The Difference Is Grace

Thursday morning I got to the coffee shop early. I spoke to the barista about his upcoming international trip and how I handled my vaccinations before my first trip abroad. Like the fellow at the Chinese restaurant here in town, the barista doesn’t even ask my order any more...I guess I'm predictable (caffe americano and a muffin or scone). I like to eat before the rest of the guys arrive. Talking through Berkhof’s a bit easier when I’m not eating. I opened my Bible. The previous evening we’d finished the Revelation in Bible study. While eating, I turned to Revelation and then Isaiah.

“And the Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come!’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come!’ And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17).

“Everyone who thirsts,
Come to the waters;
And you who have no money,
Come, buy and eat.
Yes, come, buy wine and milk
Without money and without price” (Isaiah 55:1).

(We’d been in Isaiah 54:5-13 the week before while studying Revelation 21:1-22:5.)

I kept reading through Isaiah 55 and came to a passage I’ve quoted countless times over the years:

“‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways,’ says the Lord.

‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways,
And My thoughts than your thoughts’” (55:8,9).

Reading it Thursday morning, though, I realized that this passage teaches God’s absolute difference from us as it relates to the Gospel’s free gift.

“‘Everyone who thirsts,
Come to the waters;
And you who have no money,
Come, buy and eat.
Yes, come, buy wine and milk
Without money and without price.

Why do you spend money for what is not bread,
And your wages for what does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good,
And let your soul delight itself in abundance.

Incline your ear, and come to Me.
Hear, and your soul shall live...’

...seek the Lord while He may be found,
Call upon Him while He is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way,
And the unrighteous man his thoughts;
Let him return to the Lord,
And He will have mercy on him;
And to our God,
For He will abundantly pardon.

‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways,’ says the Lord.

‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways,
And My thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isaiah 55:1-3,6-9).

The Gospel is not natural to our fallen race. Every religion other than that of the Bible is works-based. Even the religion of naturalistic evolution is works-based (the strong survive). We believe we must work to save ourselves or to keep ourselves alive in this world. In this belief-system shared by everyone from the Muslim to the atheistic biologist to the Mormon to the Buddhist, human beings stand in solidarity. And God is utterly different. Salvation with human beings is impossible; only God can save (Matthew 19:26//Mark 10:27//Luke 18:27). This is the context of Isaiah 55. The Gospel, or Good News, is that God does the impossible by freely giving a gracious salvation to those who hear His command to repent: “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord” (compare with Matthew 3:2,8; 4:17; Mark 1:15; 6:12; Luke 3:8; 5:32; 13:3,5; 24:47; Acts 2:38; 3:19; 17:30; 26:20). He freely gives grace: “...He will have mercy on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon...”

God is different because of grace. We think we must earn our salvation, yet we cannot. We fight His offer of the gift, trying to make Him like us in a million different ways. But it’s a gift. A gift we cannot earn. Ever. This is the absolute difference between God and man, and it is a difference we must accept if we are to be saved.

It is Gospel, or Good News:

• “...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, Whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith” (Romans 3:22-25).
• “...the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man’s [Adam] offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned [Adam]. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. For if by the one man’s [Adam] offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.)” (Romans 5:15-17).
• “...the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).
• “...by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8).