our Heavenly Father:

2 Corinthians 5:18-19: "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation".

1 John 4:10: "This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins".

That is a pretty amazing display of grace by a God that could have opted to just let us all burn -- but because His love for us was so deep, He extended a hand of love versus a fist of destruction.

Yet, still, I struggle because I expect the fist. I beat myself up so that God doesn't have to... even though God makes it clear that He has no plans to do so now that I have accepted His Son as my Savior:

Isaiah 43:25: ""I, I am the One who erases all your sins, for my sake; I will not remember your sins"

That is an interesting thing He adds in there: "... for my sake....". He adds that in as a bit of an affirmation to demonstrate that the forgiveness of our sins is not only a gift that hugely benefits US, but one that benefits HIM. Such is His desire to live in eternity with us that He allowed His Son to be sacrificed. Ponder that act of grace and then look at us as humans -- the idea of grace of that magnitude is one that is just hard to grasp. Maybe that is why I struggle so much with the idea of being forgiven. I know that I am -- but perhaps the bigger issue here is me forgiving myself, of not letting my past and mistakes I make on a daily basis, be how I measure my fitness for His Kingdom.

Philippians 3:13-14: "Brothers and sisters, I know that I have not yet reached that goal, but there is one thing I always do. Forgetting the past and straining toward what is ahead, I keep trying to reach the goal and get the prize for which God called me through Christ to the life above".

God wants us to forget the past (heck, He wants us to forget the present and stop worrying about the future as well (Matthew 6:34) and focus our eyes on the end result: His shining Kingdom and our great reward. That said, the enemy for his part wants us to wallow in the mud of guilt -- coat ourselves in it, stink ourselves up and beat ourselves up as unlovable, unworthy and indecent so that we don't approach the Throne of God with the fullness and expectation of heart that we should as children. But we can not allow the enemy to lie to us about grace or give us false ideas as to what God is like. The enemy would have us believe that God is scornful of us as children, that He disapproves of our every move. That he is the Mr. Wilson to our Dennis the Menace. Movies, TV shows, music, books have all jumped on that idea of God, helping to paint warped views of Him who saves as some forgetful, jovial old man on the one side or some angry, brow-beating father-figure out to hurt mankind by forcing him to atone for every wrong and denying them the happiness the world has to offer. If we look at God that way - or if we look at ourselves in that same way - it becomes much easier to understand how the concept of grace seems completely out of the realm of understanding for us. God is not someone we can conceptualize the way we can others. By that I mean, His very image - His very being - is love. Pure love. Pure grace. Pure glory. Those are hard to find in such a jaded world.

While I was writing this blog today, I happened to find a verse from Joel that I thought was really relevant and spoke to what I do to myself by refusing to understand the depth of His grace:

Joel 2:13: "Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity".

"Rend your heart and NOT YOUR GARMENTS" - how apt is that? How much am I measuring my faithfulness in Him by what I am outwardly displaying versus what my heart is doing? By begging for forgiveness, am I not figuratively "rending my garments"? Beating myself up, not accepting grace... these are all ways I am rending my garments. While my clothes are not outwardly torn, I would submit that the cloth of my soul is torn when it doesn't need to be. Grace IS the cloth that covers our heart - we make ourselves right with God when we embrace His love, His Son, His Salvation and live by His word. That verse from Joel doesn't go on to say that God will maybe consider your request of forgiveness or your cry for help if He happens to be in a mood for it. Rather, that verse affirms what God wants us to know about Him: "... gracious and compassionate... slow to anger... abounding in love... relents..."

Those are terms that describe a God of endless compassion - one that just picks us up, dusts us off, gives us a hug and encourages us to keep walking. To be a little cartoonish: God loves us so much that in this verse it almost makes Him seem like an owner with a new puppy... it's cute and charming when we piddle on the rug or dig up the flower beds... he'll gently scold us, spare us the newspaper spanking and teach us how to follow... and we will, once we get our nose out of the dirt. But the entire time, God watches with pride as we stumble through life, crying with us, laughing with us and ultimately enjoying the show -- a show made possible by grace that came when His son died on a blood-spattered cross.

God's grace means we don't have to rend our garments; Christ's sacrifice gave us that cover... the cover of salvation. This doesn't mean that we will automatically be perfect, but it does mean that God sees in us the perfection that allows us to come in to His Kingdom. It means that to walk with Him does not require a conscience of guilt, but an obedience and desire to love the way He loves and to serve the way He serves:

Micah 6:8: "He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God".

I know that salvation belongs to our God, that it was given to us as a gift and that that salvation is an eternal demonstration of grace that can never be surpassed. I'm not sure how long it will take me to understand His grace -- I think every day is a bit of learning in that respect. However, I know that His grace has saved me but now I need to understand that His grace allows me to move forward and forgive myself.

Sometimes that is the hardest thing to do.

Colossians 1:22: "But now God has made you his friends again. He did this through Christ's death in the body so that he might bring you into God's presence as people who are holy, with no wrong, and with nothing of which God can judge you guilty".