Grace - A New Frontier

Can we ever hear too much about God's grace? There are some in the church who feel this is true. They say that the message of grace will give people a license to sin.

I don't know about you but before I came to the knowledge of God's mercy and grace and had accepted Christ as my Savior, I sinned pretty well without a license.  So what is this message of grace I am referring to.

Basically, the message of grace is that God has already punished our sins; all of them, those sins we committed, those we may be commiting right now and those which we have yet to commit. And the definition of sin includes sins of commission (those things that we shouldn't have done) and sins of ommission (those things we should have done).

Does this mean that God has gone "soft" on sin; that we escape punishment for our sins?  Well yes and no.  No, He hasn't gone soft on sin and yes, we do escape punishment because Christ was punished FOR our sins. So, does this give us a license to sin?  I guess it all depends on the heart of the individual.

The bible says "it is the love of God that brings men to repentance". Once we get a reality of how deep His love for us is, only then can we come to appreciate His grace. I don't want to sin against Him. I don't want to treat Jesus' sacrifice with such contempt BUT even with that being said, you can rest assured that I will sin.  THE GOOD NEWS IS THAT THE DEBT IS ALREADY PAID. Woo Hoo!  The bible says, "He who the Son sets free is free indeed!

In this crazy world we live in, there is so much negativity. Everywhere you turn there are negative forces surrounding us, whether it is CNN (constantly negative news-which is attributed to ALL news stations) or the latest buzz at work; the television programming; or all the drama of life which smacks us in the face everyday. We need God's message of Hope and Grace. We need to know that there is a God, who is on our side, who desires for us to live a victorious life and has made this possible through faith in Christ. Not only was our sin dealt with, but our health and prosperity can be found in Him as well.

The word of God says, "guard your heart with all diligence, for out of it flows the issues of life". The word "issues" means boundaries or borders. In other words, our life can be bound by the issues of our heart. If we have a heart filled with gratitude; joy, peace; faith, hope and love. we will experience a life filled with joy. If, on the otherhand, our heart is filled with malice, anger, grief, a lack of trust, etc., that too will impact our life in a negative way. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.

Dr. Caroline Leaf, a "born-again" scientist has studied the brain and its functions since 1981. I'm going to do my best to explain this. Science has discovered that the effects of positive thoughts and negative (toxic thoughts as she refers to them) can be measured in the human brain. In its most simplest terms and under a microscope, good thoughts produce a "tree-like function in the brain with what appear to be branches containing chemicals which, when released in our system, promote health in the human body. Conversely, toxic thoughts produce what look to be like dead trees also containing chemicals that are released into our system and harm our bodies. There is a lot more to it than this but suffice it to say that science is confirming what God has already told us; "a merry heart doeth good like a medicine".

So when it comes to God and his word, I don't think we can ever hear too much of His grace. We need to be encouraged everyday about God's love and provision for us. As we do, the light of His love fills our hearts and out of that abundance, we can let the light of the GOOD NEWS spill out onto others.

Will you share the GOOD NEWS today?