grace

When Enough is Enough

by ladypbwiggins

God’s Grace is not a new thing. From the very beginning, Yahwe has shown grace to mankind. When Adam sinned, He could have let him stay in the garden, eat from the tree of life, and live in separation from God forever. Can you imagine being spiritually or emotionally separated from someone you’ve enjoyed a peaceful, loving, fulfilling relationship with, but still in their presence, forever? Grace and love placed him in a position to be potentially forgiven and potentially having a restored relationship with his Creator.

When mankind decided to build a staircase to heaven, Yahwe could have wiped them out but when He decided enough was enough, He confused the languages instead.

The prophesy of Malachi tells the priests of Israel that God is not pleased with them. He gives them a warning of what would happen if they did not change their behavior. Essentially, when He had enough, He would send His messenger to alert them to His coming and His judgment. Grace.

When John the Baptizer and Y’shua came on the scene, grace abounded. Have you every wondered what specific sins might have been committed by the people that John so passionately cried out for the need for repentance? Have you ever wondered why Y’shua was so hard on the religious leaders? Everything enumerated in Malachi was being done in Israel at that time. Was it the first time? No. Why now? God decided He had Enough. When it is enough warning comes and then the judgement.

Grace gave the religious leaders three and a half years to change their way of thinking and their behavior. When enough was enough, Y’shua was crucified and then resurrected; the judgment.

So what was Israel doing that required Malachi’s warning? Stay tuned.

Driven

by ladypbwiggins

I was listening to a minister the other day trying to explain to his congregation that we live under grace and not under the law. For those of you who are not Christians, he was referring to Ten Commandments and the Levitical laws listed in the Old Testament. That statement has always sent me into a “thought wilderness.” I mean my thoughts are wandering around my head seeking answers to things that don’t make sense. Here is my quandary.

The Word says God cannot lie and He doesn’t change. The Word says that He is the same yesterday, today and forever. So if He doesn’t change, how are we not under His law?

Next set of thoughts. Jesus was born into a Hebrew family who taught Him the law. He lived the law. He taught the law, Everything He taught was in agreement with the law. That makes sense, since He is the Living Word of God. He had to be consistent with Himself. So if He lived the law and said that He did not come to abolish the law but to complete it.  How then are we not under the law?

Next thought. The Apostle Paul was the one who made the statement, “….we are not under the law but under grace.” However, Paul said he was a Jew educated by Gamaliel and could boast of knowing the law more than most. Looking closely at the context I could see his teaching did not contradict the law. Putting on Christ, taking off the works of the flesh are in agreement with the Sermon on the Mount and the Ten Commandments. So what did Paul mean when he made these statement?

      Romans 6:12-17 (KJV) 

        12  Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
        13  Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves   unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
        14  For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

As I contemplated that question, it came to me. I believe God dropped it in my thoughts. Is it possible and even more likely that Paul was trying to explain to those who would have understood his phrasing or colloquialism as to how they should live and why. In the context Paul is explaining to the Christians in Rome that when a decision to truly follow the Christ is made our nature, our spirit changes. It becomes an internal thing. Our thinking changes, therefore, our behavior changes. He also explains that we are empowered by God to accomplish this. It comes from the inside, the very essence of our being.

We are not driven to obey God because it is the law. Instead we are motivated by His grace shown to us. His undeserved favor towards me is my motivation.

He cares for me because He loves me not because I did something to deserve it. In fact if He gave me what I deserved, I would be dead. I obey God because I appreciate Him. I reverence Him. I love Him. If I were God that would be desired so much more than someone obeying me because they were compelled to follow a law. One way facilitates intimacy and relationship. The other provokes you to respond to a legalistic check list. God did not change. He did not make His law irrelevant. We are still judged by the law but He administers justice through the filter of grace. Therefore,

I am under grace.

Driven to live His standards because of His GRACE.