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Grace (Part II)

Tracey Dyck 14 Comments
[See part one HERE.]

[Fair warning: today’s installment got longer than intended, and went places I didn’t expect it to. Read on.]
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At the dawn of the world, mankind enjoyed perfect bliss with their Maker. There in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve literally walked with God every day. There was nothing between them, nothing to detract from the perfect peace of their intimate friendship.
And then they broke the one commandment given to them. That peace shattered. Because God is holy and perfect and cannot tolerate sin, something had to be done. Adam and Eve found themselves banished from Eden, cursed to toil under the sun, destined to struggle for survival.
Generations passed. Each one succumbed to their own sins, and consequences followed.
A covenant was then forged between God and mankind, commandments written in stone. If the people obeyed, blessings would follow. If not, curses would befall them. “Obey me,” God said, “and I will be with you. I will bless you, conquer your enemies, prosper you in abundance. But if you refuse to listen, you will be destroyed.”
The only way for broken, sinful humans to have any sort of relationship with a holy God was to align their behavior with His perfect standards. Read the Old Testament to see how they fared. You’ll see generation after generation circling through the same patterns: a time of following God, and then a sudden, violent tailspin into the morass of humanity. One godly king’s reign of glory, followed by decades of chaos. Over and over again.
The concept was simple. Do good, get good. Do bad, get bad. And so it continued for millennia.
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Until the story we all know so well: the unassuming entrance of a Savior into a world of pain. As someone just as human as the rest of us, yet paradoxically God, He lived a life that completely fulfilled every one of those commandments. On a wooden cross, He carried on His shoulders the crushing weight of the sin of every. single. person. Everyone who had ever lived, all who ever would live–their failures were heaped upon Jesus. The wrath of His Father God crashed down on Him. And He died.
The commands were fulfilled. The law satisfied. Forever.
No longer were we holding to a tenuous covenant based on our efforts and performance. Now Someone had stepped into our place, filling that old agreement to the brim, and replacing it with an unshakeable new agreement purchased with sinless blood. And this new agreement had nothing to do with us.
Don’t you see? We’re not in control anymore. We tried–and failed–to obtain peace with God through our own striving. When that didn’t work, He forged a brand new covenant that no longer depended on us. Rather, it is between God and Jesus, on our behalf. Because Jesus’ obedience was perfect, what flows toward us is never going to be curses and destruction, but blessing and peace and abundant life. Does Jesus deserve to be blessed and healthy and prosperous and full of peace? Of course, you say. Anything less would be blasphemous.
So it follows that we get to experience that in our own lives. Not through anything we did to deserve it (goodness knows how impossible that is to reach, never mind to maintain for any length of time), but because Jesus made it possible for us. He took the curse of the law upon Himself, and gave us righteousness (right standing) with God. Once and for all.
I see so many people balk at this. They protest that this kind of grace (but really, is there any other kind?) gives us permission to sin. After all, if our actions no longer matter, then we can do what we want, and we’re forgiven anyway. Right?
Well, God will forgive you, but your family likely won’t. Your friends and neighbors won’t. The government won’t. Sin still sends waves of destruction throughout our horizontal relationships, even if it can no longer touch our vertical relationship with God. There are consequences for our actions. There’s no way around that. If you murder someone, you’ll serve your sentence. If you cheat on your spouse, you’ll have the pieces of your shattered family to pick up. If you withhold taxes, the government won’t take kindly to you. The kind of misery this causes for yourself and people around you is horrible.
But think about it. Please. Even if this whole post is rubbing you entirely the wrong way and kicking at the support posts of what you’ve always been taught, just stop for a minute and give this consideration.
If this kind of wholly undeserved grace is yours, do you even want to do wrong? If God lavishes such extravagant love and mercy upon you, if He literally died for a chance to have you close to Him, do you really want to run away from that?
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Tell me, truthfully: if I had the capability to come to you with open arms and say, “I don’t care what you say or do, I love you completely and always will,” if I could physically promise you unconditional love . . . would you scorn me? If you knew that you could spit in my face, curse my name, and leave my heart in a bleeding mess on the floor, but I would still love you just the same–JUST. THE. SAME.–would you have any desire to do those things? Of course, being human, you may do those things in times of weakness. But you probably wouldn’t truly want to do them.
When confronted with such amazing grace, I am utterly humbled. I did nothing, absolutely nothing, to merit a drop of this. And yet my Father gives it to me. His Son sacrificed everything so that I may have life. I did not master this on my own or create it with my two hands. He bought it for me with His very blood. Jesus, on my behalf, paves the way to the Father.

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9, NIV)


Is this not humbling in the best way possible?

Maybe one reason we react so strongly to this concept is that it means relinquishing control. It is so much easier to look at the problems in our life and assume that they’ll go away if we just pray more, read the Bible more, serve more, love more, be better Christians. The simplest answer, and perhaps the easiest to live with, when facing unwanted circumstances, is to think we brought them upon ourselves. We’re getting what our deeds deserve. Punishment or reward.

