In 1910, Julia Johnston wrote the lyrics to the hymn “Grace Great Than Our Sin” that speak of the matchless grace of God. I remember singing it as a child but the significance of the words was lost on me. It was not until later in life and long into my journey of faith that I began to understand the reality of God’s great grace and its impact on my life.
Marvelous grace of our loving Lord,
grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt,
yonder on Calvary’s mount outpoured,
there where the blood of the Lamb was spilt.
Marvelous, infinite, matchless grace,
freely bestowed on all who believe:
you that are longing to see his face,
will you this moment his grace receive?
Grace, grace, God's grace,
grace that will pardon and cleanse within;
grace, grace, God's grace,
grace that is greater than all our sin.
– Lyrics by Julia H. Johnston and music by Daniel B. Towner
This marvelous grace is one of God's most endearing and deeply appreciated attributes. A. W. Tozer describes grace as “the good pleasure of God that inclines Him to bestow benefits upon the undeserving” (A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy). Without God’s grace, His love would be unavailable to us, because He is holy and, as sinners, we are worthy of His wrath, not His compassion and beneficence.
Yet, at the heart of the gospel message is the wonderful story of God’s grace, showered upon the undeserving.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. – Ephesians 2:8-9 ESV
My grace is all you need. – 2 Corinthians 12:9 NLT
For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people. – Titus 2:11 NLT
But grace is not a New Testament doctrine. From the pages of the Old Testament, we read of the eternal nature of God’s grace and mercy toward His children.
“The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin…” – Exodus 34:6-7 ESV
Tony Evans describes God’s grace as “His inexhaustible supply of goodness by which He does for us what we could never do for ourselves” (Tony Evans, Theology You Can Count On). A much older, but no less accurate definition comes from the pen of Abraham Booth: “It is the eternal and absolute free favor of God, manifested in the vouchsafement [favor] of spiritual and eternal blessings to the guilty and the unworthy” (Abraham Booth, The Reign of Grace, 1793).
Grace is a gift of God that flows from His very nature. God is gracious and makes His grace available to the undeserving because of who He is, not because of anything we have done. His grace is unmerited, unearned, and completely undeserved. No one can ever say to God: “You owe me!”
A. W. Tozer puts it this way: “Divine grace is the sovereign and saving favor of God exercised in the bestowment of blessings upon those who have no merit in them and for which no compensation is demanded from them” (A. W. Tozer, The Attributes of God). The apostle Paul clearly understood the amazing nature of God’s grace.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God… – Ephesians 2:8 ESV
Just as God’s love is made available through His grace, so His love makes it possible for Him to display grace. These two marvelous attributes go hand in hand and one cannot exist without the other. It is because of love that He extends His grace. The apostle Peter reminds us, “…we are all saved the same way, by the undeserved grace of the Lord Jesus” (Acts 15:11 NLT). The apostle Paul expands on that thought by adding that we “are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Romans 3:24 ESV). A. W. Tozer provides us with further insight into the one-sided nature of God’s grace. It flows in one direction, from our gracious God to a world of undeserving sinners.
“…it is the favor of God shown to those who not only have no positive deserts of their own, but who are thoroughly ill-deserving and hell-deserving. It is completely unmerited and unsought, and is altogether unattracted by anything in or from or by the objects upon which it is bestowed. Grace can neither be bought, earned, nor won by the creature.” – A. W. Tozer, The Attributes of God
All of this seems to run counter to our human understanding of how things should work. We have been raised to believe that you don’t get something for nothing. To put it another way, there is no such thing as a free lunch. You only get what you deserve or what you have legitimately earned. And while modern society seems to have run amuck with the idea of entitlement, we all know that earning and effort go hand in hand.
But not with God. God owes us nothing. He is beholden to no one. The apostle Paul, quoting from the book of Isaiah, asks the rhetorical question: “…who has given a gift to him [God] that he might be repaid?” (Romans 11:35 ESV). Then he adds that the flow of God’s grace is one-directional. “For from him and through him and to him are all things” (Romans 11:36 ESV).
It is important to understand that the goodness of God is only accessible to fallen mankind through the grace of God. Romans 3:23 reminds us that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” and Romans 6:23 provides us with the non-negotiable consequences of man’s sin: “the wages of sin is death.”
God’s justice and righteousness require that He condemn and pronounce judgment against all sin. He cannot leave sin unpunished and still remain holy and just. But in His divine wisdom, God chose to provide undeserving men and women a means by which they could be made right (justified) with Him.
God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. – Romans 5:8 ESV
God will also count us as righteous if we believe in him, the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was handed over to die because of our sins, and he was raised to life to make us right with God. – Romans 4:24-25 NLT
Tony Evans writes, “…grace means giving a person something he doesn’t deserve” (Tony Evans, Theology You Can Count On). Because of sin, all men deserve death. But in His grace, God gives men the opportunity to experience forgiveness for their sins and eternal life in place of death and eternal separation from Him. This amazing grace is available only through faith in God’s Son. Centuries before it happened, Isaiah prophesied about this marvelous expression of God’s grace.
…he [Jesus] was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. – Isaiah 53:5 NLT
As another old hymn of the faith points out, Jesus’ death was an expression of God love and grace that made possible our right standing with Him.
Jesus paid it all,
All to him I owe
Sin had left a crimson stain
He washed it white as snow – Elvina M. Hall, 1865
Without the grace of God, every man and woman who has ever lived would stand before God as “a sinner condemned, unclean.” Yet, in 1905, Charles H. Gabriel penned the words to the hymn, “My Savior’s Love,” providing us with a timeless reminder of just how amazing God’s grace really is.
I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus, the Nazarene,
and wonder how he could love me,
a sinner, condemned, unclean.
How marvelous, how wonderful!
And my song shall ever be:
How marvelous, how wonderful
is my Savior’s love for me!
But God’s grace extends beyond the point of our salvation. It shows up in the everyday affairs of life, providing God’s children with the power to live the life He has called them to live. Each day, we must rely on His undeserved grace to experience the joy, contentment, peace, and power He has promised. At no point are we to fall back on our own strength or to live as though our spiritual growth is somehow up to us. Our salvation was based on grace and the same is true of our sanctification. We cannot grow to be more like Christ through self-effort. In fact, it requires death to self. It demands that we give up any hope of transforming our lives by our own power. We cannot earn God’s favor. We cannot score brownie points with God. But we can rest in His amazing grace and rely upon the power of His indwelling Spirit.
The author of Hebrews would have us remember that grace is a gift from God and, if we want to enjoy it, we must always go to the source of it.
So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. – Hebrews 4:16 NLT
James would add that humility is a non-negotiable prerequisite for those who desire to experience the ongoing gift of God’s grace.
God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. – James 4:6 NLT
English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
New Living Translation (NLT)
Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.