What is the grace of God?
Few words in the Bible are used more often or understood less than "grace" — writers in this collection describe it as the free favour of God toward people who had earned the opposite, and they press two questions: where does it come from, and what does it do once it arrives?
Its Source Is God Himself
Commentators repeatedly locate the origin of grace outside the person receiving it. Nothing in us starts it moving.
A. J. PollockLet nothing weaken our sense of the grace of God. The very word, Grace, means that there is activity on the part of God, not because of what is found in man in the way of goodness or deserving, either before or after conversion, but because of what He is in Himself, and based on the righteous foundation which the atoning work of Christ gives Him, so that He can show His love to poor fallen man.
Because grace rests on what God is, our peace does not rise and fall with our performance.
J. N. DarbyIf we look at the simple fact of what grace is, it has no limits, no bounds. Be we what we may (and we cannot be worse than we are), in spite of all that, what God is towards us is LOVE. Neither our joy nor our peace depends on what we are to God, but on what He is to us, and this is grace.
More Than Unmerited Favour
The standard dictionary definition is treated here as true but too small.
H. J. VineThe dictionary tells us that grace is unmerited favour; but God's grace to the sinner who believes is more: it is favour for the one who deserved judgment; and further still, according to the riches of that grace, and to the praise of its glory, believers are taken into Divine favour as sons, through the redeeming work of Christ; they are "accepted in the Beloved" (Eph. 1:6-7)... The fact is, we are treated not according to what we deserve, but according to what God's beloved Son deserves.
It Does Not Excuse Sin
A common misreading is that grace means God shrugs at wrongdoing. Writers here argue the opposite: grace exists precisely because sin is beyond repair.
J. N. DarbyThere is sometimes the thought that grace means God passes over sin, but no — grace assumes sin is so horribly bad a thing that God cannot tolerate it. If it were in man's power, after being unrighteous and evil, to patch up his ways and mend himself so as to stand before God, there would be no need of grace. The very fact that the Lord is gracious shows sin to be so evil a thing that man, being a sinner, is utterly ruined and hopeless, and nothing but free grace will do for him — can meet his need.
Righteousness Gives Grace Its Throne
Grace is not God relaxing His standards. It reaches us along a channel cut by the death of Christ.
H. Forbes WitherbyGrace reigns on the principle of righteousness, through what God has done by the cross and resurrection of His Son. Righteousness has enthroned grace and given it its sceptre and rule... God's heart of love can go out in grace to the vilest of sinners and the most determined of His enemies.
The same truth is pictured as a river with a beginning and an end.
F. B. HoleWe see the river of grace. We see the channel of righteousness, cut by the work of the cross, in which it flows. We see finally the boundless ocean of eternal life, into which it flows.
Grace Appeared as a Person
Grace is not only a principle. It walked into history.
Ernst-August BremickerThe grace of God has appeared, and it has done so in the person of our Lord Jesus. Around 2,000 years ago He became a man. He lived here on earth and died on the cross of Calvary. After being buried He rose again as the great victor over Satan and death. In all this the wonderful grace of God shines brightly.
Grace and Law Work in Opposite Directions
The order of blessing and behaviour is what separates the two.
The Christian's FriendLaw demands a certain walk as the means of gaining a position. Grace gives the position, and then asks for a matching walk. Law gives no power, but exacts the penalty for failure; grace remits the penalty, and then gives the power.
Grace Is a Teacher
Far from leaving conduct undefined, grace instructs on three fronts at once.
F. B. HoleGrace teaches us to live soberly, that is, "with self-restraint and consideration." It thus puts us each right in regard to ourselves. It teaches us to live righteously, that is, in a way that is right toward our fellows. It teaches us to live godly, that is, to give God His right place in our lives. It puts us right in regard to God and man and self, and it sets us waiting for the appearing of the glory.
Grace Keeps On Supplying
The same grace that saved also carries the believer through everything afterward.
J. T. MawsonHis resources are enough to meet every demand that can be made on us... His words to Paul were, "My grace is sufficient for thee"... There is the ocean of grace at one end of the sentence, and the thimble of our need at the other, and the ocean is enough for the thimble; and not for special days of stress only, but always and for all.
Summary
- Source. Grace starts in what God is, never in what He finds in us — so it has no limits and no conditions.
- Cost. It never ignores sin; it assumes sin is fatal, and it reaches us only through the righteousness established at the cross.
- Person. Grace is not an idea but an arrival: it appeared in Jesus, who lived, died, and rose.
- Order. Law demands a walk to earn a position; grace gives the position first, then supplies the power for the walk.
- Supply. The grace that saves also schools us to live soberly, righteously and godly — and keeps supplying, an ocean for a thimble of need.