There is nothing common about grace. Grace is a magical word. It has the power to carry imagination to a place where sins are forgiven, debts are cancelled, and everything is without money and without price. This is the kingdom of grace. But it is no fantasy land. The Christian is a citizen of this kingdom in the here and now. Every Christian stands on grace ground today. Spiritually, grace is where we live.

Grace is our Father’s land, and when we first walked on its shores and breathed grace air, we knew we had come home. This is where we belong, and here we have access to all the resources we need to live graced and gracious lives. And here we are secure, caught up in the invincible love of the sovereign, in grace that is free and full and forever. Let’s think about grace.

Priority of Grace⤒🔗

We begin, appropriately enough, with grace as our priority. This is easily illustrated from the shape of Paul’s letters. Most of our reflections this evening will be taken from Paul’s writings, not just because we have to limit ourselves somehow, but because most instances of the grace-word in the New Testament are found there. The real Paul was so different from the caricature of the screwed-up misogynist, legalistic to the core, stravaiging the world gracelessly with a travesty of the Master’s message.

Paul was the apostle of grace, and his theology was sweet as honey. His letters are framed in grace. After a conventional first-century introduction, “From Paul ... To Whoever”, they begin with a blessing, a prayer for grace on his audience. And the letters close by benedicting grace over the readers. Ephesians is particularly striking, with the grace and peace of the beginning (1:2) reversed at the end (6:23-24), so that peace gives grace the last word! Some say Romans breaks the pattern, but even with its extended introduction before the opening grace in 1:7, and a postscript and doxology after the closing grace in 16:20, the point still holds ¾ the body of the letter is bounded by grace.

All this is fresh and distinctive. It may seem like a detail, but it is a vital theological statement, declaring grace is the framework of each letter and all that it says. Grace hugs the whole thing. If we are to be true to the same theology, then grace needs to be our first word and our last word too.

News of Grace←⤒🔗

So our great theme must be grace. We have news to publish and to broadcast, and it needs to be grace-news on every page and in every programme. For much of the media today it is a given that good news is no news, whereas tragedy and scandal ensure readers and viewers are hooked. Now we are not naive, and Christians know better than any the horror of the dark backcloth against which we speak. But our peculiar role in this world is to headline Jesus Christ, good news of great joy to all people.

God loves his world, and he loves to forgive sin. Even yours. Even mine. Grace means we receive the opposite of what logic would decree. The spiritually bankrupt, the hell-deserving, are granted pardon and guaranteed heaven.

Grace also means that we experience the power of God transforming and liberating us. Those who were blind to the beauty of God are oriented to glorify and enjoy him. Surely we who have tasted that the Lord is so good should long for others to know the same good news for themselves.

Paul was obsessed with preaching grace. He could sum up the commission given him by Jesus as “the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace” (Acts 20:24). In 2 Corinthians 4, a chapter full of divine sovereignty and evangelistic responsibility, he rejoices in the spread of the gospel, “so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God” (v.15). Waves of grace were rippling out to touch ever more lives, and Paul was glad.

And grace gladdens God. The divine evangelist rejoices when grace brings the prodigal home, safe and sorry. That generous welcome is the image of God we should be presenting to the world, a God who is good news and who sends his church to offer grace-news to all.

Thrill of Grace←⤒🔗

Is the news still just as good? Or have we perhaps lost the wide-eyed wonder we once knew, when grace left us awed and amazed? If so, we need to recapture the amazing in grace, to remember how to gasp at grace.

Paul never forgot. In 1 Timothy 1:12-17, he bears personal testimony to grace. Even though he had once been a blasphemer and a persecutor and a man of violence, he was shown mercy.

The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly..., the worst of sinners.

As he remembers the depths to which he had sunk and to which grace had reached, he soars in doxology to the King eternal (v.17). We too are called to worship, in the fabulous light of what we have received in Christ, all of it “in accordance with the riches of God’s grace which he lavished on us” (Ephesians 1:7-8). God has been so generous, and we are so grateful.

