Unforced Rhythms of Grace

We know very well that we are not set right with God by rule-keeping but only through personal faith in Jesus Christ. How do we know? 

We tried it—and we had the best system of rules the world has ever seen! Convinced that no human being can please God by self-improvement, we believed in Jesus as the Messiah so that we might be set right before God by trusting in the Messiah, not by trying to be good.

Have some of you noticed that we are not yet perfect? (No great surprise, right?) And are you ready to make the accusation that since people like me, who go through Christ in order to get things right with God, aren't perfectly virtuous, Christ must therefore be an accessory to sin? The accusation is frivolous. If I was “trying to be good,” I would be rebuilding the same old barn that I tore down. I would be acting as a charlatan.

What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn't work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’s man.

Christ’s life showed me how, and enabled me to do it.

I identified myself completely with him.

 Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ.

My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not “mine,” but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.

Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.

Something crazy has happened, for it’s obvious that you no longer have the crucified Jesus in clear focus in your lives. His sacrifice on the cross was certainly set before you clearly enough.

Let me put this question to you: How did your new life begin? Was it by working your heads off to please God? Or was it by responding to God’s Message to you? Are you going to continue this craziness? For only crazy people would think they could complete by their own efforts what was begun by God. If you weren't smart enough or strong enough to begin it, how do you suppose you could perfect it? Did you go through this whole painful learning process for nothing? It is not yet a total loss, but it certainly will be if you keep this up!

Answer this question: Does the God who lavishly provides you with his own presence, his Holy Spirit, working things in your lives you could never do for yourselves, does he do these things because of your strenuous moral striving or because you trust him to do them in you? Don’t these things happen among you just as they happened with Abraham? He believed God, and that act of belief was turned into a life that was right with God.

Galatians 2 and 3 The Message

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

That is the message of grace. And I've never seen it so clear. I've scorned this message by treating it like an elementary concept. But it's the whole message. We find ourselves stuck in the same sin or sinful tendencies and were wondering why we haven't overcome it. And people tell us we need more rules, more boundaries, more self-discipline. But that is the same thing as saying the answer is the law. Every thing, every question, finds its answer in grace. And I think that scares people. It feels unnatural to live a life without rules. 

We did not receive the message of grace to turn back to the principles of the law. 

The law won't save us. Trying to self discipline and rule our way into righteousness will not save us. The message of grace is what saves us. Living under the law can produce results, and that is tempting, but it doesn't mean that is what God desires. 

The law can produce results, but it can't produce life.

His spirit produces life. His spirit also produces results, but results that comes from rest in him and trust in his finished work on the cross. Not from our moral striving. Let's be honest though...not striving, that seems lazy, boring, and unproductive. 

I've strived my whole life, emotionally and physically. No one had to teach me that. Circumstances taught me that. You strived to survive. I started working at fifteen. I emotionally pushed my way through my parents' divorce, a friend's suicide in high school, petty highschool crushes, petty highschool drama. I've strived to make good grades, to excel in debate, newspaper, whatever I was in. I was by every account productive. 

"but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise" 1 Corinthians 1:28

What the world sees as unproductive and foolish, the Lord sees as life producing and wise. You can't use the wisdom of the world to operate in the kingdom of God.

"I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." John 15:5

There is no striving. Only resting and trusting in him. That's why the bible says we are the branch and he is the vine and we are only to abide in him so HE can produce life through us. He is the one with the roots, with all life producing power, and his life flows through us. That is grace. 

We did not strive to get to Jesus. And maybe because of that we feel like we owe it to him to strive now. Like "aw man you're really doing me a favor here, saving me and all. I won't make you regret it"

As if we could! We are his children. He saw us before the foundation of the world. He knit us together in our mother's womb. Knowing the things we would do and struggle with. Jesus didn't die for an unknown people. He knew all of us individually and personally. He died knowing his death would save you, would save me.

We know that it was because of GRACE Jesus died for us. But what happens to grace after that. Did grace end at the cross?

"We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus...For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace." Romans 6:4-10

Christ's death and resurrection united us with him. The bible talks about our bodies being a temple. Our bodies were a place where sin and darkness could abide and rule. But when we accepted Christ, the light invaded our temple. Where there is light, there cannot be darkness. So now His Holy Spirit is what resides in our temple. Sin has no dominion, no say, in our lives. Christ is literally the ONLY thing that can define us.

Can we make mistakes. Sure. But our sins can never become our identity again. We can't call ourselves sinners because God doesn't see us that way anymore. When we accept what Christ did on the cross, when we invite him in, we become one with Christ. He takes up residence in us. So when God looks at us, he doesn't see us, he sees Christ! Is Christ a sinner? Heck no. 

He died the death we deserved, so we could live the life he deserved.

That is grace.

Grace after the cross is Christ saying, "No matter the mistake, you are still mine. No matter the mistake, you are still a daughter. No matter the mistake, I still see you as perfect, as holy, as dearly loved. No matter the mistake, you still get to walk in freedom and love and security. No matter the mistake, I am covering you with my body, with my blood. No matter the mistake, you still get to walk in the freedom I won for you." That's grace. That is our grace.

That's why Paul says "I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me"

That kind of grace is what changes us. That grace allows us to identify ourselves with CHRIST, the perfect one! That grace is what empowers us to walk in righteousness. When we come from a place of identity (I am righteous because of Christ) then sin becomes an easy feat. It's easy to defeat something we don't believe defines us. It's easy to defeat something that Christ has already overcome.

Instead of...I am a sinner how do I overcome all this sin in my life. 

How can you defeat something you believe defines you?

There is a HUGE difference between those two perspectives. One focuses on us, and how we can overcome. The other focuses on God and what God has overcome. God wants us to learn and lean into this grace.

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly."- Matthew 11:28-30

If you want to overcome, stop trying to overcome. The battle is already won. The problem is not that you should be doing more to strive. The problem is you're not resting in him. The problem is you lost focus on the cross and what it did for you, what it WON for you. 

He says all you need to do is abide. Abide in his grace. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. It's not lazy. It's not unproductive. It's not unfruitful. It is the reality of grace. It is what he desires for you. It is the way of the kingdom.