The matter is far more difficult to wrestle with when we consider that we did not bring this calamity upon ourselves–that this is not God’s wrath but the results of living in a broken world.* It’s harder to figure out where to lay blame. Harder to figure out what our response is supposed to be.

*I’m not touching on consequences of our own actions here. Sometimes the crap we deal with is our own fault. When I don’t keep a promise to a friend, or say something unkind to a sibling, I have to work out the consequences. If I gorge on unhealthy food and never exercise, I will experience health issues, yes?
This is part of “fighting the good fight of faith.” In those times of trouble, when shadows of death cross our path, we must choose to trust God’s grace. We must let His truth influence our circumstances, rather than use our circumstances to try adjusting His truth to fit our experience.
We no longer do good in order to earn God’s favor. We open ourselves up to the rushing tide of grace He’s pouring out, and it is this grace that gives us the power to beat sin. The power to do good. Then there is such joy in it, you see!
It is a response, no longer a hoop to jump through.
It is our heartfelt answer to a Love that will take a thousand lifetimes and more to comprehend.
It’s a beautiful mystery, this grace. An unending ocean. Will you dive in with me?
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When Love Runs Red

Tracey Dyck 26 Comments
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When Love Runs Red
by Tracey Dyck
When Love comes down to authored world—
Conceived within a virgin girl,
Laid to rest in bed of straw—
Come to satisfy the law . . .

When Love walks with the least of these
And answers blind men’s searching pleas;
Touches lepers, calls forth the dead,
And finds no place to rest His head . . .

When Love endures the scoffers’ words,
The hatred by His enemies stirred;
And bows to take a crown of thorns,
The cross upon His shoulders borne . . .

When Love climbs up that hill of death
And cries forgiveness with final breath—
When wrath of God on Him does fly
And night engulfs the weeping sky . . .

When Love runs red down rugged beams
And wrongs are washed by scarlet streams,
When blackest sinner becomes white,
Declared by God to be made right . . .

How can our hearts not drown in this?
This flood of grace, redemption’s kiss?
How can we not succumb to Him?
In light of this, all else grows dim.

When Love emerges from the grave,
Makes children of the serpent’s slaves,
The victory won, the chasm spanned,
In glorious light we Beloved stand.
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Diced Tomatoes and Indecision

Tracey Dyck 25 Comments

It was summertime, and I was driving with my family to our holiday destination south of the border. Near the end of a long day of miles and flicker-by scenery and cramped legs, we stopped at Quizno’s for a bite to eat. I ordered my chicken breast and honey mustard sub, and the server started asking which condiments and veggies I wanted.

“Tomatoes?” he asked.

“Yep,” I said.

“Sliced or diced?”

I froze. “Um, it doesn’t matter. You decide.” My brain shrieked, You decide?! You’re ordering a meal, Tracey! YOU decide.

The guy behind the counter looked at me funny, then threw in a handful of diced tomatoes.

Later, I told the story to my family and had a good laugh. I realized the silly answer produced by my travel-weary mind was my default response at home. When miscellaneous leftovers are being divied up for Saturday lunch, or we have two kinds of dessert to split among the six of us, I don’t have an opinion on what I would like. Or I do, but I don’t vocalize it. It’s only food. Let my younger siblings have what they want, and I’ll take whatever is left. It’s no big deal to me, but maybe Miss K prefers brownie or my mom would rather not have that leftover lasagna.

It’s such a trivial matter, but maybe it reveals something deeper.

When I graduated high school and realized that full time authoring was not a practical career path to take right away, and that I needed a fallback career, I was faced with the decision of what else to pursue. (Still working on that one . . .) And as I’ve contemplated that choice over the last several months, an ugly realization has dawned on me.

I’m scared of making the wrong decision.



That branches off into all sorts of other thorny vines. With some decisions, I don’t want to make one displeasing to someone else. Mostly, though, with the big stuff, I’m afraid of choosing anything less than best. I’m pretty confident I won’t do something drastically terrible to my life, but what if I pick something mediocre or just okay? Something good but not BEST?

For whatever it’s worth, my INFJ personality type is supposedly most terrified of his or her life not meaning anything.

Sometimes I wish God’s specific will would be written down, that we could all have a personalized page of the Bible saying where to go to school or who to marry or what to do. (Not really. That would probably be a catastrophic idea.) But you know what I mean? When you’re following God’s principles for life, that makes a lot of things clear, but not nearly everything. Because there are plenty of situations when you have lots of good choices in front of you, none of them wrong, and it’s up to you. Situations where God says, “Any one of these things could be amazing. So go ahead. Pick.”

Which is freeing . . . unless you’re frozen by indecision.

