Grace

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Grace is the greatest motivator

“But for the grace of God” is one of my favorite phrases to describe how blessed I am. 

Paul was the first person to use this verse as an explanation of his life and ministry:

“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me” (‭‭I Corinthians‬ ‭15:10‬). 

In this verse Paul was talking about who he was because of the grace of God. The phrase I grew up hearing talks about who we’d be without the grace of God. 

Either way, the greatest common denominator is grace. 

Grace is the best motivator. 

Nothing empowers you toward change, toward action like the undeserved gift of grace. 

I try my best to see everything through this lens, especially as I hang out with non-Christians. They need to see that grace is for them. 

Do you remember what life was like before Christ?

Do you remember the patience and mercy of God during that time?

How often we forget where we started. I know that I’m guilty of this mentality. 

As a child, I was reminded quite regularly of how fortunate I was to end up on top despite of the abandonment of my parents. 

And it’s true. 

I should’ve been placed in foster care. 

I shouldn’t have graduated from college. 

I should’ve ended up impoverished or inprisoned. 

The statistics were not in my favor.

But for the grace of God…

Redemption and restoration is found through grace. There is hope for the seemingly hopeless. 

Christ in us is the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27) and Christ is full of grace and truth (John 1:14). 

This is what makes the gospel such wonderful news. 

 

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Compelling Love

I’m reading Tortured for Christ and it’s an inspirational and eye opening book. 

The cruelties inflicted on Christians in communist countries are evil beyond compare because, as Richard Wurmbrand says, the presence of evil in it’s darkest state was seen in the eyes of their torturers. 

  The love of Christ, though, is greater than all evil. 

What’s amazing to discover is that the Christians never hated, belittled, or backstabbed their tormentors. 

The grace and love of Christ compelled them to see these men as who they could be. 

All around the world, persecuted Christians share this same view. 

I want to follow their example. I want to love others with the pure love of Jesus. 

The level of selflessness expressed by my persecuted brothers and sisters calls me to action, challenges my apathy. 

If you haven’t read this book, I highly recommend it. 

Go to The Voice of the Martyrs website to request the book (it’s free). 

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When comfort doesn’t come

I struggle with being assertive.

Being nice? Having fun? Keeping things light and fluffy?

Welcome to my comfort zone or my discomfort zone, depending on the day.

Lysa TerKeurst says it best:

Having a comfort zone doesn’t mean you’re always comfortable.

I’m being stretched in this area at work. Accountability in the work place, especially for those of us in management positions, means holding meetings to discuss progress.

Guess who’s the bearer of bad news?

Yeah. Fun-loving Audra.

And most of the time it’s not terrible news. Managers are just trained to notice things that are not going well–and then come up with strategies for improvement.

I’ll be really honest with you. I have to pray a lot when receiving instruction and correction. When my thoughts are allowed to go off alone, I take it personally–and even my controlled thoughts find me vulnerable.

Receiving instruction with grace is always a choice I have to make.

This is one struggle that can send my emotions and relationships into a tailspin. One of my goals for next year is to deconstruct this area and come up with a battle plan.

IMG_1566For now, though, I’m sitting in a hard place. Things have gone wrong and all I can do is clean up the mess.

Can I give you some advice?

Don’t ignore warning signs.

Don’t put off conversations.

Pretending everything is okay, will be okay, can be okay is not helping.

Which brings me back to being assertive in the workplace…..

If management teaches you anything it’s how to conquer fear, especially when your fear pops up as a subject in a meeting about your personal performance.

Here’s what I’m learning as I face up to my insecurities about giving/receiving instruction and correction:

Dealing with a problem is always uncomfortable. Stop waiting for comfort to come along. It won’t.

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An amazing and sustaining grace

Many of the bloggers I enjoy following are so bold. They take fierce stands on hard topics and ride the criticism like surfers ride waves.

I’ve deleted everything 5 times today.200 words here, 150 words there. The thought of hitting publish made me queasy.

Playing it safe is a hard trap to escape.

How many times have we talked about being bold? Being unafraid? Not hiding?

Your fearless leader was a coward today.

She cried over what to make for dinner. Seriously. This happened. When told to put something together for dinner I freaked out. The need for approval and the fear of rejection collided in the perfect storm.

Over dinner.

