It’s been quite an unexpected experience to watch the church across the globe define grace on their own and decide on their own who has fallen from God’s grace. It happens very often that a church group decides that one sin is greater than another; that sin, in their opinion, is unforgivable; or that one person is completely acceptable because of the lifestyle or sin they are known for. The truth is …. we are not dependent upon the judgments that come from one another – only the judgment that comes from The Most High God.
God extends the invitation to us to clothe ourselves in His righteousness. That is a major shout cue!! “On Christ, the solid rock, I stand; all other ground is sinking sand!” Yet we believe that we would benefit from having some standards and checklists in place. To keep score, we accept the law (or our own set of rules), and in doing so, we unknowingly cut ourselves off from the grace of God. And that, my good friends, is the very definition of a fall from grace. Many believers have redefined a fall from grace as the commission of a sexual sin by a leader, but the truth is that the commission of a sexual sin is just that: SIN!
Sin is sin! My mama always taught me to call a spade a spade.
A fall from grace is a move away from dependence upon the justification of God and a move toward our own self-reliance and self-righteousness. You are declared righteous before God as a result of an act of grace, also known as free and unmerited favor on the part of God as a Christian, a person that believes that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. If you try to earn righteousness in any other manner, you will forfeit God’s Wonderful Grace! Grace is not a condition of our minds or our hearts, but rather the divine act that He does for our benefit. Instead of walking in the freedom of allowing the one and only righteous judge to keep tally, we feel better judging ourselves and others by the law and its works because it is tangible. Galatians 5:4 makes it so very clear … “You who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace” – that is what is in the Word of God.!
For me … it is enough for me to be dressed in His righteousness! He is enough!
My prayer is that we will study the Word of God so that each of us can truly walk according to His will and way and not our own. We are fooling ourselves into believing that we are righteous while all the while stripping ourselves of the only righteousness we can ever truly have. Our ONLY confidence is in Christ’s shed blood! May we cherish the promise that He will dress us in His own righteousness – we don’t have to redefine it; we don’t have to keep score; we don’t have to set the bar. We need only believe.
All my delight is in You Lord
All of my hope, all of my strength
All my delight is in You Lord forever more
Loving Christ - Living Christ 