Grace

Grace. What does it mean to you. Have you truly stopped to realize the gift you have received in grace? Have you grasped the amazing God that desires to look past our fault and see our possibility?

In church this week the most profound statement left echoing in my mind has been: grace produces faith that leads to obedience. How wonderful to know that our obedience is not a requirement for grace but a production of the grace so freely given!

Humility reveals our need for the grace of GOD...Faith reveals our trust in His grace!

I am so thankful to be saved by grace! The law was in place prior to Christ's death on the cross, but his death was a transition of sorts in which grace was introduced and the grip of the law was released.

The laws demands: Do your best with your resources to live up to the high and holy standards of God. IMPOSSIBLE!

It is impossible to build a relationship with God with that plan of action. Our resources limit our ability to be "good enough." The law only produces defeat. It is simply by grace that we are able to walk with God and have a relationship with God. Accepting that grace and living by that grace is what enables us to know Him. When we act on our own, pride and self reliance hinder our relationship with God. They give us a false realization of what we are capable of. Pride blinds us to our need. Self-reliance causes us to stumble. Humility and Faith are the building blocks of a relationship with the Almighty because in humility and faith we see our need and trust His fulfillment.

Humility allows us to stand before God IN GRACE. GRACE is the very essence of God drawing us close to Himself in our current condition. Faith is the next essential step. Trusting God for his provision, that is Faith!

Humility says: "I need what you have." Faith says: "I trust you are sufficient for my need."

The results of God's grace is to bear fruit. Producing a life that honors that grace. Grace produces a growing life of obedience. I read in my devotional yesterday that grace leads to courage. Courage is edified by knowing grace. How much more dedicated and driven would you be, knowing that someone saw it fit to have grace on you. That drive is courage result of grace, result of pardon.

John 15:4-5 "Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing."

The grace of God stirs our faith and we find that in spending time in the word and with our God, we realize his life filters ours and produces fruit! Going to church to merely go, or reading to say we read, talking the talk with out walking the walk is no different that wax fruit. True fruit is produced from a relationship, not from religion or ritual expectations.

I love living with God's grace on my mind! It causes me to view possibilities differently! It produces hope for every moment! Because of Grace...my life can far exceed the limitations of my human nature! I can be Christ-like!

And another great encouragement is knowing that when I faulter...God's grace is an all-sufficient supply! A God with so much grace to grant us, is a God that sees something GREAT in us!

Are you living today with the realization of the possibility that God sees when He looks at you?