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Grace Overflowing
The Overflow of Grace
We
not only live in the overflow of grace, we are now the flow of that grace into
the lives of those around us.
by Phil
Ware
“For it is
by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this is not from yourselves,
it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast. 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).
I love
waterfalls.
I love
waterfalls when they trickle down a gravel bed accompanied by the gurgle of
water weaving its meandering path over mossy stones.
I love
waterfalls when they are massive moving monsters of raw power with all the
crash and splash of a monstrous cascade of turbulent water falling off a high
cliff into a seething churn of whitewater below.
A
waterfall provides a sensory overload of sights, sounds, and smells accompanied
by the refreshing spray, mist, and cool that chases its movements.
As
magnificent as waterfalls can be, however, they are merely the places where
water does what it is made to do: flow downhill while refreshing all things
nearby with needed moisture as it carves a channel in the path of its flow.
Waterfalls
are not beautiful because water is asked to flow uphill.
Water in
a waterfall is not compelling because it reverses gravity or changes its
essential properties.
Waterfalls
are not spectacular because water has somehow earned its right to flow,
refresh, and carve its way through rock, dirt, and vegetation.
No,
waterfalls are amazing because water does what it is made to do!
I love
grace.
I love
grace because it enables us to be who God has made, and re-made, us to be.
We can
do what we are created in Jesus to do by being who we are in Christ. We don't
have to earn our way into God's favor.
We don't
have to prove our right to be our Father's daughters and sons. We don't have to
make ourselves into something we are not or never can be.
I love
grace.
Grace is
one thing separates Christianity from every other religion.
We are
given the gift of a new identity and value because of God's love demonstrated
in Jesus.
When we
believe, we get to share in Jesus' demonstration of this love in His death,
burial, and resurrection and are born into God's family.
We don't
earn this right. We don't achieve this new identity. God gives them as a gift.
This
gift is grace. We then live out of the overflow of that grace.
We
become the person God declares us to be as the Holy Spirit transforms us with
the power of God's indwelling grace.
Like
water, we flow downhill while refreshing those nearby with needed grace while
carving a new way of life as we go.
I love
grace.
Don't
buy the cheapened version of modern Christianity that still leaves you
responsible for earning your salvation with all of its doubts about your
worthiness.
Yes, a
true disciple of Jesus leads a transformed life, yet that disciple doesn't live
as a follower of Jesus to be acceptable to God but because God has already
accepted him or her.
Out
of the overflow of this
grace, we do what we are
re-created in Christ to do.
grace, we do what we are
re-created in Christ to do.
God gave her, God gave him, that new
identity by grace.
The Holy Spirit is Jesus'
transformational presence to live into that new identity. That transformed
person lives out of the overflow of grace.
This new person does not live with the
burden of trying to be good enough to be chosen for adoption by God. That's the
point.
Jesus chose to do what we could not do
for ourselves, so that we can become what we are born, and are now re-born, to
be.
Out of the overflow of this grace, we do
what we are re-created in Christ to do. We flow toward him as we become like
him.
We splash his refreshing grace on those
around us as we flow in his direction.
We bless those we touch as we meander
through the challenges of life, people God places around us, and the situations
we find in our paths.
We not only live in the overflow of grace,
but we are also now a flow of grace into the lives of those around us.
I love waterfalls. I love living in the
flow of grace even more!
[H]ow much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one
man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! (Romans 5:15).
Phil Ware has authored 11 years
of daily devotionals, including VerseoftheDay.com, read by 500,000 people a day. He works
with churches in transition with Interim
Ministry Partnersand
for the past 21+ years, he has been editor and president of HEARTLIGHT
Magazine, author of VerseoftheDay.com, God's
Holy Fire (on the
Holy Spirit), and aYearwithJesus.com. Phil has also authored four books, daily devotionals on each of the four
gospels. (Visit
the Author's Website)
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