But maybe God is a bit like a GPS. Make a wrong turn, and that thing recalculates. It doesn’t matter how many wrong turns you take, if you keep trying to follow the GPS’s directions, it’ll get you there eventually. God is a God of second chances. And third and fourth and three hundredth chances. And He’s a master at making beauty out of brokenness, at putting purpose into a meandering road.

So I can use the brain He gave me, evaluate each situation (knowing I can’t possibly gauge all the pros and cons), ask Him for direction, surround myself with wise counsel, and go from there.


That GO is an important verb. Not sitting still, forever analyzing and agonizing. Do what you can, then decide. Just decide.

And if you find out further down the road that you made a wrong turn, just know it didn’t surprise God. He loves you too much to let you wander aimlessly. He’ll redirect you. Truly.

The wrong turns are never, ever a waste either. He uses all things for our good.

I don’t want to be crippled by fear anymore. I’ve seen what indecisive people look like in their old age–I don’t want to be them. I want to keep moving forward. It’s a lot easier to steer a moving vehicle than it is to steer one in park.

Decide.

***
I drafted this post a few weeks ago, and recently felt there was something to add, but as I brush it up right now, I can’t find a good spot to insert it. So here’s my little afterword:
I have some major decisions right in front of me. Right now. I’ve had some time to chew on them, to wrestle with them. To, yes, agonize. And to work a few stones out of the soil of my heart in the process. I can feel myself coming to grips with things, making up my mind.
And the old skin I’m shedding likes to latch back on exactly at those moments, whispering doubtful second guesses in my ear.
But tonight I’m making one of those choices, one that sits right. It makes me gulp because of the investment it requires on my part, but it also makes me excited because of what may come of this. This is a decision that sprang up suddenly, leaving me very little time for contemplation. But surprisingly, I have been impatient to make a move, rather than wishing uselessly for more time. Anyway, the choice is made, and all that remains is for me to act on it this evening. I feel satisfied because I decided. And I didn’t procrastinate (much). I just said yes.
That being said, there is another big decision rapidly approaching, regarding school. I’ve had almost two years to think on this one, so it’s definitely high time to move forward. Old fears still grasp for a hold. I choose to shrug them off and walk on. (I shall most likely share how this particular choice goes, once things are settled. So stay tuned.)
Well. I feel like this postscript kind of stole the neat, conclusive ending the original post had! But it was important to tell you how this whole battle with indecision is going in my own life.
What decisions have you faced? What choices are you facing now? Do you struggle to pick a path too, or does it come easily for you?
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Emmanuel

Tracey Dyck 12 Comments

Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. (Matthew 1:23 KJV)

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Emmanuel.


We sing this name at Christmastime. “O come, O come, Emmanuel; and ransom captive Israel . . .” We read it in the story of Jesus’ birth. It is wound into the fabric of this holiday, and yet we skim over its significance.


God with us.


God. Creator of the universe, the One whose words caused a sun to flame into being and a world to burst forth. The One who hung and named the stars, the One who formed a man from the dust of the earth and breathed life into his lungs. The King of all the kings that have ever been or ever will be; the Lord over every lord. A God so big we can’t even begin to comprehend Him, a God who has no beginning or end because He always is. Just a glimpse of His power and majesty is enough to bring us to our knees. This is God.


With. This God pitched His tent among the sweltering throng of humanity. He entered this world in the weakest form possible, in the humblest place possible. He immersed Himself in our reality, in our lives of depravity. He walked the broken shards of our earth. The Author entered the story. Trading the glory of heaven for the constraints of mortal skin, He lived among us. And more than just being here physically, He was with us. On our side. Taking deep interest in us. Piecing our broken parts back together. Feeling our pain and joy and eventually sacrificing absolutely everything for our sake.


Us. Human beings, each one flawed. Individuals with struggles and cravings and skewed vision and inflated egos and world-trampled hearts. Not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, yet graced with the presence of One who was completely man and yet completely God—the Perfect One. He could have shrunk back from our mess, but instead He waded right into it. And His entry changed everything.


Emmanuel—God with us—is the reason Christmas means so much. With this day we celebrate the beginning of what changed the world two thousand years ago. What changes us.

Rejoice!
Again I say rejoice
For unto us is born
The Savior of the world

Take heart
Oh weary soul, take heart
For help is on its way
And holy is His name

This Christmas, remember the Savior who promises to be with you; who is right beside you now. He was born to die so that we might live. Indeed, the manger in which He was laid, contrary to popular belief, was actually carved not from wood but from stone, symbolizing the rocky tomb not far in His future.

Whatever your holidays look like this year—whether you’re sitting around the glowing tree with your family or grieving a loved one or wishing the rifts in your world would mend—Jesus is with you. Never will He forsake you.

Emmanuel. God with us. God with me. God with you.

Merry Christmas!

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