But we do not simply look back. Grace also means the thrill of optimism, of real hope for grace-living through all the days to come. This insight has been fleshed out by John Piper in Future Grace. At the heart of a rich and provocative book is his conviction that the promises of future grace are the keys to Christian living. Piper implores Christians to live by faith in the promises, trusting God always for fresh supplies of grace. God will really be there for us, in powerful grace, in the next moment, and the next, whatever the need. “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Grace be with you.

In our own heritage, the rich resources of grace were lyrically expressed by McCheyne: “Unfathomable oceans of grace are in Christ for you. Dive and dive again, you will never come to the bottom of these depths. How many millions of dazzling pearls and gems are at this moment hid in the deep recesses of the ocean caves.” The treasures of grace are inexhaustible, and available to faith. We go on to more grace. Let’s grow old gracefully.

Means of Grace←⤒🔗

We grow through “the means of grace”. The phrase trips off our tongue without much thought, and certainly without any sense of excitement. But it should be an electric expression, charged with potential for divine light and heat and power. God really uses the means to minister blessing.

In one of Luke’s snapshots of the early church, we see a cluster of some of these means. Acts 2:42 shows Christians devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Remember this is happening in the glow of Pentecost. A church bathed in the light of the Spirit focusses first on the basics, on what some today might regard as humdrum.

This was a Word church. The apostles taught from the Bible of Jesus, our Old Testament Scriptures. They also expounded what Jesus had taught them in his days on earth and what his Spirit continued to reveal to them, the elements which would eventually form our New Testament. And through his revelation, the Lord spoke grace for growth. As Paul said, a little later in the Acts story, “Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up” (20:32). We share the same guidebook of grace with Christians in all ages, and we make progress on our journey as we read, listen, meditate, memorise and discuss.

This was also a church of fellowship, with a deep experience of shared life; a church of celebration, centred around the table of the Lord; and a church of prayer, both set and spontaneous. All these avenues of grace, and others, are available to us, but sometimes each of them can seem like a cul-de-sac. We need the Spirit of grace so that the Word comes with freshness, so that congregation means community, so that communion is oasis rather than ordeal, and so that prayer makes us think “throne of grace”. All these means should be like ice-cream when this world is desert, scoops of grace in an arid land.

Words of Grace←⤒🔗

It’s good to talk, and our words are indispensable in so much of the church life we’ve just been considering. In worship services, in casual conversation, in theological exchange, in evangelistic and pastoral visitation, and in business meetings, speech offers opportunity for grace to shine. The challenge is never to sound ungraced, but to speak in love, “the most excellent way” (1 Corinthians 12:31).

In Ephesians 4:29-32, Paul insists that our speech to fellow Christians ought to be grace-giving.

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may give grace to those who listen.

Words have incalculable power for good or ill. God can make them bearers of grace, speaking his language.

The apostle also urges grace-rich speech to those outside the faith. In Colossians 4:3-6 Paul asks for prayer, that God would open a door for his message and that he might proclaim it clearly. He then turns to his readers’ responsibility before an unbelieving world: “Be wise in the way you act towards outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” Their speech was to be wise and winsome, and graciously tuned in to the individual partner in any conversation.

Accents are wonderful things. I sometimes wish I had one myself. Spiritually, I know how to pick up the accent of grace, and that is to spend time with One whose every inflection gives away his homeland. This is the Saviour celebrated in Psalm 45:2: “You are the most excellent of men and your lips have been anointed with grace.” When we first believed, we heard grace in his voice. The longer we live the more we know that only Christ can give pattern and power for graced communication. Anyway, we just love listening to him speak. His accent has the tang of home.

