The Freedom of Grace

Funny thing about grace, you can't decide where it goes or how it's offered. 

This is perhaps what makes us the most nervous about it.  

We like parameters.  We like limits - even though we often pretend as though we hate them. We like the illusion of control. 

But grace cannot be tamed! 

Grace refuses to fit into our neatly constructed boxes of who is worthy and who isn't. 

Grace will not stay behind the lines we have drawn in the sand as if to say, "You may go this far but no farther." 

No, grace falls like rain on the hardened soil of fear and disdain. Grace brings life to even the most desolate of places.

And yet, we stomp our feet and scream that it just isn't fair when those who we have deemed unworthy are offered grace. We pout and cloister ourselves as we watch with jealous rage those who have the audacity to dance in the rain, splash in its puddles, and soak in its abundance.

That is the nature of grace.

As uncomfortable as it may make us, we must be willing to allow grace to flow where it may.  

We have a choice. We can either join the others playing in the wonder of grace or shelter ourselves in our hurt feelings from the very grace we desire.

As Roger Miller once said, "Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet."  May we find ourselves walking leisurely in the freedom of grace.