Grace

Likely the most misused and under appreciated word in the Bible, grace is the foundation and bedrock of the Christian’s hope. Ultimately, when we are talking about salvation, grace is the answer. Anyone who claims that we are not saved by the grace of God is someone who simply has not read the Scriptures in an honest attempt to see what lies at the heart of Biblical teaching concerning salvation. While this does not mean that no effort is required from the human side of things, it certainly means that there is no human effort which can earn or deserve salvation. As pointed out in the last post, if salvation could be earned it would be a wage and not a gift (Romans 4.4).

Grace, Faith or Works?

There’s a big question in the religious world today as to which of these three things saves you. Are we saved by grace, faith or works? Which one and why? The answer to the first question is “yes” and the answer to the last question is “because it gives glory to God”. Rather than separating the three pillars of salvation and focusing on one, when all three of them are combined, there is a beautiful picture painted for mankind of an infinitely wise and wonderful God who carefully planned and prepared everything to be carried out according to his purpose from the foundation of the world.

If we were going to look at all three of these words and study how they fit together in a single post, no one would read it and I would get tired of typing before it was finished. Rather than write something that no one will ever read, I am planning on making several smaller posts throughout the next week or two that focuses on the idea that we are saved by grace, faith and works. As an introduction, I wanted to offer a glimpse of the picture mentioned earlier.

Give Glory to God!

So for the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, “Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner.” He answered, “Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”

- John 9:24-26 ESV

You can picture the scene. There is a man who, moments earlier was blind, standing before a crowd of men with scowls on their faces who though seeing do not see and yet hearing do not hear. The listen with great irritation to the man describe his healing by one he calls a prophet sent from God. Finally, when they can no longer stand his supposed insolence, one of the men cries out “Give glory to God! We know that this man (referring to Jesus) is a sinner!” The claim is that since Jesus is a sinner, there is no way that he could have healed anyone. Obviously this man, who was blind from birth, was lying about something. Obviously, there was some trick or illusion that they were simply not able to see. The Pharisees demanded that this man give glory to God by telling the truth, and that is exactly what he did even though it wasn’t the truth the Pharisees wanted to hear.

Rather than folding under the pressure, this man claimed that Jesus of Nazareth had healed him. He claimed that a great sign was performed in Israel unlike any sign that was ever done by any other prophet. While many miraculous things occurred in the Old Testament, no one was ever given sight who had been born blind. Ever. This made Jesus healing of this man something of particular interest. It was something that would catch everyone’s attention. It was something to take note of, something to remember.

It’s also interesting to note that this man wasn’t just asked to confess before a hostile audience, he was facing excommunication from the Jewish nation for teaching that Jesus was something other than a prophet of Satan. The Pharisees wanted this man to give glory to God by renouncing the miracle that had occurred and joining them in declaring the Son of God as an imposture and false teacher. Rather than doing so, he boldly declared that Christ healed him and, later would confess Jesus Christ as the son of the living God.

We live in a world where we are constantly called upon to deny Jesus Christ as the Lord of Lord, King of Kings - the very Son of God. We are constantly confronted with people who want Christians to deny the lordship of the savior. We must be like that blind man from so many years ago; in the face of our hostile audience we must stand firm and give glory to God in all that we do, say and believe.

The purpose of this blog is to do just that: in all things, in all ways giving glory to God. Through study, prayer and interesting tidbits of information, through posts and comments, let us all do everything we can to glorify the God who has created the heavens and the earth and redeemed mankind from sin and death.