Liberty of Grace←⤒🔗

Lips that speak for grace sometimes need to say tough things, especially when grace itself is under attack. Words then become holy weapons, guarding the gospel against the enemies of grace and blitzing the lies of the liberty thieves. The Jesus of the Gospels fulminates against the grace-robbers of his day. In Matthew 23, he describes the teachers of the law and the Pharisees as hypocrites, blind guides, blind fools, whitewashed tombs, snakes and a brood of vipers. His most uncompromising denunciations are reserved for these legalists, the self-justifying, rule-setting, judgmental, sectarian, spiritual warders of Judaism.

Such legalism always majors in minutiae, endlessly playing trivia pursuit. There is no sense of proportion. So these Jews meticulously tithe their spices (which Jesus affirms they are free to do), but neglect the more important matters of the law, namely justice, mercy and faithfulness. “You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel” (v.24).

In What’s So Amazing About Grace?, Philip Yancey recalls the church of his youth in the American South having plenty to say about hairstyles and jewellery, but nothing about the racial injustice around. He met South African students from churches in which jeans and chewing gum made you spiritually suspect, but where apartheid was defended from the pulpits. May grace preserve us from the grotesque!

Paul too, like his Lord, can be angry when grace is at stake. He doesn’t spare the Galatians, so stupid as to seem bewitched. They are ready to desert his grace-gospel (1:6-7) and turn to a ritualism and legalism which will take them tumbling away from grace (5:4). So Paul calls them back to liberty: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (5:1).

Some Christians still want to imprison others. As Eugene Peterson says in Traveling Light, a study of freedom inspired by Galatians, “They don’t want us to be free to express our faith originally and creatively in the world. They want to control us.” So we act the part which they have written for us, instead of playing our own role, scripted by Scripture.

Legalism is a grace-denying heresy, and should be named and shamed as such. Among its many dangers is the suffocating of assurance, as the Christian life becomes a question of measuring up to human criteria. But the divine demands have already been met in Christ, and in his grace we find our acceptance and assurance. Don’t let “Free Church” be an oxymoron. Look at the Cross, not over your shoulder. Open the doors and windows, and let the fresh air of Pentecost-grace blow in, because where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Obedience of Grace←⤒🔗

We know, of course, that grace-liberty can be misused. This is nothing new. Listen to Paul, in Galatians 5:13: “But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another in love.” Or Peter, in 1 Peter 2:16: “But do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God.”

The phenomenon of what has been called “grace abuse” can take different forms, from laziness to licence. On the one hand, grace can be used as an excuse for doing next to nothing, couch potato Christianity. The symptoms appear in the lie-back-and-let-God syndrome, an attempt to sanctify sloth. There is also the inertia of a more sophisticated theological malaise, the if-it’s-decreed-it-will-happen-anyway disorder. Here fatalism breeds paralysis.

But in Scripture, grace inspires effort. In Ephesians 2:8-10, a classic passage where Paul insists we are saved by grace and not by works, he concludes: “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works.” Saved by grace, but saved to work. And it was grace that empowered Paul to labour in the most demanding of ministries: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them — yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10). Grace really works. Grace grafts.

And grace will gift us for service. The New Testament word for grace, charis, is in the words for gift(s), charisma, charismata. Official ministries in Christ’s church are grace-gifted (Ephesians 4:7, 11). But all Christians are in ministry too (Ephesians 4:12), with their own grace-gifts for service. Paul insists so, in Romans 12:3-8: “We have different gifts, according to the grace given us” (v.6). Peter likewise, in 1 Peter 4:10: “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s manifold grace.” Grace offers power to the people, charismatic every one.

But more perilous than laziness is the spectre of licence. Here the liberty of grace is flaunted, in a look-at-how-near-the-edge-I-can-go bravado. It is asking for trouble, this toying with the enemy, and it can suddenly spiral out of control. So pubbing and clubbing, for example, can begin as a laugh and end up a life-style, with a profession in smithereens. For all of us, young and old, there are dances with danger that could be dicing with death.

