I Got You!

One of the great advantages in studying grace for several months is that I see grace more in the everyday things of daily living. I see it in the way that God speaks to me through His Word. I see it in the things that Jan does for me just because she loves me. I see it in the enabling from God to do things that I normally don’t do well. I even see it in television programs I watch. I believe that the more we focus our lives on God’s grace, the truer we will find passages like Romans 5:20-21.

Romans 5:20-21

Now the law came to increase the trespass, but where sin increased grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The more I focus on God’s grace the more it abounds all the more, and as I focus on God’s grace it also reigns or rules my life. When I focus on the negative things in life, then that is what abounds and rules my life. This is not about positive thinking; it is about positive faithing (I know that is not a real word but it should be). It is about believing God more than I believe circumstances or feelings.

In John 16:33 Jesus says, “I have said these things to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” There are troubles, struggles, heartaches, failures, and very difficult times as we live in this fallen world, but that is not what we are to focus on. We focus on the truth that Jesus has overcome the world. We focus on the grace of God that gives us His victory.

As I said, even in television programs, I see God’s grace illustrated. An example is in a series called The Village.

The series focuses on a group of residents in a New York City apartment building. All of these people are in some way broken. The difference I see in the people in this series is that they know they are broken. There is even a hint that some of them may even know that God is the solution to their brokenness.

One of the characters is a pregnant seventeen-year-old, the daughter of a single mom. Her father has just come back into the picture. The girl has an accident and delivers the baby early, and there are some complications with the delivery, and the baby may have suffered some brain damage. The girl had planned to give the baby up, but when the baby is born and she sees him, she loves him, and even with the potential brain damage, decides to keep him. She reaches into the incubator and touches the baby and says to him, “You’re not broken because I’m your mother and I have got you.”

When I heard that, I realized that God was speaking that to me and to you. We came into a broken world as broken people. The Bible reveals to us that the world is fallen because of sin. The Bible also reveals that we have all sinned and come short of God’s holy standard. But the Bible also reveals to us that Jesus came as the perfect person (unbroken) and gave His life, taking my sin and giving me His righteousness.

When Jesus says that in this world, we will have trouble, He is saying we are broken people living in a broken world. But when He says to “take heart, I have overcome the world”, He is saying, “I am your Lord and Savior and I have got you.”

Hebrews 4:16

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

The grace of God means that God is our Abba and He has got us.

By God’s grace you and I are:

Loved

Healed

Restored

Redeemed

Renewed

Made Whole

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is “God’s got you!”

In God’s Grace, Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                           Joe