I don’t wanna abuse Your grace
God, I need it every day
It’s the only thing that ever really makes me wanna change
Holy Water, We The Kingdom
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:8-10, NIV
Grace and works.
As long as Christianity has been around there has been a debate amongst believers about the relationship between grace and works.
Ranging from over-the-top, holier-than-thou legalism to a cheapening of the grace of God as a license to do what we want without condemnation, there are many opinions on the topic of grace and works.
Some believe that it is absolutely necessary for salvation – that you cannot call yourself a Christian unless you also live a sinless, legalistic life. They believe in strict rule-keeping as a means to garner favor with God. This unfortunately is not practical, as we all fall short no matter how perfectly we might try to live. This kind of thinking will very quickly lead to burnout and feelings of guilt and condemnation.
It is also contradictory to scripture and diminishes the sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross. The Bible tells us that we all fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3), that the law cannot save us (Romans 8) but rather only brings an awareness of sin and not salvation from it (Romans 3).
Nothing we can do can save us from our sinful selves.
We can only be saved through the grace of God – and nothing else. That is why Paul writes to the Ephesians: 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9).
At the same time there are many people who are at the other extreme – clinging to a false gospel of hypergrace.
Hypergrace emphasises the idea that God’s grace is unending, that His forgiveness is infinite – that all sins past, present and future are already forgiven – while also taking sanctification completely out of the picture. They preach a gospel of ‘come as you are’ without encouraging change and growth.
The reality is that we cannot have works without grace – it is the grace of God that helps us overcome sin, not our own power. It is the grace of God that empowers us to live victorious lives. It is the grace of God that enables, and not only enables, but urges us to pursue holiness. We should strive to live holy and righteous lives, but not because we think it is our ticket to salvation – rather because the grace of God has provoked us towards denying sin and doing good. We pursue holiness and righteousness, dying to sin and self, because the grace of God is so good that would never want to risk doing anything to build a wall between us and God again. We pursue holiness and righteousness because of the grace of God that has called us out of darkness and into His light. His grace rewires our thinking. His grace rewires our desires. His desires become our desires the more we pursue living according to the Will of God – the same God who poured out His grace, mercy and love so freely for us upon the cross.
By the same token we cannot expect to have grace without works.
As much as the grace of God propels us towards holiness, and as much as our righteousness rests in the sacrifice of Christ Jesus, we need to maintain our relationship with Him or risk falling away. A slip up now and then is not a major tragedy – we can recover from our mistakes; we can get back up again by the grace of God. The danger, however, is that if we allow the slipping and backsliding to become our norm we might find ourselves sliding so far that we might find ourselves sliding right out of the church and into the world. We might find ourselves slipping out of victory back into brokenness, back into addiction, back into habitual cycles of sin, back into hopelessness and darkness – and eventually to a place of complete renunciation and apostasy (giving up the faith all together) as we build walls between ourselves and God, as we stop listening to His voice, as we turn our backs on Him.
We are saved by grace – yes – but as Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, this is not a license to sin. We have moved from being slaves to sin (leading to death) to being slaves to obedience (pursuing righteousness and living a life worthy of the One that Christ gave for us).
Prayer: Lord, help me understand the beauty of Your grace today. It is not a license to sin, but a call towards holiness and righteousness. It is Your grace that helps me overcome sin and unrighteousness and leads me to live a life worthy of the One You gave for me upon the Cross. It is through Your grace that I can live the life of an overcomer. Lord, lead me to live a life of righteousness, blameless in the sight of those around me so that You may be glorified on the day of Your return. Empower me Lord to live a Kingdom life here on earth – a life of good works; righteous, holy and made whole, encouraged, enabled and empowered by Your grace. In Jesus Name. Amen.