UNDER PRESSURE â—½ YOU
We may exist in this world, but we won’t have life, without the life blood that comes from the Word. And the word for this month is grace.
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Back in the beginning, in Genesis 6, we read that God saw that wickedness on the earth was great and every imagination of the heart was evil, continually. And it grieved God’s heart that he had made man. He even thought of destroying man…until Noah. He was a man that found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
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Fast forward to today, and we find ourselves living in this putrid, stinking place where the beauty of the earth is still tampered with and contaminated by evil. It’s not the world God created, but just like in Noah’s day, continuous evil has made it dark.
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And just like Noah found grace, God made a way for us to find the same grace. Even when the weight of the world is overwhelming and we feel isolated and helpless, God’s grace abounds over the presence of sin and evil around us.
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Romans 5 speaks about this. Where sin increases; God’s remarkable and gracious gift of grace increases more. And just as sin reigned in death, His grace reigns in righteousness through Jesus.
photo courtesy of Doug Gephardt
Is this grace only reserved for those who are pure in heart and perfect?
Oh, no…
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Noah wasn’t perfect at all. But he walked with God and toward God. We are eligible for that same grace as we humbly walk toward and with Him.
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Why do we need grace? Mostly for forgiveness of all wrong doings, but also grace to live, work, raise families, and to stay true to God. We need grace to rise out of a spirit of fear, as our relationship with God grounds us in his word.
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The last words of II Peter 3 tell us to be on guard, so we aren’t carried away and lose our own footing. And we are encouraged to grow in grace and in the knowledge of Jesus.
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Genesis painted a bleak picture of how evil man had become in such a short time, but because of one man that walked after God, the ark was built and life was sustained in an enormous flood. Quite an amazing rescue!
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It’s really not complicated, but rather simple, when we pray like this:
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Father, like Noah, we need your grace for all things.
We open the deep places of our hearts and ask you to wash us clean
as we are showered by your grace to see your kingdom come on earth…as it is in heaven.