The Gospel of Jesus Christ

[sojourner]

Grace is such good news because it completely changes the paradigm under which we operate spiritually. Righteousness by free grace obliterates the need for righteousness through acts (being "good"). What many do is simply to transfer righteousness from works to faith. We don't have to "do the right things" in order to receive God's grace...but we do have to "believe the right things" in order to receive God's grace.

But that's not what the theology of grace says. Grace says that, because God is loving and merciful, God has imparted to us God's grace, even though we do not, and cannot deserve it.

Should we react to that good news by opening ourselves to grace, and bringing our hearts and our being into alignment with it? Of course we should. We should act as though we are acceptable to God.

 

[Katzpur]

I don't disagree with you Katz, but even after this act or work of faith or any other work for that matter, we are all still sinners and fall short of the perfection that is God. No one will die in a perfect state, IMO. With that being the case, there is an element of completely unearned grace that will be bestowed upon us, making us pure enough to be brought before God.

I totally agree. In the end, grace is all that saves us. We could never, ever do it on our own, and Jesus is under absolutely no obligation to redeem any of us. To me, that is a more accurate way of understanding "grace" than just insisting that "it's a gift" and that we need to do nothing for that grace to be operative in our lives -- nothing, that is, but believe. As soon as you add the requirement of "belief in Christ," you've crossed over into saying that something is expected of us after all.

 

[Damien Sid Malery]

If I hear about grace one more time I am going to scream! Grace is the biggest bullocks I have ever seen in my entire life... Who came up with that stupid term that encompases everything and nothing at the same time? GRRR! Anyway. It doesn't take faith or "Grace" for god to do anything. He said when his son dies the gates of heaven will be open again. So it happened. What else matters? Maybe he did it out of boredom. Maybe he did it because he needed to show some sort of sacrifice for breaking his word. I don't know why or how he did it but he did.

 

[Scuba Pete]

Why do some insist that nothing is expected of us?

The point of the scriptures on "works" is not to excuse us from having any sort of response, but to show us that apart from God we ALL would fail.

Again look at Naaman. He was told to dip 7 times in the River Jordan. Was this a work or a response?

If it was a work, then anyone with leprosy could dip in the River Jordan and be clean. That is, the actual dipping in that river would make them clean. But it was a response based on faith: Faith that God would do the impossible if we only trust him.

That's why God works through jars of clay: so that it's OBVIOUS where the power comes from. Make no bones about it: Baptism is as much about humility as it is about faith. We can't see HOW God will work his miracle within us, but we have to have faith (as little faith as Naaman had) that God can do the impossible with something as insignifigant as a little dip.

II Corinthians 4:7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. NIV

Just like Naaman, many of us are guilty of telling God about a cleaner river: a better way to get clean. THAT'S works salvation. The only way to really get clean is to obey God ad all that he tells us to do.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Why do some insist that nothing is expected of us?

So we can do what we want.:beach: :cigar:

 

[dawny0826]

It is by love!

Luke 7:44 Then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. 45 You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. 46 You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. 47 Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven little loves little." 48 Then Jesus said to her, "Your sins are forgiven."
49 The other guests began to say among themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?"
50 Jesus said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace." NIV

Love entails both faith and grace.

I concur.

(You didn't have an "all of the above" option.)

 

[Scuba Pete]

So we can do what we want.:beach: :cigar:

Ain't it the truth! Your statement reminded me of this verse:

James 4:1 What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. 3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. 4 You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? 6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:
"God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble." NIV

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Ain't it the truth! Your statement reminded me of this verse

I had another group of verses specifically in mind:

The wicked man says in his heart, "there is no God." - Psalm 14

and

If this is for the righteous, what will become of the wicked? 1 Peter 4.17-18

 

[sojourner]

Why do some insist that nothing is expected of us?

The point of the scriptures on "works" is not to excuse us from having any sort of response, but to show us that apart from God we ALL would fail.

Again look at Naaman. He was told to dip 7 times in the River Jordan. Was this a work or a response?

If it was a work, then anyone with leprosy could dip in the River Jordan and be clean. That is, the actual dipping in that river would make them clean. But it was a response based on faith: Faith that God would do the impossible if we only trust him.

That's why God works through jars of clay: so that it's OBVIOUS where the power comes from. Make no bones about it: Baptism is as much about humility as it is about faith. We can't see HOW God will work his miracle within us, but we have to have faith (as little faith as Naaman had) that God can do the impossible with something as insignifigant as a little dip.

II Corinthians 4:7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. NIV

Just like Naaman, many of us are guilty of telling God about a cleaner river: a better way to get clean. THAT'S works salvation. The only way to really get clean is to obey God ad all that he tells us to do.

But the presence of grace does not depend upon our response to it. The relationship we allow ourselves to have with God depends upon our response -- but God always makes the first move toward us. Our actions are only responses to God's invitation to full relationship with God.

The problem is that we do not truly trust that God has made us clean -- to extend your metaphor -- so we have conceived and built a better bathtub than the grace that God has already provided. That is the predicament embodied in the concept of original sin -- that humanity will always find it's own way to come away from God. And we perpetuate that stance whenever we insist on our works to save us.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Bump for recent reference.

 

[Scuba Pete]

We have fundamentally different understandings of grace, sojourner. I see your grace as being "cheap" and mine being "responsive". When you "grow in grace" it means you are BECOMING more like God. Jesus was FULL of Grace and Truth. We need to be like Jesus and ergo we become just like God.

 

[Captain Civic]

How do you accept a gift if you don't accept it? Of course, there is nothing we can do to be right with God. Only God can offer that bridge for us to cross. But do we have a choice if we walk over the bridge, or does God push us across it, even if we don't want to go over?