Lessons In Truth - Lesson 11 - Annotation 9
What is the grace of God?
9. The grace of God is His love in action for man. The love of God is equally available to all His creation, but we receive His grace "according to the measure of the gift of Christ" (Eph. 4:7). God gives Himself equally to all, but our response to His love determines how each of us lets this love produce miraculous results in our life. In other words, to the extent that we recognize, acknowledge, and accept God's love for us, we experience God's grace. It is a free gift to each of us and only awaits our acceptance.
"To become recipients of that which the Father would bestow, we should take the element of grace into consideration; that even beyond what we ask, seek, earn, or deserve under the law, God is more than willing to give. God, as the great creative principle of the universe, will always meet us more than half way. By becoming receptive to the 'grace of God,' we receive the measure of God's provision, which exceeds any of our imaginings" (Keep a True Lent 169).
In one sense we may think of grace as being God's love actively working for us at our definite request -- fulfilling all the laws of God, for "love ... is the fulfilment of the law" (Rom. 13:10), says Paul. God always loves us, but His love is ours as grace when we avail ourselves of it in any situation. This grace meets us right where we are, mo matter what our level of soul unfoldment. The love of God is as much available to the one sunk deeply in sin as to the saint, but each must, as a free-will being, call on it -- then is God's love active as His grace. None of us need hold back and say, "I am not worthy," because the fact that we desire to know God consciously, and long for His forgiveness, erases the mistakes of the past and makes us worthy to receive. Like the prodigal son we confess our shortcomings; that is, we turn our attention and interest from them (by denial) and place our thought wholeheartedly on the good and true (by affirmation). Once we have done the work of preparing our consciousness, God's grace opens up a new life for us.
God's grace reveals the beauty of life; it makes us appreciative of good in any form. We speak of a person or a thing as being "graceful" and are at once aware of beauty, divine order, symmetry, and the response in us is one of satisfaction. God's love at work fulfilling the law gives us the same sense of beauty and satisfaction, no matter what challenges life may offer. When we have become conscious that we are under God's grace, compassion, tenderness, joy and peace are predominant in our approach to life. God's grace would seem to bring all the divine powers into clear focus, for it makes us more understanding, faithful, creative, strong, wise, decisive, active, as God's love in us is busy "fulfilling . . . the law" (Rom. 13:10 A.V.) .
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Preceding Entry: Is cultivating a cousciousness of our oneness with the Father more important than demonstrating things?
Following Entry: Should we measure our work by what others have done?
