Grace
It's the name for a girl.
It's also a thought that could
Change the World...
-U2
Over the last couple of years I've been on a road of reformation. Reforming my beliefs, reforming my actions, reforming my mind. The results of this Great Reformation have been varied. One of the best by products of this reformation has been a rediscovery of Grace.
I started this reformation thinking I needed to be more transparent in my life. Then I realized that instead of transparency, I need to just live in what C.S. Lewis describes as One Room. All my life, I am the same at work, home, shopping or where ever I go. It goes beyond transparency. My Faith, my relationship with my wife and kids, my work, my friends - can I be the same person in all areas of my life? Well the answer was no, I can't. Not alone. Not by trying to obtain the fruits of the spirit through elbow grease and hardheadedness. Not by searching for that some sort of secret formula, as if the Spirit works like math. Around that time I was able to study and teach the Gospel of Matthew to our Sunday School class. I was struck by Grace all over again. Me trying really hard to make everything right was just another form of religion. Jesus didn't care too much for religion, if you recall. I began to study, read, absorb as much as possible about Grace.
Grace dominates sermons, studies, books, songs and conversations in Christianity, but do we really understand it? The big question for me wasn't if I understood grace, rather it was do I live grace? Am I demonstrating grace? Am I applying grace. For example, if my role as a father is to teach my children the nature of God, what am I teaching them about God's grace? Do they look at me as the loving father who has made an effort to communicate with them, to give them tangible demonstrations of my love, to use their mistakes and shortcomings as opportunities to improve? Or do I demonstrate a hard line, vindictive, wrathful father whose love and favor is conditional upon certain expectations being met? The former begots love and growth. The later begots, well, religious-like devotion out of sheer fear. When faced with these questions, I soon realized that I had some growing up to do.
Grace dominates sermons, studies, books, songs and conversations in Christianity, but do we really understand it? The big question for me wasn't if I understood grace, rather it was do I live grace? Am I demonstrating grace? Am I applying grace. For example, if my role as a father is to teach my children the nature of God, what am I teaching them about God's grace? Do they look at me as the loving father who has made an effort to communicate with them, to give them tangible demonstrations of my love, to use their mistakes and shortcomings as opportunities to improve? Or do I demonstrate a hard line, vindictive, wrathful father whose love and favor is conditional upon certain expectations being met? The former begots love and growth. The later begots, well, religious-like devotion out of sheer fear. When faced with these questions, I soon realized that I had some growing up to do.
Grace is what everyone wants. You heard it said that everyone has a God-shaped hole that can only be filled with God. I believe everyone has a soul deep longing for grace, that can only be filled with a grace that comes from God. Karma makes sense when you think about it. It is the logical end result of our fallen nature - you get what's coming to you. But grace is what we want. forgiveness, mercy, love no matter what we have done. Unmerited favor is what we long for. If you think about it, we use the word -or the root word - quite a bit. We are grateful when someone is nice to us. One who is kind is said to be gracious. We give waiters, cabbies and others who perform well a gratuity. We offer congratulations when someone achieves success. We are gratified after a good meal. I like it when i get something gratis. We can use the original Greek word and be charitable and charming. We also use the word in it's opposite meaning: fall from grace, disgrace, ingrate, persona non grata - a person without grace
One of the things that stood out most to me when reading the Gospel was the fact that every conversation Jesus had, he intentionally left a piece of himself with the listener. I wondered what would happen if I fought through my laziness of mind and let grace have its way with me in all that I did. So, I started at home. My prayer each day was this: Let me be the type of father that when my kids think about God, they approach him with gladness and love, not fear and afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing. And let me demonstrate the grace that Jesus showed the church to me wife. That is, after all, what I was instructed to do during my wedding ceremony. It's been a journey. It's been tough. I haven't been perfect to say the least. But I'm doing much better than I had been. Not by force of will though. You can't just summon grace from somewhere deep within you. I can't grit my teeth and love these spoiled rotten kids even if it kills me. It has to come from the spirit and being self conscience that I have the opportunity to share the grace that was freely given to me to the people I care most about.
Next came the baristas, gas station clerks, Wal-Mart employees and call center people. They get enough crap, I'll give them grace. That, actually, has been fun. Now, they still do things that drive me crazy (I'm looking at you Wal Mart employees), and in some cases instead of grace, the most I have been able to show in some situations is neutrality - which is better than pre-reformation me. It's still a work in progress, but the change in my own life has been amazing.
The next logical place to move with this grace has been work. Grace at home made sense, At some level I already love them unconditionally; or as close to it as I possible can. Grace with strangers was different. Maybe because it was because sometimes it is ignored or unnoticed. But, that is kind of what grace is about. 9 Lepers left grace to celebrate, only one truly understood. Letting Christ's grace move through me is it's own reward, and is the very least I'm expected to do. But grace at work, that has proven harder. Because coworkers are some where in between family and strangers. Some are friends, some are not. Some have lifestyles that make my Baptist sensibilities really uncomfortable. And that has been the lesson for me. If I was truly going to live by the example of Jesus and leave a piece of me with every conversation, then I was going to have to throw away some of my old thinking.
