Grace

We are a law and order society.  If you doubt that, come to a middle school.  Those kids are all over an eye for eye.  If a wrong has been committed, they want justice.  Some are very concerned with what a specific punishment will be, others are just happy knowing punishment was doled out.  Just last week, a sweet 7th grader came to me excited because he thought he knew who was sending 'anonymous' emails to the entire 7th grade.  He was so crestfallen when I told him I wasn't worried about it.  The email had no words or attachments, it wasn't sent from a school email.  It wasn't a crime, it was an annoyance.  I could just see it in his face "Oh man! I wanted someone to pay for annoying me!"

We're all like this aren't we?  We want justice.  Someone has to pay!  My food is late - give me a discount! It's our sinful nature and it's what makes grace so hard to understand.

Undeserved favor.  This is such a foreign concepts to us.  Nothing in life is free. If it's to be, it's up to me. We want to work hard and get what we deserve.

Until we don't.  We really don't want to get what we deserve in all instances.  I don't want to get what I deserve when I screw up.  I want grace desperately.

God gives us grace so freely and completely.  He sent his Son to die for us so we didn't have to receive the punishment we earned by our actions.  It should follow then that because we have been given grace so freely that it will be easy for us to give.  Wrong - o!

When someone wrongs me, I want to well up my righteous indignation.  "How dare you!"  I want to get angry.  "Can you believe!?!" But this is not the example set by my Lord.  All the way to the end, he forgave those who wronged him.

And to be honest, it's hard to accept grace sometimes.  Sunday afternoon I was 20 minutes late to let a basketball team into the gym for no good reason.  I totally zoned out.  When I realized it, I went running to the gym without even putting shoes on.  I should have been relieved by the team's graceful attitude towards me.  "It's ok" they said. "We just appreciate that you can let us in."  It kinda made me feel extra guilty.  It's weird, I know.  I would have definitely felt worse if they were snippy or treated me the way I deserved to be treated.  I was thankful for their grace but also a little guilty feeling.  I didn't deserve their sweetness.

Guess what? I didn't deserve their sweetness.  But they gave it anyway.  Jesus didn't deserve to die for my mistakes, but he did it anyway.

So today, let's be on the two way street of grace.  Let's give it freely to those who don't deserve it and let's accept it freely when we don't deserve it.