We need to guard against spiritual smugness. What sins do you flirt with, confident you will never be seduced? Take heed, lest the unthinkable happen. We have to learn to listen to grace: “It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives” (Titus 2:11-12). Grace will make us more like Christ, truly human and truly holy. God loves the beauty of holiness. He calls us to that, no compromise, no messing. Anything else cheapens grace and cheats God.

Generosity of Grace←⤒🔗

Our obedience should be generous, because grace has been generous. I need to be careful here. I have tried to heed John Piper’s warnings about the “debtor’s ethic”, the idea that because someone has done something good for me, I feel indebted to do something good for them, to pay them back. He warns us against smuggling this kind of thinking into the Christian life, so that we serve God as if we were making instalment payments on the unending debt we owe him. We can never repay God for what only he could have purchased, and what came to us as a free gift, gratis. Granted.

My point is that the lavishness of grace should inspire lavish discipleship. To take a very practical example, when Paul challenges the Corinthian Christians to give sacrificially, his clincher is the supreme example of grace, the self-impoverishing and other-enriching Christ: “

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.”

2 Corinthians 8:9

There are no spending curbs in his grace.

And if anyone thinks that talk about offerings and collections is less spiritual than talk about the things of grace, please note the use of the grace word in Paul’s discussion here: “…the grace that God has given the Macedonian churches … they urgently pleaded with us for the grace of sharing in this ministry … to bring also to completion this grace on your part ... see that you also excel in this grace … to travel with us in the matter of this grace” (vs.1,4,6,7,19). Grace gives.

So what about an ethic modelled on this crazy thing called grace? The Father’s prodigal, outrageous grace is so different from my careful, economical, thrifty discipleship. Do something over the top for him! Is anyone ever surprised, even shocked, at the extravagance of our Christian discipleship? If no one ever says we need our heads examined, it’s probably because we need our hearts melted.

Christ of Grace←⤒🔗

Only Christ will melt them. Everything said here has sought to honour Christ, because biblical grace has Christ as its heartbeat. He was, and is, grace incarnate, and grace flows only through him. John saw this:

“We have seen his glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth ... From his fulness we have all received, grace upon grace ... grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

John 1:14, 16-17

Paul could never envisage grace apart from Christ. To take one instance among so many, in 2 Timothy 1:9-10 he writes: “This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Saviour, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” For Paul, nothing in that whole majestic sweep of salvation-grace could be outside of Christ. Grace is always Christ-shaped.

I was moved recently by the tender eloquence of John Bunyan, (as quoted by Chuck Swindoll, in The Grace Awakening):

Thou Son of the Blessed, what grace was manifested in Thy condescension. Grace brought Thee down from Heaven; grace stripped Thee of Thy glory; grace made Thee poor and despised; grace made Thee bear such burdens of sin, such burdens of sorrow, such burdens of God’s curse as are unspeakable ... Here is grace indeed! Grace to make angels wonder, grace to make sinners happy, grace to astonish devils.

The amazing Christ of grace must have the pre-eminence. Pray that his Spirit would deluge this dry world with rivers of grace. May grace cascade, and may Christ be glorified!

Song of Grace←⤒🔗

In a moment, we hope to make music as we sing praise! But perhaps we should think of grace as the music in ministry.

Early in his classic, Grace in the New Testament, James Moffatt commends the image of grace notes. However, in the wrong hands this could easily mislead. Now, I love grace notes. On the other hand, I also recognise they are decorative, rather than essential to the melody. But ours must never be a ministry of grace notes, with grace providing trills and frills. For us, grace is always the melody itself.

Don’t throw in the occasional grace note, trying to lighten and brighten some deadly dirge. On the contrary, be known as those for whom grace is the theme tune. Let us sing, and let us encourage others to sing, the melody of joy and health.

Grace is God’s signature tune. For his church to sing from any other score would be a sheer disgrace.