"Grace is free.
Grace is undeserved love. Grace is the undeserved love God gives to us, and it’s the undeserved love we can give to others. Both of these types of grace, the grace given by God to you and the grace given by you to others is free. If it’s not free, it’s not grace. Undeserved love is a gift to the undeserving requiring nothing in return. You will never find grace in a store. It’s not for sale. It can’t be bought. It can only be given.
And this gift, this potent weighty reality of free and undeserved love, changes people’s lives (all the way down to the deep root system of their life; I’m talking change that changes everything, not just the color of a few leaves). Grace is probably, I’ll go ahead and say it is, the most powerful force in the universe.
Grace is free. And, grace costs.
The grace God gives us is free for us, but so costly for God. The Son of God bore the full weight, consequence, shame, humiliation, guilt, and cost of our sin and failures so that we could be forgiven, loved, and free. This is how God works. This is how true love works. This is how forgiveness works. God took the hit so that we could be healed and whole.
It’s the same dynamic for us and our relationships. The grace you give to others is free for them, but costly for you. Have you ever forgiven (truly and completely forgiven) someone who has deeply wronged you? When you gave them that gift of undeserved-forgiveness-love, you decided to pay for the cost of the wrong instead of making them pay. You took the hit.
Why did you do that? Because, like I said, grace is the most powerful force in the universe. As God’s never-stopping grace for you slips deeper and deeper into your DNA you discover that you can’t help it. Your own life becomes so infected with the joy of undeserved love that you must spread it. Grace doesn’t stay put. Grace must spread.
Grace is free. Graces costs. And grace is contagious." [via]
No comments:
Post a Comment