The Gift of Grace
By Jessica Brodie
Do you beat yourself up when things go wrong? I’ve been guilty of holding myself to extremely high standards—standards I can never hope to live up to—then mentally bashing myself when things go wrong.
“You know better,” I berate myself. “How could you have done such a thing?”
Ah, negative self-talk… we can be our own worst enemies, can’t we? And the sad thing is when we are forced to watch it happen in those we love.
My oldest child is, like many firstborns, a bit of a perfectionist. (As a firstborn and a recovering perfectionist myself, I get this!) He especially hates to be late for anything and gets stressed out at the prospect of being “only” five minutes early.
I come from a long line of chronically late people, so I can relate—I don’t like to be late for anything, either. But my son is even more vigilant about time than I am. He’s adamant that we’re always at least 10 minutes early for anything he needs to do.
This morning, we were a little off our routine because I needed to take my daughter to school for a make-up test. I dropped her off, then doubled back to the house to get him, and proceeded to drive him across town to the high school. But just as we got there, he realized he’d left not only his lunch but his musical instrument at home—two things he absolutely needs for the school day. We had to turn around and go back for them.
He would be late.
He was furious at himself for forgetting and beyond stressed about having to walk i to school late. I tried to reassure him—it’s not the end of the world, everyone’s late sometimes—but he wasn’t having it.
“I can’t believe I did that,” he grumbled from the dark corner of the front seat.
I called the school to explain and ask the procedures (since we’re “never” late, I had no idea if I was supposed to send a note or walk him in or whatever). But the receptionist was incredibly relaxed about it.
“Not a problem in the least!” she said in a bright and genuinely cheerful voice. “We deal with students who are late every single day. He doesn’t need to stress in the least—just walk in the doors and we’ll tell him exactly what to do.”
The relief in my child’s eyes when I explained was almost palpable.
At the red light, I looked my son in the eye. “That’s grace, you know? And it feels really great when someone else extends grace to you. That way, when we extend grace to someone else, we understand what a gift it is.”
(Don’t you love it when precisely the right thing to say comes out of your mouth and deep down you know you didn’t have anything to do with it? It was all just the Holy Spirit speaking through you?)
Grace is indeed such an extraordinary gift! And it’s something every single one of us gets thanks to the love and mercy of our Heavenly Father.
Most of us don’t spend a lot of thinking about how absolutely fortunate we are that we get the opportunity for salvation, that God offers us eternal life through His son Jesus Christ. And yet—how amazing that He does!
We are sinful people who often go directly against what God says. We mock Him, run from Him, and put other things before Him, from money and earthly pleasures to other “false gods.” Yet God still loves us, and He gives us a path to heaven anyway. He gave us His own son, who paid our sin debt.
Because of that, God tells us in Scripture, when someone else wrongs us in some way, we’re supposed to forgive as we’ve been forgiven. We’re to remember the grace we get and extend it to others in turn.
In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus commands, “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins” (Matthew 6:14-15 NIV).
Jesus echoed that in Matthew 18 when Peter asked how many times he should forgive his brother or sister who sins against him. “Jesus answered, ‘I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times,’” (Matthew 18:22).
Then Jesus offered a parable to illuminate why: that of an unmerciful servant, whose master forgave his vast debt, but who then turned around and refused, in return, to forgive the debt owed him by his peers. When he was found out, the servant was handed over by the master to jailers to be tortured until he could pay back all he owed (v. 34-35).
Forgive. Remember the gift you’ve received and offer the same.
Later, the apostle Paul reminds us of this truth in Colossians 3:13: “Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.”
And in Ephesians 4:31-32, Paul urges, “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”
Today, it was just a little thing—the school was so nice and forgiving even though my son messed up and was late to school. I hope he remembers how kind they were to him and extends some sort of understanding, kindness, and grace back to them in return.
Or maybe it will be some other thing. Maybe a friend will turn a cold shoulder, or a sibling. Maybe someone will do more than just be “mean”—maybe someone will grievously wrong him. That’s when it’s really hard to forgive. The easy stuff is one thing. What about the big stuff?
But God calls us to forgive—not just once but again and again.
Be merciful. Be compassionate. Forgive in honor of how you were forgiven.
And while you’re at it, forgive yourself, too.
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