"By grace you are saved, through faith, and that not of yourself, it is the gift of God."
Well, that's me put in my place. What's needed is trust, not competence, grace not discipline, gift and definitely not personal achievement. Of course as a long time Christian I know all this; as a veteran disciple I know all about following and the daily obedience of taking up the cross; like a long term prisoner I'm now a trusty, one of the experienced followers, a seen most of it before disciple, a been there done that and learned the lessons kind of person. Saved by grace, yes, absolutely.
But if I'm honest, my recongition of, dependence on, trust in, gratitude for, astonishment and embarrassment at, this scandalously patient, uncompromisingly generous, disturbingly subversive, endlessly mysterious grace which is the gift of God, and the self donation of Eternal Love in Christ, is so far beyond my capacities of thought and emotion, that it's sometimes easier just to get on with life and try to be faithful, and accept my limitations, failures and mistakes as the way it is and has to be.Grace is just too complicated, or maybe too simple.
There is a Pelagian instinct that wants to carry my share of the burdens, and perhaps a residual pride not that far removed from Peter who promised to follow, never to deny or forsake, and whose best intentions tripped him up as he stumbled and fell on the tragic path that led to the High Priest's courtyard. Trust is such a difficult disposition; an expensive risk to take; a reckless commitment with no guarantees; a surrendering of control from hands used to steering ourselves. So that even the act of trust, the emotional and mental readiness to say yes to the call of Jesus, feels like an effort, something we must do, a piece of hard work on which our all depends.
And that's when Paul's words come with their liberating power and we hear the clink and clatter of falling chains. By grace….through faith….not of yourself….the gift of God. I doubt if we ever reach a stage when those words lose their power to contradict our pride, heal our anxious performance oriented devotions, renew with a different energy our frantic, or complacent walking in the footsteps of Jesus. And you know, that's as it should be. For the gift of God is the gift of God himself, promised presence, sufficient grace, love incognito, the goodness and mercy that follows us, with patience and hopefulness, bearing us up when otherwise we would fall.
Denise Levertov, in a short poem, expresses the reality of a life thus borne up, and her words are a call to the risk of trust, and perhaps to the trusting of risk.
The Avowal, Denise Levertov.
As swimmers dare
to lie face to the sky
and water bears them,
as hawks rest upon air
and air sustains them,
so would I learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace.
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