My Sin, His Grace

I'm sick of being a mediocre Christian. Enough. Done. And yet, the harder I try to not be mediocre, the more I am average. I fail to see the hand of God, even when it's there in plain daylight. I fail to praise the God whose mercies I cannot see, because I do not see them. I fail to share the news of the Gospel with everyone I meet, and I certainly do not live it out on a regular basis. I engage in prayer as a beggar looking for material gain, and I fail to open my heart to God's plans. I run around foolishly, as a chicken without its head, searching for wisdom and affirmation where I will find none. I value those around me only as far as I think it will add to my prosperity. And I fail to see grace.

Grace. Why is it important anyway? Can't I be a good person on my own? Well, no, I can't. If I was in the garden of Eden, I would have jumped even faster than Eve to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Frankly, I would have no concept whatsoever of a need for God. Yet God has chosen in his infinite love and goodness to bestow upon me an understanding, a hard realization and comprehension, that I need grace. Many Christians like to think of grace as the thing you get once that covers everything. They're right that true grace, the kind that comes only from God, covers every sin. But there is a process in salvation that reformed theologians call sanctification. Sanctification is that level of grace that keeps giving and giving and giving. The more you know the depths of your sin, the more grace you realize you have been given. And, paradoxically, the more grace you are given, the more you realize the depths of your sin, and your absolute need for a Savior.

So I'm sick of being mediocre. Yet, in the words of John Newton, who experienced grace upon grace in his truly wretched life, "Two things I know. I am a great sinner, and Christ is a great Savior." Today, as you go about your day reflecting on the death of our Lord Jesus, and prepare for the celebration of his resurrection on Sunday, keep in mind his grace, his love, and his boundless forgiveness. May it drive each of us to a deeper need to rise above mediocrity and become worshipers, proclaimers of the gospel, and eager folowers, of the God who saved us all from the pit of hell, and brought us into his glorious light.

Meridian