New Morning Mercies #155

It would be amazing if a God of awesome glory recognized our existence, but for him to welcome us into his family is grace beyond amazing!

It is just so incredible, so counterintuitive, and so beyond anything else in our experience that it is very hard for us to wrap our brains around its majesty. There is no human being so creative and imaginative as to be able to pen such a story. You can read the story in Scripture and still not be blown away by its glory because you just don’t have categories to understand its depth and breadth. In fact, it takes what this story is about for you to fully understand what this story is about. Only the gift of divine grace is able to help you grasp even a portion of the wonder of divine grace. The expansiveness of God’s initiative of grace is so beautiful and transformational that it is the reason John Newton chose the best qualifying word, amazing, when he penned his famous hymn about that grace.

Think about it. No human being ever kept God’s law (except Jesus). No one has ever given God the honor due his name. No one has lived the life of worship that is the duty and calling of everyone who has ever taken a breath. All people have not only rebelled against God, but they have written their own sets of self-oriented rules. Everyone not only has failed to worship God, but also has worshiped false gods. Every human being not only has failed to recognize the centrality of God in all things, but also has inserted himself or herself in God’s position. Everyone not only occasionally breaks one or another of God’s laws, but we all, in some way, have broken all of his laws. Not only do we misuse God’s creation, but we put it in God’s place and give it the worship that belongs to him.

So in the face of the depth and heinous character of all of our rebellion against God and his glory, it would be amazing if we were not exterminated. It would be an act of wondrous grace for God to recognize that we exist. But he has done so much, much more than this. By means of the life, death, and resurrection of his Son, he has made a way for us to be welcomed into an intimate familial relationship with him. He literally adopts us into his family so that, quite apart from anything we could have ever deserved, we are given the full range of rights and privileges of his children. And not only are we granted those things in the here and now, but we are blessed with them forever and ever. Along with this, he has promised us the final end of all the sin, sickness, sorrow, and suffering that our rebellion brought down on this world. So grace lets you have it all—everything, that is, that you need. Grace makes the King of kings your Father and his Savior Son your brother. Now, that really is beyond amazing. Pray for eyes to see it and a heart to embrace it, and then let your soul soar.

For further study and encouragement: Ephesians 1:15–23