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).

7 Abominations on a Monday Morning

“He that hateth, will counterfeit with his lips, but in his heart he layeth up deceit. Though he speak favorably, believe him not: for there are seven abominations in his heart. Hatred may be covered by deceit: but the malice thereof shall be discovered in the congregation” (Proverbs 26:24-26, Geneva Bible).

One of the results of being gathered into a group is that our inner nature is eventually brought out. In the Church we are shown to be servants or power-hungry, no matter what flattery or smiles we use. Our actions and motivations will be shown. This is one of the reasons God commands us to congregate with people who are different from us in race, socio-economic status, education, entertainment preference, etc., finding our unity in a common confession of the faith alone. God uses our differences in unity to expose us for what we really are as we interact with one another in the gathering of the Church. Those who cannot tolerate this nakedness will either be increasingly shamed in this nakedness (I’m still – after twenty years – reminded of Anne Rice’s description of vampires: they don’t change, they just become more of what they are) or will depart from the congregation of people different than themselves (the more we build a congregation on elements outside the confession – or refuse to be unified by confession – the less accountability there is as we build a group of people very much like ourselves by non-confessional standards).

God commands His children congregate in Him so that the non-Him elements in the members of the congregation are revealed for what they are...so that we may grow past them together.

I am struggling in this area of discipleship this morning. I’m on my third night of sleep deprivation, taking care of little ones in their illness. My bride leads a ladies’ class on Monday mornings, so I prepared a healthy breakfast for the children. While they were eating, I mixed some green chile in with an egg and threw it on the griddle for myself. Just before I put the mixture on a tortilla, the youngest gagged and vomited forth his banana, apples, milk, and honey-bun mixture (okay, the breakfast was mostly healthy). I remained calm in this, but I confess it was a fake calmness. In my heart, I was yelling, “what?! I don’t get to sleep or eat?!” Mess cleaned quickly for the benefit of the other children. Little one bathed and re-dressed. I took out my inner anger on the now-unappealing meal, throwing it away with more aggression than necessary (out of sight of little ones). Grrrrrr...deep breath. Lord, I am an impatient man. I can fake it so many times, but I am impatient deep down...sometimes to the point of feeling pretty unloving toward folks who trigger that impatience. I am a sinner in need of a Savior at every moment, and being around people who aren’t as enlightened and perfect (read heavy sarcasm here) as I am shows this very clearly.

It may not be vomit, but being in the gathered Church means that people will do things around me and say things to me that trigger my inner un-Christlikeness very quickly. It’d be easy to leave them and identify with a group of people as awesome as myself, but I wouldn’t grow there...except in the area of my own self-worship and self-righteousness. I need you to show me to be what I am, that I may be thrown more and more upon God’s mercy and grace in Christ and molded by the Spirit into the image of the One Who loved me and gave Himself up for me. I cannot do that alone, and I cannot do that with those who are more or less clones of myself. What I am will be discovered in the congregation, that I may be conformed to the image of the Son.

On Monday mornings and many other times, there are seven abominations in me that I will never be rid of apart from the Spirit’s means of exposing them and excising them from my being: the gathered Church.