Today is not the first time I’ve struggled with words and dinner either. Today is simply the first time I’ve had the courage to talk about it.

Dear Friends,

I have a hard time making choices without a plan and saying things without fearing the opinions of others.

Sincerely,

Tired-of-being-scared Audra

Yesterday I talked about Bold Christians vs. Sissy Christians. (Insert face palm.)

Sorry about that…

I strongly agree with what I said, but you need to read today’s post for a much needed addendum.

It’s hard to be a Bold Christian when you cry over dinner planning. (This is what’s been haunting me all day.)

But remember what I said about grace for the lost?

Grace is for Christians too. There are no double standards with Jesus.

Look at Romans 5:

10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

If grace and love is available while we were sinners, grace and love will sustain us even more when we become Christians.

Learning how to extend grace to yourself can be hard. We see our fallacies and failures so clearly. Remember, though, that grace gives us new vision–for others and for ourselves.

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Grace changes vision

When I was an enemy of God, He decided to make me a friend. His forgiveness is readily available to everyone. It’s not available once your life looks pretty. It’s available right now.

Romans 5:7-8 says:

7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

My heart was a mess before Christ. I tried really hard to be good. Some people even bought into my costume too.

But I knew and God knew that what I really needed was grace–God’s DNA–to make a change. Once I accepted God’s grace, everything changed. I gave up my acting career and became an honest woman.

Grace is a change in vision.

God's loveI now see people as God sees them: forgiven, free, loved, and full of potential. This is the future for those who will accept the freedom purchased by the blood of Christ.

Verse 8 says that God loves people when they are still sinners.

As Christians, we are called to love as God loves. This means that I am to love people when they are still sinners.

The exclusivity of the church from the world makes me angry.

Living in Christian Bubble Land is not included in the Great Commission.

I will not pray for anyone to be delivered from a non-Christian environment. What I will pray is that he or she will  grow up in the faith and stop being a Sissy Christian.

Sissy Christians are scared of non-Christians and don’t understand grace.

Sorry if that sounds harsh, but it’s truth.

Jesus is no sissy and I follow Him.

He defeated sin, death, and hell to give us grace, love, and mercy.

This is the Good News, the gospel we need to spread.

I think some of us forget that we were once a mess. No one asked us to clean it all up before coming to Jesus.

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Life is a story

We all have a story to tell, right?

Your life, after all, is one big story that gets written a day at a time.

Of course, every story is different in one way or another, but we all have a lot more in common than we realize.

Can you list all the movies that retell Cinderella?

Exactly. There’s too many to count.

journalThe premise is the same but the small details–time, place, etc–are what make it different.

Our world is filled with brokenness: tragedy, addiction, abuse, divorce. Listen to enough stories and you hear about these things.

No one escapes life without a few sad chapters, with pages covered with tears, blood, and grime.

I am finding, though, that the greatest stories of redemption are found in books where sad chapters give way to victorious chapters.

The victorious chapters are when the villains–and all their filthy, disgusting lies–get their butts kicked.

Love, joy, mercy, hope, grace, forgiveness…..

These are the key elements of  victorious chapters.

But you have to remember that victorious chapters cannot replace the sad ones.

No amount of time or distance can eliminate the past.

Think of it this way:

If I read a book and hate the first half, I can’t decide to only read the second half next time. The story wouldn’t make any sense.

What I can do is choose to see how the character made peace with the past in order to move on.

I said earlier that we’re all more alike than we realize.

We’re all alike because we’re all storytellers.

Maybe you didn’t write the first part of your story.

Let that go.

Focus on the story you get to write.

Focus on the victorious chapters.

And share the hope–the redemption in your story–with the world.

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Showing kindness

Today at church we talked about kindness. 

I was voice interpreting and did pretty good. (I’ve only done it a five or six times so it was stop and start.)

The critic inside me was screaming, though, that I didn’t do a good job. I tried not to listen but it was hard. 

Maybe I can’t do this…

But I persevered because my mentor is teaching me to not give up, to give myself grace. 

We talk a lot about extending grace and kindness to others. And we definitely should!

My problem is that I’m great at giving it to others and terrible at giving it to myself. 

The voice I was hearing was me–expecting to not mess up, which is impossible because I’m a beginner. 

