Grace

Grace.

When it comes to my relationship with God, what is grace? Where is grace? 

How to even define what it is.  The bumper sticker answer is that grace is "unmerited favor." Everything that comes from God is unmerited... We can't earn it. We have no real merits on our own.

I've head grace is the God given ability to do the right thing. But if I explore this more, the question that quickly comes to mind is: what's the difference between grace and will power? I mean, I don't fly into a drunken rage because I decide not to. I could argue whether that decision was mine or God's... He made me with a certain makeup. He had a hand in my upbringing. There really isn't much of my life that isn't influenced by Him. So whatever will power I have has to be at least partially, if not wholly attributed to God.

But in the moment it is still a choice that I have to make. Sure my makeup and history help make some decisions easier than others... But over time things are supposed to change. My life is supposed to be more Christ-like. So a decision I chose to sin in today should become a decision I chose to do right in tomorrow.

That right there... That change. That movement in my decisions and actions... That's where I think grace should live. I get the feeling that over time, God makes the decision easier to make without sin. That right there should be grace.

But my experience is different. It seems that I chose a path, and then force my life to follow that path. The choices may get easier with repetition, but nearly never to I feel them getting influenced supernaturally.  

Perhaps the problem is with my feelers. That it is happening but I am not sensitive enough to see it coming from God. I understand that I am dangerously close to saying God isn't do His part. As if it would even be possible for Him to so deny His character. I mean, I guess it is... He IS God. But if I have a sense that God isn't doing something He should be, the first thing I should suspect is my sensors. 

So I'm thinking about grace. Looking for grace. Praying for grace. 

/shrug

Worship

Last Sunday I was tired of the me me me of worship, and I wrote the following:

Jesus, be blessed today. Praise You, Lord Jesus. 

Great are You. All power is Yours. You've created everything. You've set it all in motion. All physical creation exists because of You. You put all the laws of "nature" in place, and You called it good. 

As history unfolds, it is Your hand that guides. Your hand than raises and lowers. You are the absolute authority. You hold it all in Your hands as creation itself unwinds over time. Only You are all knowing. Only You know the end and the path each part will take to get there.

You are beyond comprehension by creation. You who spoke everything into existence are above that which You created, and exceedingly so.

You are good. You do thing based on love, justice, compassion, mercy, and truth. You do things perfectly. You are pure in every way.

Praise you Lord Jesus.