We would
be in trouble if we had to face the enemy or our souls alone with out
His help, without His Grace. In the words of an ancient hymn by
Luther “Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be
losing.” But in the passage we are looking at (Romans 5:1-5), we
learn that we have “access by faith into this Grace in which we
stand” (verse 2). This is a different aspect of grace than saving
grace (Ephesians 2:8,9). The aspect of grace Paul is talking about
here, is the wherewithal to do what without Him we cannot do. I call
this standing Grace, or the grace to stand. Saving Grace is an
unconditional gift. On the other hand we can be saved, yet fail to
obtain this grace to which we have access. In fact, the writer
to the Hebrews warns us to be careful “lest anyone fall short of
the grace of God …” (Hebrews 12:15).
The
Greek lexicon says of the word translated here as “fall short”
that it means “to be left behind in the race, to fail to reach the
goal, to fail to become a partaker.” The thing that can trip us up
in the Hebrews passage is bitterness (verse 15), but there are many
ways we can fail to obtain standing grace. In our Romans passage, we
can fail to receive the grace to “rejoice in the hope of the glory
of God,” and to “glory in tribulations” (verse 3). At the risk
of being overly repetitive, we cannot do this without His help,
without standing Grace, at least I cannot! And as I said last day,
it is about progress not perfection. In other words learning to tap into this Grace, like all learning, is a process. Now our access is by faith (verse 2 again), and since we are at
war, we can be sure that our faith will be tested. In fact James
tells us that this testing is an integral part of the process of
leaning to rejoice in the many different kinds of trials and testings
(James 1:2-4).
Part of what will be tested, is our knowing, our knowing by faith.
In the Romans passage it is knowing first of all that “tribulation
produces perseverance” (verse 3), that is it produces the ability
to stand up under trail. What will also be tested is our knowing that
perseverance produces “character; and character, hope. And hope
does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out”
(verses 4, 5). In terms of progress, every time we stand in the
midst of a trial, we in effect build another brick in our wall of
faith. And as, in the process, this wall gets bigger, we can look back
on the times we came through, and allow hope to rise that (by Grace) we can do it again. And to say it again, the important thing, when we have blown it, is to repent
and turn back into His embrace.
Father,
thank You again, that You who began a good work in us will keep
right on working in us (Philippians 1:6). Thank You too for the
assurance that this is not about being saved (justified) but about growing in Grace. So
Lord I ask You this morning to strengthen us by Your Spirit in the
inner man, and ground us and establish us in Your incredible
multidimensional love, so that we might be filled with all the fullness
of God (Ephesians 3:16-19). In Jesus Name Amen
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