god's Grace

Hello readers, welcome to my heart.  Let's begin. 

The title was intentional.  It is not a typo.  I wanted to talk about this illustration that's been running over in my mind about how we try to grace ourselves outside of grace.  So for the sake of having to explain everything, here's a key to follow.   

Upper case G, is for God and His Grace. 
Lower case g, is for us and our grace. Ready? Let's work.  

So I had this idea one time about why do we always try to grace ourselves outside of Grace?  Here's the illustration. 

So, you're driving down the interstate one night and your car breaks down.  You pull over to the side of the road and immediately pop the hood of the trunk.  Now, even though you have NO IDEA what you're looking at or looking for, you still look.  Or even if you do have an idea, WE STILL LOOK.  We think, "Hmm, maybe I can fix it. Maybe I can save the mechanic or tow truck some trouble if I can fix it myself?"

We do this exact same thing with God. 

We try to grace ourselves outside of God's Grace.  We try to fix things ourselves.  We try to "save God the trouble" and won't pray about everything and seek God for it.  Here's where this is stemming from. 

I remember a season of my life where I was trying to deal with some issues I had.  And for some reason, I was trying to do it on my own.  This literally was my thought, "God I know better than this.  I shouldn't be feeling this way.  I shouldn't be desiring to do this."  And honestly what I was doing was pushing God away and telling Him, no, I'll fix it, I can handle it.  And now I know why.

We're always looking for our own glory.  We, the little god's, are running around so desperatly to be praised ourselves.  What joy it would have brought me that "I CONQUERED THIS DEFEAT!  I CONQUERED THESE ISSUES!  And besides, I have a reputation to maintain, I can't let people know I struggle with this.  I'm supposed to be a man of God, I can't let people know I have this problem."  Right there, wanting glory for myself.  Trying to operate in my own grace, the little that I have and it's temporary.  I think back to Adam and Eve.  Part of their motivation to eat from the tree was because they wanted to be like God. (Genesis 3:5)  And the funny thing, ------we're still trying to do that.  Let me give you a hint.  WE'RE LOUSY GODS.  Horrible. Terrible. 

We couldn't keep ourselves in the garden.  We couldn't save ourselves from our sins.  We couldn't provide ourselves a healthy birth.  We couldn't decide who our families were.  We couldn't decide how we looked, what happened to us, how tall we got, how short we are, how our facial features turned out.  Hahaha, we can't even create a government that works flawlessly.  Man, we can barely chew food without swallowing down the wrong pipe!  We can't even stop ourselves from dying!  And, this is funny.  We'll continue to try to create our own word.  Hey, every time we disobey God that's exactly what we're doing.

"The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so".Romans 8:7 says that we're hostile to God.  Because in our attempt to create our own word with our little god efforts we're rebelling against His word, telling Him that I disagree with it so I'm going to do my own thing.  I can't imagine the slap in the face.  Think of an expert cook.  Cooks a meal for friends and family.  And as soon as he serves it to them, people start adding salt to it. 

"But you haven't even tried it yet." 

"Well, it needs salt." Or they start to add barbeque sauce to it. 

"You haven't even tried it yet."

"Well, I love barbeque sauce."  LOL...funny illustration but I hope it makes sense.  We're hostile to God when we're operating in this flesh get what flesh wants mindset.  And flesh wants its own glory.  Flesh wants to be elevated.  And to even show how sickening our sinful nature is, flesh even wants to be elevated with God's name on it---the Pharisees for example. 

So focused on BEING MEN OF THE GOD, that they forgot the very essence of what that means.  Being men and women of God means knowing you're weak and worthless and incapable, that God has to grant us grace for us to even approach His throne.  Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.  Hebrews 4:16.  


Be vulnerable and transparent.  Remind people that you are weak.  Because strong men and women of God are weak and dependent.  Crazy right?  Check what Paul says.  

That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:10