Amazing Grace...(More thoughts on Acts...)

Most of you are familiar with the old hymn Amazing Grace. Some of you might even be humming it to yourself as you read this...and some of you might be wondering what grace has to do with Acts, or why talk about it....After all, don't we all know what Grace is and that we have been saved by Grace? Why revisit something we all know and hold dear? What more could be said? With all due respect, quite a bit more needs said and hasn't been said much, if at all.

Most of us would define grace as "unmerited favor", and most see it as more or less the same thing as mercy. While this is definitely a big part of grace, and certainly the most well known, it is not the whole picture.

Most of you might be thinking "what does he mean?", "What does this have to do with Acts?", and some of you just might be still humming that old hymn and might be wondering why you still are!

All questions and jokes aside, let's take a look at Acts 4:33..."With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all." (NIV)

Also in Ephesians 3:7, it says "I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's grace given me through the working of his power."(NIV)

In Romans 15:15 it says "I have written you quite boldly on some points, as if to remind you of them again, because of the grace God gave me"(NIV)

John 1:16 says "From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another."(NIV)

It becomes obvious that grace as mentioned here means more than just mercy or unmerited favor. It is the very power of God to shape and move us. It is God's power to use us. It is not us, but Him.

Part of this is realizing that we can't, but He can. We on our own can not be perfect or holy. We are a mess, despite our best efforts. Don't think I am excluding myself from this. I am all too aware of my own failings. I am a mess on my own spiritually, bogged down in sin. When I try and do my own thing or get in front of God and try and do things my way, I fall and fail terribly. Even when I try and do great things for God, and do my best for Him and rely on my efforts and still during it rely on me, I find that I fall, and even fall into sin, into pride.

In Romans 7, Paul had a similar problem as I do, and as all of us do. "I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing." (Romans 7:18-19, NIV)

How many of us can join with Paul in saying that? How many hands raised? I find that even when I desire to do what is good, I end up in sin, and hurting others. Our sin nature is pretty tricky...

But, Paul continues: (Verse 22, 24) "For my inner being, I delight in God's law...." but then he says "What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?" Verse 25: "Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord!" And then He continues in chapter 8 by saying that "Therefore there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus, who do not live according to the sin nature but according to the Spirit. because through Christ Jesus the law of Christ set me free from the law of sin and death." (8:1-2, NIV)

Now many in our modern church take a look at this passage, particularly in chapter 7 and conclude that it provides evidence that we can never truly be living holy lives, that we will be stuck in sin until Christ comes again. We use this scripture to justify being stuck in sin.

That is not what Paul is saying here. He is telling of how sin reigned in his body, and he was powerless to fight it...until he has set free by the Grace of God. (I talk more on this in a previous post: http://becomingawarriorpoet.blogspot.com/2009/05/time-to-kill-horse.html)

Here is the point that I am trying to make. We are saved by grace (Ephesians 2:8), but Grace is so much more than that. It is more than unmerited favor; it is God's power. We are wretched and sinful. We've established that. I, my sinful, selfish self can never accomplish any thing for God, nor have victory over sin (Romans 6:4-11). It is only by the power of His Grace that we can do anything. We can't do anything on our own, Only God can through us.

To live by Grace means to submit everything to Him, and rely on Him. His grace is more than mercy...it is the power to overcome sin, to be a follower for Him, the power to be bold for Him, and to have words to defend the gospel...that is what His grace does. By the power of His Grace we have victory over sin. By His Grace and the power of it, can we dare to live as He did. It is by His grace that we can be holy.

We can't do it on our own. We need His Grace. Jesus lived just as we did, but by God's grace, lived such a life that the world has been turned upside down, and we have been offered forgiveness and Grace. Jesus lived the ultimate life by and of Grace, and He beckons us to come and follow. It is only by His Grace that we can dare try.

I've only scratched the surface on God's Grace; none of us can ever truly comprehend all that it is and its power. The early church in Acts lived by Grace. I mentioned in the my title that I would dig a little deeper in Acts, and so I shall, before I forget! (I have a tendency to get carried away when I write and I don't always finish all that I mean to say.)

When we look at Acts and see how the church was and how we are now, we see a big difference. I had mentioned this earlier. One other thing that the Early church did that we don't is live by Grace. They lived by the power of God's Grace. It was by His grace that they did what they did and had the impact that they had.

Nowadays, Grace is seen as mercy. We are "just forgiven". We are stuck in the mire of sin and self. We don't realize the power of God's grace. We try and do things on our own. We see God's Grace as a "get out of jail free card". We are under God's grace; we can do what we want.

This is not how it is supposed to be! God's Grace can and will deliver us from that, if we let Him. We can't...But He can. We need more of that powerful side of Grace in the church. For more on this, check out this site: http://www.ericludy.com/ericludy.com/What_is_Grace.html.

To conclude this rather lengthy post, let me say that I have decided to live by His Grace. I can't do it on my own. I do not want to be mired in my sin and selfishness. I've seen what it has done to my life. It is only by His Grace that I can follow Him, and be holy. That is why His Grace is so Amazing!

For Christ's Glory!