Grace On Tap

What does a grace-full Christian look like? Or better yet, how does a grace-full Christian look? I have been deeply challenged by Philip Yancey's book, "What's So Amazing About Grace" & have just finished teaching a 10-week study taken from the book. Yesterday I shared with our congregation some thoughts that have been digging away at my inner thinking process.

I have been challenged by the concept that a grace-full, grace-filled Christian is one who looks at the world through grace-tinted lenses. We do not base our Christian life on ethics or rules, but on the basis of a new way of seeing...seeing ourselves as the recipients of God's grace...totally undeserved. Yet He loves us. Love beyond comprehension. The amazing thing is that we can, and should see others in the same way, people God loves unconditionally.

So a grace-full Christian should delight in loving others, as God loves them. There is an excitement in that possibility. It doesn't matter the background or situation, we can love you as God does, unreservedly. God loves because of Who He is, not because of who we are. Categories of worthiness do not apply here. We have been called to be a people, to be a church, where this kind of grace is freely offered, where people come because they are hungry for grace.

That is exciting, and that is why we call our church "The Happy Church." We are learning to delight in loving others, as they are. We are striving to emulate Jesus. He did not condemn, He loved. Then He said, "Go and sin no more." We want to be a place where people can come and be loved. Thus we seek to be a group of people with "grace on tap." Plenty for everyone, and having a ball giving it out...to anyone who needs it.

Now doesn't that sound like fun? We happen to think so.