God's Lavish Grace by Terry Virgo

Author:Terry Virgo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lion Hudson
Published: 2012-08-21T00:00:00+00:00

10

Grace teaches us to say “No”

Sadly, some Christians give the impression that they are not allowed to participate in this world’s pleasures. They seem to communicate that they are far from happy about the prohibitions that shape their narrow lifestyle.

This chapter opens our eyes to what grace teaches us and how it provides us with God-given motivations that set us free to prefer and choose Godliness, and say “no” from our hearts to the short-term pleasures of sin.

Grace teaches us to say “No”

“Should we apply grace or righteousness?” I was being asked a question at an open forum for leaders and this one provided a real shock to my system. The questioner explained that an unmarried couple who were living to gether were asking about the possibility of being baptised at his church. What should he say? The enquirer clearly saw grace and righteousness as alternatives!

When God declared the Old Covenant obsolete (Hebrews 8:13) and introduced a New Covenant, he wasn’t throwing in the towel in the battle against sin; he was revealing a new and better way of overcoming it. In the coming of Christ, grace suddenly “appeared” (Titus 2:11. Greek: epiphany – “shone out”), not to lower the standards but to equip believers to rise to unprecedented heights.

Not that God had not always been gracious. When Moses asked for a revelation of God he was told that God’s presence would pass before him and that he would reveal his name. So Moses heard “the Lord, the Lord … compassionate and gracious … slow to anger” (Exodus 34:6). God has always been gracious. However, grace was particularly displayed in Christ’s coming. The law came by Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ, and of his fullness we have all received grace upon grace (see John 1:16–17). Grace certainly shone out in the coming of Christ but grace doesn’t come to lower the standard. It comes to motivate and enable us to live a totally new life.

Paul told Titus that the grace of God appeared instructing us to say “No” (Titus 2:11–12, NIV). The vivid translation of the New International Version arrests our attention. Saying “No” is a vital part of holy living. The downward gravitational pull of human society is so all-pervasive that if we don’t learn to say “No”, we will soon be in trouble. If young people don’t learn to say “No”, they will be quickly compromised by the opposite sex. If they don’t learn to say “No”, they will soon be experimenting with drugs and alcohol.

“No” is a word we must be instructed to say. It is an antisocial word. It goes against the tide. It takes courage and commitment to say it. It needs strong motivation, and grace motivates powerfully.

How does grace teach us? It begins by telling us that we are totally acceptable to God through our faith in Christ. We are justified freely as a gift. So I am a winner before I start. I am accepted before I have done anything. What a relief! How magnificent! Some would argue, “How dangerous!”, but they don’t understand.

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