The first thing to go was morality. I don't mean I became immoral, but I stopped trying to act moral. We've been lead to believe that if we live good enough at work, we will attract people to Jesus. Here is my theory; Morality has never won anybody to Jesus. Nowhere in the New Testament are we call to be moralists. But Lane, we are told to "live a life worthy of your calling". True, but the ability to do so comes from grace. The problem with "acting moral" is that it tends to lead to judging others. And it leads to separation. We call them "the lost" and "The world". we acted shocked when "the lost" behave like, well, a person who is lost. How many people have entered the kingdom because of my stance on gay marriage? How many souls have been snatched out of hell fire because I was outraged at the levels of alcohol consumption among college students? Well, I'm not sure, but I suspect not many. But I do know this: every soul that has entered into the Kingdom has done so because of grace. I do what I do because of grace, not because of a mandate to be different than "them". Next, I had to stop expecting people to behave like me and just accept them for who they are. And they are broken, flawed, far from perfect, hurt and wandering losers. Just like me. Luckily for us, Jesus is for losers.
Again, bringing grace in my brief case to work with me has been a challenge. I haven't been perfect, far from it. the are good days and not so good. There are conversations where I have to take a breath and make a conscience decision to watch my mouth. It has been good though. But it brings up another problem. Can grace work as a business model? There is a point where capitalism and Christian spirituality clash. How can I demonstrate grace to the nth degree and still make money for my boss? How do I treat people under me who are problem employees? At what point does grace say "you know what, your fired, have a blessed day"? How about the occasional disgruntled employee who comes back in the office days after being let go and creeps everyone out? Is there a gracious way of filing a restraining order? How can I apply grace to, say, contract negotiations? I can easily see where grace is the standard operating procedure as it applies to relationships in the work place, but can it be the business model as well?
I'd love to hear your thoughts. Is it easier or harder to demonstrate grace if you work in a service type industry or own your own business or are an executive?
The thing about grace is that it is more than amazing. It is outrageous and it is dangerous. It upsets the apple cart of human policy regarding rewards and justice. There are times when it simply doesn't make sense, even to those of us who have experienced it first hand through Jesus. And most problematic, it flies in the face of the American Dream at some point. But if there were more grace at work, what would it do for us?
Next came the baristas, gas station clerks, Wal-Mart employees and call center people. They get enough crap, I'll give them grace. That, actually, has been fun. Now, they still do things that drive me crazy (I'm looking at you Wal Mart employees), and in some cases instead of grace, the most I have been able to show in some situations is neutrality - which is better than pre-reformation me. It's still a work in progress, but the change in my own life has been amazing.
The next logical place to move with this grace has been work. Grace at home made sense, At some level I already love them unconditionally; or as close to it as I possible can. Grace with strangers was different. Maybe because it was because sometimes it is ignored or unnoticed. But, that is kind of what grace is about. 9 Lepers left grace to celebrate, only one truly understood. Letting Christ's grace move through me is it's own reward, and is the very least I'm expected to do. But grace at work, that has proven harder. Because coworkers are some where in between family and strangers. Some are friends, some are not. Some have lifestyles that make my Baptist sensibilities really uncomfortable. And that has been the lesson for me. If I was truly going to live by the example of Jesus and leave a piece of me with every conversation, then I was going to have to throw away some of my old thinking.
The first thing to go was morality. I don't mean I became immoral, but I stopped trying to act moral. We've been lead to believe that if we live good enough at work, we will attract people to Jesus. Here is my theory; Morality has never won anybody to Jesus. Nowhere in the New Testament are we call to be moralists. But Lane, we are told to "live a life worthy of your calling". True, but the ability to do so comes from grace. The problem with "acting moral" is that it tends to lead to judging others. And it leads to separation. We call them "the lost" and "The world". we acted shocked when "the lost" behave like, well, a person who is lost. How many people have entered the kingdom because of my stance on gay marriage? How many souls have been snatched out of hell fire because I was outraged at the levels of alcohol consumption among college students? Well, I'm not sure, but I suspect not many. But I do know this: every soul that has entered into the Kingdom has done so because of grace. I do what I do because of grace, not because of a mandate to be different than "them". Next, I had to stop expecting people to behave like me and just accept them for who they are. And they are broken, flawed, far from perfect, hurt and wandering losers. Just like me. Luckily for us, Jesus is for losers.
Again, bringing grace in my brief case to work with me has been a challenge. I haven't been perfect, far from it. the are good days and not so good. There are conversations where I have to take a breath and make a conscience decision to watch my mouth. It has been good though. But it brings up another problem. Can grace work as a business model? There is a point where capitalism and Christian spirituality clash. How can I demonstrate grace to the nth degree and still make money for my boss? How do I treat people under me who are problem employees? At what point does grace say "you know what, your fired, have a blessed day"? How about the occasional disgruntled employee who comes back in the office days after being let go and creeps everyone out? Is there a gracious way of filing a restraining order? How can I apply grace to, say, contract negotiations? I can easily see where grace is the standard operating procedure as it applies to relationships in the work place, but can it be the business model as well?
I'd love to hear your thoughts. Is it easier or harder to demonstrate grace if you work in a service type industry or own your own business or are an executive?
The thing about grace is that it is more than amazing. It is outrageous and it is dangerous. It upsets the apple cart of human policy regarding rewards and justice. There are times when it simply doesn't make sense, even to those of us who have experienced it first hand through Jesus. And most problematic, it flies in the face of the American Dream at some point. But if there were more grace at work, what would it do for us?
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