Grace

“And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8, NIV 1984).

Ken was sitting on the examining table with his wife in a nearby chair. For five years he had been dealing with multiple myeloma, responding well to treatment, becoming refractory and then responding again. This was his third approach to therapy, with a fairly new drug called carfilzomib.
“You are responding well, Ken,” I told him and then joked a bit, “I don’t know why, but it looks like the Lord just wants to keep you around.”
Ken’s face slipped into a Mona Lisa, deep and gentle smile and, with bowed head, he simply said, “Grace.”

I used to think that grace was all about being saved from my sin. And it is.
But I have come to learn through the years of my life that grace covers far more than my entry into God’s kingdom.
God’s grace also generates undeserved blessings throughout my life. Like Ken above, I bask in undeserved blessing after blessing in spite of what I do, because of whose I am.
God’s grace also produces undeserved patience with my living—through all the years of my delaying His call on my life, through all my denials of His demands, through all the balls I have dropped, through all the sins that still rise up and smirk at my Lord.
God’s patience with me shouts grace.
I am His and He loves me unconditionally throughout my life, not just at the beginning of my walk with Him.
God’s grace is not simply a point of action in my life.
God‘s grace is a blanket that lays over the entire imperfection of my living.

Dear God,
Thank you for the grace that covers each day this side of heaven.
Amen