Talk about unrealistic expectations. Geez…

If we want to be gracious, merciful, and kind to others we must first understand that grace, mercy, and kindness is for us too. 

As Christians, God tells us to show others the love He gave to us. 

We can’t show love–or any of God’s characteristics–to others if we haven’t received it ourselves. 

Let’s remember this week to be kind. 

Start with yourself and go from there. 

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Practicing graciousness 

Ever gone out to eat and have your order messed up? 

Tonight I went out to dinner with friends. My order was fine, but their orders were completely messed up…..

At the end of our dinner, even my friend’s ticket was messed up! 

Oftentimes it’s awkward to tell a waiter, “Hey! This is all wrong.” 

You don’t want to be an overcomplaining customer, but you’re also paying for the food. 

The goal is to handle the situation with as much grace as possible. (Both of my friends were super gracious by the way.)

Sometimes it’s easy to be gracious, sometimes it’s not. 

I’m not saying it will be easy, but I do know that a little graciousness will go a long way. 
And, if that doesn’t work, have a chat with the restaurant’s manager. 

Being gracious is not the same as being a doormat. 

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An incomprehensible love

I read an article once that said many Christians feel uncomfortable when questionable people attend church. You’ve probably read or heard something similar before too.

Homeless people, prostitutes, druggies, murderers, pedophiles….

Even reading that list probably made some of you cringe just a little.

But Jesus died for us all. He didn’t say, “Unless your past was questionable. That’s where I draw the line.”

If a questionable past can keep you out of Heaven, I’m already disqualified.

All of us deserve hell. We just can’t measure up to God’s righteousness by ourselves.

And that’s why God–from the foundations of the earth–had the plan of salvation ready to go.

God, creator of the world, knew BEFORE IT HAPPENED that man–his most special creation–would screw up.

Then he created us anyway.

Why?

Because He is a God of love and wanted a people to lavish that love upon.

This fact still blows me away!

God has ALWAYS loved you. He loved you BEFORE you were ever loveable. He loved you even when He KNEW mankind was going to say, “Buzz off! I’ve got this under control.”  

It’s a love that’s beyond comprehension.

Why is the church not sharing this wonderful news?

God's loveBecause we can’t run around telling people Jesus loves them just as they are. There are conditions you know!

So the church continues to avoid homeless people, prostitutes, druggies, murderers, pedophiles….

And don’t even pull the “So your saying that we should all just do whatever we want? That’s greasy grace” card.

It’s a tired argument that needs to die.

I’m simply stating the fact that a behavior modification program, which has never worked (just ask the children of Israel) is not the same as the transforming power of grace.

The “bad” people we try desperately to avoid need Jesus.

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The suspenseful side of grace

I have a love/hate relationship with suspense movies.

suspense 1

I’m ready to face the ideas in this post.

I love the plot twists, action scenes (cue bomb!) and creativity involved.

I hate the scenes where you are clutching the popcorn bowl, screaming at the TV.

Don’t do it! It’s a trick!!!!! (Big swig of coke) The bad guy’s right behind you!!!!!!!!!!!!

And then it goes into a wicked awesome fight scene and I fall in love all over again.

Watching a friend make a poor decision is a lot like watching a suspense movie.

You know it’s a bad idea, but your friend? He or she is totally clueless.

Or, worst case scenario, your friend willingly makes a bad decision.

But, let’s assume that your friend isn’t willingly making bad decisions because most of us don’t go into a situation thinking:

How can I really screw this up?

At least, I don’t anyway…

Your decisions are scaring me!

Your decisions are scaring me!

Somehow, though, we have the worst thoughts about our friends and family when they mess up.

My grace is always on vacation when this happens.

Until, of course, I mess up.

I can then give you a million and one reasons that I made a mistake:

I didn’t mean to say that, okay?

I had to make a snap decision.

I thought bangs would look good on me. (Let’s take a moment to mourn all the bad haircuts in our life. Okay, I feel better.)

Can’t you see that I need a little grace?!? Seriously.

Put yourself in your friend’s shoes. (Unless they don’t fit and then metaphorical shoe wearing will do.)

If you would want someone to extend you grace, then that means your friend wants grace too.

It’s a lot easier to be the one on the couch, clutching the bowl of popcorn, screaming your head off.

It’s a lot harder being the one walking around the corner in a poorly lit hallway.