Lifetime Daily DevotionsSample

How Long Have You Walked in Grace?

  

For by grace you have been saved through faith.

Ephesians 2:8-9 (NAS)

 

            What is generally the first thought that comes to mind when you think about God's grace? The first thought that comes to my mind is His "Salvation Grace." Ephesians 2:8-9 says, "For by grace you have been saved through faith." God gives us some very dramatic examples of people who encountered His Salvation Grace.

            For instance, God took an ambitious, calculating, proud, self-righteous, brilliant man, a man so zealous for his religious traditions that he ruthlessly murdered innocent people and imprisoned entire families for following an upstart fanatic from Nazareth named Jesus. God changed that man into an unbelievably loyal, totally committed, bold and brave apostle. Who was that man? Paul. That's what Salvation Grace ' looks like.'

            God took another man with big macho problems, a braggart, crude, impulsive, outspoken and profane, an exposed coward, and changed him so drastically that He gave him a new name. Who was that man? Peter. That's what Salvation Grace ' looks like.'       

Praise God for His Salvation Grace! What would your life be like today if you had not known His Salvation Grace? For Peter and for Paul their magnificent salvation experiences were just the beginning of grace. Peter began a new life. He preached and thousands responded. He healed just as Jesus touched and healed. He taught others about his Jesus. He was persecuted because of his relationship with Jesus. He held tenaciously to his Salvation Grace and died because he refused to deny being a follower of Christ.

Paul and Peter walked with grace and came to know grace more deeply, more intimately through the pain, the persecution, the rejection, and the suffering that walked closely with them. Paul was fanatical in his walk of faith after his Damascus Road confrontation with Jesus. That moment of encountering grace changed his life completely. He is very transparent as he tells us about his experiences as a disciple of grace. He was beaten, stoned, imprisoned, hungry, persecuted, and abandoned. But there was something that kept him from reneging, something that drove him relentlessly, something for which he, too, was martyred. That "something" was God's Enabling Grace, the grace of II Corinthians 12:9 that tells us "My grace is sufficient for you."

So after Ephesians 2:8-9, God's Salvation Grace, comes II Corinthians 12:9:8, His Enabling Grace. One tells about beginning our walk with grace, the other tells about walking with grace every second of our lives. Maybe you thought Salvation Grace was the beginning and the end. "I'm saved, sealed, and heading for Heaven." No. Your faith walk just began at the moment you reached out and took His gift of Salvation Grace. Did you have any idea of the incredible grace that was yet to come?    

John 1:14 tells us, "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father full of grace and truth." You see, Grace is a Person. Once you meet Grace your life is controlled by Grace, your days are filled with Grace, your goal in life is to worship Grace, to lift Him up, to love Him with all your heart, soul, and mind. Now you are filled with Grace Himself. You can never be separated because He is your life, your breath, your entire being. "In Him we live and move and exist (Acts 17:8)."  Have you met Grace? Oh yes. You and I have met Grace. From the beginning of our walk to the hardships we encounter, Grace is there. But there is still more Grace!

 The Bible says emphatically that God cannot lie and to exaggerate is to lie.

Therefore, when God couches a statement in superlatives, we should recognize the import of that statement. This scripture falls into that "unbelievable, incomprehensible, too amazing to be true" category, doesn't it?

God is able to make all grace abound to you,

that always having all sufficiency in everything,

you may have an abundance (of grace)

for every good deed.

II Corinthians 9:8 (NAS)

            From Salvation Grace, to Enabling Grace, to Grace More than Sufficient for Everything! Sufficient means as much as is needed. We have so much more than what we need! According to the scripture we have all sufficiency, we have an abundance of grace!

And it is ours now. It is ours for tomorrow. It is ours and cannot be taken away from us. Oh, yes! He has been ours from our first grace steps, but we didn't really know it, did we?

Have I met Grace? Yes. I am a child of Grace. When I was twelve years old I became acquainted with Salvation Grace. As my needs accelerated and my ability to meet those needs failed, I met God's Enabling Grace. Now, I live every day in His amazing grace, His abounding grace, His abundant grace.

Nothing can come into my life that His grace cannot handle.

It is more than sufficient!