Grace: A Peculiar Thing

Written on November 9, 2010 in thought

What can be said about grace?

Is it something we can control? Is it something we can understand, own and dispense? Is it something we can exclude others from? Is it something we can manipulate, manage and market?

This is the problem with grace, because always the answer is no. Grace is a peculiar thing. It offers itself to be known. It offers itself to be enjoyed. It offers itself to be shared. It offers itself to be possessed.

But simultaneously it conceals a secret. We may discover it but we may not fathom it. We may enjoy it but we may not own it. We may know it but we may not understand it. We may share it but we may not dominate it. It is like a precious key to a locked door that we cannot find. The precious key is enough, validates our ownership, and provides us all entrance into all that is good. And everyone has the key.

This is what frustrates the church who may pretend to be the sole proprietor of grace. It knows what it is taking about. It possesses what it preaches. It shares what it has. But only somewhat. Only somewhat. This is the secret.: it doesn’t guard the door. It only has the key, like everyone else.

And this is the terrible secret the church won’t publish. All are included and none are excluded, no matter who thinks they own, know or manage it or not. It doesn’t matter how deep we understand, how loud we preach, or how right we live, it isn’t ours.

For grace only seems to submit itself into our hands.

http://www.daddytude.com gwalter

Oh yes! Right on – very poignant and very true. Thanks for this important post DAvid!
amy

You say that the church doesn’t want people to know that grace is for everyone. Were you taught this in seminary? How did you form that opinion?
http://dmergent.org/ Doug Sloan

Amy:

Most mainstream seminaries have been teaching this for almost a century.

——————–

But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
(NRSV Romans 11:6)

Yet we know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law,
because no one will be justified by the works of the law.
(NRSV Galatians 2:16)

For by grace you have been saved through faith,
and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God – not the result of works, so that no one may boast.
(NRSV Ephesians 2:8-9)

Grace is not awarded for the satisfactory completion of a spiritual check list – and grace is not earned for works or acts – and grace is not part of a quid pro quo arrangement or relationship – and grace is not a stipulation of a contract or covenant – and grace is not right thinking or thinking right or thinking good thoughts or having the right beliefs – and grace is not about rewards and punishments – and grace is not about later. Grace is not about heaven or a post-mortal existence or guaranteeing a future occurrence because grace is not about having an after-life insurance policy or hedging our spiritual bets. We live in, we exist in and have always existed in (not “by”, not “because”, not “alongside”, not “under”) in the grace of God. Grace is now – constantly present and immediately accessible. Grace is always freely available and freely supplied and supplied freely unconditionally and abundantly without exceptions and without restrictions and without qualifications. Grace and conditions are mutually exclusive, even oppositional. A faith full of grace has no conditions – meaning no qualifications and no requirements and, consequently, no exclusions and no differentiation. A faith with any condition or any qualification or any requirement or any exclusion or any differentiation has no grace. God requires nothing of us – this is grace.

“RECLAIMING GOD”

also

“REFORMATION II”

both at dmergent . org
Tim Page

Doug,
Your reminder that we exist and live IN God’s Grace is a helpful thought to start the day. Thank-you.
http://bethegospel.wordpress.com jay sauser

That last paragraph was beautifully written. like from a poet’s pen
Doug (WearyPilgrim)

Grace has no conditions. The Church has never quite gotten that message, including those segments of it that loudly proclaim they DO understand. Much of my evangelical past was fruitlessly and painfully spent living out the supposition that faith is somehow a “work” — that once you “accept Christ,” you have to strive to Do All the Right Things to please him.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
Clinton W Spence

Doug, AKA Weary Pilgrim, we do not “have to strive to Do All the Right Things,” as our duty, after we “accept Christ.” Yet, do we not “want,” “desire,” “yearn” or “hope” to please the Grace Giver as the grateful response of pilgrims who know that we owe our Life to the Gift of Grace? As Christ lives in us, we are thankful, i.e., we live the eucharistic life through the persevering power of sanctifying grace. We reflect holiness without striving.

In my experience, judgmental leaders or members of the Church always ultimately reveal that any persons, who judge other pilgrims or attempt to control grace, have no true experience of grace for themselves. How can they forgive others if they do know forgiveness for themselves? These judgmental, controlling, unforgiving leaders of the Church live by the Law, until their efforts to please the Divine fall short, like everyone. Then, they accept, rejoice and celebrate grace.
Johnfom

So what yer saying there, Clinton, is to dig up and expose any dirt on judgemental leaders and members so we can show them grace and all get on with our lives?

Church members: Oh wow! Look at that sin.
Judgemental leader/member: On no! What have I done!
Church members: Meh. God doesn’t reject you and neither do we. Welcome to the ‘grace side’.
Clinton W Spence

Well, Johnfom, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in a chapter on Communion, asked, “Why are church members so surprised to find sinners in the church choir?