I am kind of a black and white guy. And it is exacerbated by the simple fact that I do not find filters helpful. They may make the person feel better that you are talking to but they tend to cloud the issue at hand. So often I am told I am simply “blunt.” (My attempt at filtering “hard things” makes me uncomfortable and probably does nothing to help the party I am speaking to!)

Lately I am seeing some painful things happen. Much of this is founded on a lack of understanding of grace. Selfishness and self-centeredness is the antithesis of grace. Grace causes you desire to move ahead touching others with the goodness you have received.I find that most people make the bad decisions they do for two reasons.

1. They do not give themselves the opportunity to unravel the faulty thinking of the past and push ahead thinking it will fix itself.
2. They do not allow the grace of God and the fruit of consistent loving relationships help shape their lives.

In the midst of much grace, I see a number of people resorting to the rules of the past and adding “addendums” to the goodness of grace. (The fact that there is much grace tells you the nature of what is happening. Romans 5:20)

If the full measure of grace that has been given to you is not poured out into you relationships, your spouse, your children, your friends, you probably do not know the depth of His love and plumbed the grace. Paul might even suggest you have been bewitched. Galatians 3:1-9

The concept of grace is easier than we try to make it. And when grace is served up it leaves us with three responses.

1. We accept it and are thankful for how good it is. We bask in the goodness of it and allow it to shape us.
2. We struggle with what it is and feel the need to make it more complex, adding rules to make it fit a human existence, failing to see the fullness of it through the eyes of heaven.
3. We call it the reason we do all that we do, leaving others in our wake of selfishness.

The first is actually the “plan” of heaven when we encounter the grace of God or the person of grace being Jesus. It is at that place we flow in what He is doing. We recognize the great gift we have received and our desire is to pour it out on all. Without measure ore restraint. I find the person doing this never “loses.”

The second is the product of an un-renewed mind that is struggling to accept the goodness of His grace. The person in this place is back and forth in their thinking, second guessing decisions, always wondering about His goodness. “Will it last” is a theme that takes up residency in their mind. It is bewitchment that causes you to think you could pay back the gift of God with anything. It is only when you relinquish this mindset that freedom enters in.

It is also this thinking that unravels so many relationships. The spouse who thinks, “If I am nice to them what is in it for me?” will not “win” what they desire to have. Rules are a poor relationship maker. The parent who bemoans their child’s troubled day as they “break all the rules.” Rules? Where is grace is the midst? (There are many great books that will help you with this.) It is here that most relationships falter and fall. Withdrawal from others,(Too often rooted in selfishness.) broken relationships, scattered children and divorce are frequently symptoms of the rules that rule!

The third deals with what I can only call the mindset of selfishness. The idea that “because I am free I can do whatever I want.” Okay, if I agree with you, I can tell you in advance the consequences will not be pretty. You will soon become disenchanted. You can dress, act, talk anyway you want. I agree that freedom is free. But at some point you recognize you are trying to eat from a tree that is gone (The tree of good and evil.) and it is affecting your life. You can be in or out of relationships, work or not work the way you choose and act the way you please.  But that really is a form of legalism. Let me tell you that grace is not the guardrails of the road of life but the power to keep the car in the lane on the road. Using grace as guardrails is like taking your shiny new car and caroming from side to side, denting, breaking and bending the beauty of what you have. LEARN TO DRIVE! You would say. Grace is like that.

False grace(legalism), the guardrail kind, is not grace at all but a spiritual position that works against the goodness of God, and the law of life and liberty. Some might deem it lawlessness. My only reason for even using that word is that there is a biblical principal that uses the Greek word “anomia.” It speaks of the “substitution of the will of self.” As a believer in the finished work, I recognize the conflict that occurs when we look at Romans 12:1-2, in an area we call the “renewing of the mind.” It is here we see the battle.

My heart is that each would give themselves over to the care of God’s grace. Not wavering in our acceptance of it or our operation in it. That we would see the end of goofiness so often a continuing expression of self-centeredness, that we would see the fruitfulness of grace and that we would embrace life as He has shown us.

It is honor to Him and to one another when we walk in the grace that has been given to us.  Psalm 133