Does God's Grace Have Limits?
You would never ask this question if you have experienced God's grace
You know how one can tell whether or not a person really understands grace? I’ll get to that in a moment. First, I want to emphasize just how important grace is because as Ephesians 2:8 says, ‘We are saved in grace.’
8 For in grace, through faith, are you saved, and this is not out of you; it is God's approach present (Ephesians 2:8).
Now, here’s the thing about grace…you can’t do anything to earn it. The minute you do something to earn it then it is no longer grace. That is how the definition and action of grace works.
Let’s define grace: Grace is a gift of God given to man that man does not deserve. The apostle Paul explains the fact human beings can do nothing to earn grace with this verse in Romans:
6 Now if it is in grace, it is no longer out of works, else the grace is coming to be no longer grace. Now, if it is out of works, it is no longer grace, else the work is no longer work (Romans 11:6).
There it is! Paul says once you do something to earn grace, then it is no longer grace. Our apostle also says that this grace is NOT OUT OF YOU in Ephesians 2:8. In fact, Paul says in Acts 17:25 that God Himself gives to ALL life and breath and ALL. So everything that we have, be it faith, repentance, love, or anything else is given to us by God, therefore given in grace.
Well, now to the purpose of this post. I’ve heard Christians make statements against grace and speaking out using names like free-grace or hyper-grace. This, in their religious view, is a bad thing. In other words, they are suggesting that too much grace is a bad thing or that if we don’t act in a certain way, then grace really doesn’t apply. In essence, they make people ‘do something’ in order to earn or maintain grace because us doing nothing destroys human pride and proves that all is of God.
The argument from Christianity goes like this: Yes, salvation is by God’s grace but you must do something in order to earn it or maintain it. Christ died for you but you must have faith says Mr. Christian. Okay, well faith is a gift from God given to each in measure (Romans 12:3), therefore it is grace. You must do works, acts, or the law some of the religious say. However, Paul says we are saved apart from works (Ephesians 2:9), not in accord with our acts (2 Timothy 1: 9), and apart from law (Romans 3:21).
So does that mean that we don’t have faith or that we don’t do good works? No. It means that God gives us the faith and the good works by grace. He gives some faith now and they are the firstfruits of salvation, not because they did something of themselves, but because God gave them faith. See, its still all grace. Those that are not saved now will be given the grace later. Reference 1 Timothy 4:10:
10 (for for this are we toiling and being reproached), that we rely on the living God, Who is the Saviour of all mankind, especially of believers (1 Timothy 4:10).
I have talked about grace in my other posts so I am not going into detail here. But now, I want to address the question I asked at the beginning of this post: How can you know if a person really understands grace or not?
When people here that God will eventually save all creation, their objection will go something like this: “Oh, so grace is free, really, so I can go out murder children and commit all kinds of sin and God will eventually save me.”
That response above absolutely PROVES a person does not understand grace. I would dare say that the person that says this has not experienced grace. Why? BECAUSE ANYONE THAT HAS EXPERIENCED GRACE KNOWS THAT GRACE DOES NOT PRODUCE SIN, BUT PRODUCES GOOD THINGS.
This person that objects is really saying that he or she is doing something to earn grace and at least that part of it is of them and not God. Therefore, they deny the grace of God because they say it is earned in some way.
The person that has truly come to the end of self and completely rely on God’s salvation through the death, entombment, and resurrection of Christ, knows they can do nothing. All their eggs are in the grace basket.
Therefore, knowing what Christ has done for them only makes them want to give thanks to God and Christ. In fact, Paul says that believers behave themselves because of the grace of God (2 Corinthians 1:12). You see, we behave ourselves because we have grace, not in order to earn grace.
This is the motivation (grace) that God loves. But, in order for grace to truly be the motivator, we must know that salvation is all of God and there is nothing we can do to earn it or lose it. However, once we believe that our actions or behavior earn or maintain grace, then ‘doing’ will always be our motivation. This gives way to salvation and grace by ‘human will power’ and not the power of God.
Rest in His grace. All is of God.