A NEW AND BETTER LIFE (June 28, 2024)

If you believe your life has been rescued and redirected by a power greater than yourself, you live differently.  One of the most frequent criticisms of the Bible’s teaching about how we are saved is the charge that because grace saves us “just as we are,” we stay “just as we were.”  To some, grace looks easy, unremarkable, even cheap—a gift for those who don’t deserve it. Where is the historic space for human striving, effort, and obedience?   But grace is not a freeze-frame moment that eliminates the potential—or need—for change. As we grow in gratitude for what Jesus has done for us, we discover that our primary attitudes and behaviors are changing as well.  “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another” (2 Cor 3.18).  Getting what we don’t deserve really does produce a better life—one ultimately filled with “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Gal 5:22-23). Nothing will change you more thoroughly than grace.  So stay in it. -Bill Knott