Discovery of Grace

Ludmila Petrina, Kyiv, Ukraine 

Every morning, as we wake up, we praise God for His boundless grace. It may seem paradoxical, given that in Ukraine, where we live, the most dreadful war in Europe since World War II is raging: thousands of civilians and children are perishing, horrifying tortures unfold in occupied territories, entire towns are erased by bombings. Yet, in the midst of these harrowing trials, the spiritual view of the incredible grace and mercy of God to those who seek Him with all their hearts is sharpened.

What is Grace? In Greek, it is charis; in Latin, gratia -- in Christianity, it is a supernatural gift from God, granted to rational beings (humans) for their eternal salvation. 

Grace is the good that the Lord gave us out of His mercy and eternal love for humanity, aiming to save us, for Christ died for us when we were sinners.

Grace is the foundation of faith, the basis of our salvation. 

Romans 5:12 "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand." 

Romans 3:24-26  “and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.”

Faith is our response to God's grace, much like our good deeds can be a response of gratitude to God’s grace. However, our good deeds cannot increase the flow of God's grace towards us; salvation cannot be earned through them. (Romans 11:6 "And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.) Good deeds can be a manifestation of Christian love for one's neighbor.

Grace is a manifestation of the perfection of the Creator, who is implacable to sins, but gives people a chance for salvation and eternal life through the suffering and crucifixion of Christ, which gives us access to the grace of God's forgiveness.

The way to eternal life lies through awareness of the value of God's grace, which grows faith in the soul of a person, and faith prompts us to do things pleasing to God: to repent of our sins (Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God"), to accept Christ as Lord of our lives, to be baptized, thus participating in Christ's crucifixion, his death for sins and resurrection to new life; to strive to live in righteousness and harmony with God's word, with His commandments and our consciences.

The fact that we are in God's grace does not mean that we can live and act according to the values and whims of this sinful world:

 “What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin — because anyone who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” Romans 6:1-14. 

We cannot have peace with God, or even with ourselves, as long as our lives reflect the values of this world. We have a powerful force - the Spirit of God, which will help us fight against the sin and temptations of the world: Romans 8:9 "You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you."; Romans 8:26 "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans." God did not leave us orphans, but sent us the Comforter Spirit, who will not leave us. God exists in eternity beyond time and lives in every Christian: Ephesians 2:22 "And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.", and this is an extraordinary grace of God.

Awareness of the power of God's grace helps us to persevere in times of trials and every morning, waking up, thanking God for every new day of life, every breath of air, every ray of sunlight, for the sacrifice of Christ – salvation -- to hope for life in eternity.