Grace. It is not something we do well. At least not often. Perhaps those that we hold the most grace out towards are our children, who sometimes can “do no wrong” in our eyes. But to others with bad behavior, they don’t get a pass, instead we desire for them to experience our wrath through revenge. I’m so glad that isn’t how God deals with me! And it certainly isn’t how God calls us to deal with others.
“Over the years I have seen Christians shaping God in their own image – in each case a dreadfully small God…. Some, like the elder brother in Luke, sulk and pout when the Father serves the best for the prodigal son who has spent his last cent on sinful living. Some tragically refuse to believe that God can or will forgive them: My sin is too great.”
“This is not the God of grace who ‘desires all men to be saved.’ This is not the God embodied in Jesus that Matthew came to know. This is not the God who calls sinners — which, as you and I know, means everybody.”
God says that He loves us in spite of us and that He demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, He sent Jesus Christ who died for us.
He loves us not because of what we’ve done and not because of who we are, but because of who He is! That is God’s Grace.
“God wants us back even more than we could possibly want to be back. We don’t have to go into great detail about our sorrow. All we have to do, the parable says, is appear on the scene, and before we get a chance to run away again, the Father grabs us and pulls us into the banquet so we can’t get away.”
Let us delight in God’s grace. The grace He holds out to us is amazing. And because of our experience of God’s grace in our own lives, let us then attempt to be people of amazing levels of love and grace to others. Let us be accepting of all people. Let us not force people to clean up their lives to “look more like us” before we offer them the right hand of fellowship. Let us not withhold our forgiveness to others when they ask for it. Instead let us take God’s love and share it with others so that more people come to a knowledge of who He is – the God of amazing grace.
–quotes above are from Brennan Manning in Ragamuffin Gospel