To be like Jesus, I daily choose
To be like Him, His Word I’ll use.
I must leave the world far behind
And in His Word more love to find.
Does my life show His image in me?
Does this world see Christ in me?
If I, my Savior, I would portray
I must live for Him every day.
So every day I’ll spiritually grow
If a Christ like life I always show.
The fruit of the Spirit will show in me
If the image of Christ they ever see.
In a world that needs the Savior; do we show that He is real in our lives? Grace gives me the ability to show Jesus to others in how I live. So what exactly does grace mean in the lives of Christians?
Grace gives us the liberty to honor the One Who saved us
John 1:1 says, “For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” If we look at this verse we can see that the law was given to Moses in the Old Testament before Jesus walked this earth. The law was given to point people to the Savior. After Jesus died, the law showed us we could not keep it on our own and needed the Savior.
He fulfilled the law with His death so we wouldn’t have to keep the law in order to be saved. However, we were given grace. This means that God in His great love towards us richly provided a way out of the law (working towards salvation) by sending Christ to die for all our sins. Christ gave His life as a measure of love and great grace for us!
If you look at the definition of grace in the verb form you will see it means: do honor or credit to someone. Being gracious is a lost art in our world today and one we need to teach our children. When Christ saved me, He gave me new life and I became fully satisfied and ready for heaven. I now stand forgiven! What a rich gift! How can I ever repay Him?
First of all, it was a free gift so we are not required to pay Him back. However, when someone does something wonderful for us, it is an honor for us to give back to them and to be kind to them. Say, for example, someone saw you crossing the street in front of a car and grabbed your jacket to pull you back. Wouldn’t you be so grateful to that person for saving your life? Wouldn’t you want to show them grace and honor? This is how we should be towards a Savior Who died a horrible death for us!
Grace gives us the liberty to live a notch above the law
We’ve talked about being saved by grace. We’ve talked about the law that shows us our need of grace. Now we can see that grace is there to help us honor God and His great salvation and we can do that by living above the law. Does this mean in whatever way we want? Does it give us a license to sin? Many people get confused by Philippians 2:12 which says, “…work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” Some think this is a verse that supports salvation by works but there are plenty of other verses that tell us salvation is through Jesus Christ and faith in Him.
Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.” Working out our salvation here means to persevere in our salvation. It means to be so grateful for our soul’s eternal security that we share this with others and show them the way to Christ. It isn’t possible to show others that the way of the cross leads home while living like the world. Grace allows us to live above the law but to live in a higher standard to show people how free we are in Christ.
Think of it as, choosing to live like Christ did on earth (free from the law while living differently in every aspect of His life) so that when they see us they see someone different. Remember what Peter admonished in I Peter 2:9? “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light;”
If we are then a chosen, royal, holy and peculiar people, why then would we live and look like the world? We can’t share the wonders of our life with Him while living like the neighbor down the street who has no knowledge of God. It is such a marvelous light He has given us and such a wonderful grace we have to show to others His redeeming love.
JOY IN GRACE AND LIBERTY