Amazing Grace
It happened during that cup-of-tea-time after a Sunday evening service where I had been the preacher. A lady approached me. She was nervous, agitated even, and refused to return my smile, preferring to look down and avoid all eye contact completely. Her fingers fidgeted endlessly with the leather bag strap that dangled limply over her drooping shoulder, and her hurried, half-whispered words made me feel like we were engaging in some kind of furtive conspiracy, which, in a way, we were.
She thanked for me helping her to have a moment of laughter during the sermon, something she had not done for quite a while, she explained, still staring down woodenly. She had been taught – probably more by inference than directly - that laughter was a trivial, suspect thing, not appropriate for her and for her kind. Fun was not really a live word in her vocabulary; it had been killed by the pursuit of more weighty things. Why, fun was surely silliness, foolish even, a vain, flighty folly to be firmly rejected in favour of more “profitable” pursuits. As I listened to her faltering words, I wondered how long she has been so imprisoned by such diligent sternness. Surely she had laughed, skipped, giggled, and been wonderfully dizzy and loud as a child: somewhere along the way, a cloud had been firmly pulled over her sunshine, and fun had been taught out of her, laughter legislated against, sent packing.
But during that evening’s sermon, she said, the faintest crease in her face hinting at the dawning of a smile, she had allowed herself the luxury of laughter – and - scandalously – it came during a church service too. She had actually laughed out loud. She had felt guilty, but good. And then, ever so slowly, a tear overflowed from the corner of one eye and trickled down her cheek to her trembling chin, where it dropped onto her hand. But this was a tear was born of relief: she had been thrilled and stunned at the thought that God really did like and love her: it was such a relief, she said. Could it really be true?
Of course, she had long believed in the Christian doctrine concerning the God of love. She could probably quote more biblical texts than most to support the idea: it’s just that the doctrine had never penetrated beyond the solid crust of her belief system, had never launched the so needed long thaw of the icy fear that seemed to chill her heart. She would have died a martyr to protect her conviction and belief in divine love, but had never been able to live in it as a reality; her Sunday morning creeds had never brightened her Monday mornings.
Who was the stern governess who had taught her thus? Remarkably, it was her Christian faith. Her church couldn’t take all the blame; perhaps she was the product of a lethal cocktail created by a stern upbringing, a few bruising episodes of harsh words pummelling her, and a host of other unknown factors had made her this way: but her church certainly hadn’t helped. Hers was the kind of congregation that is, thankfully, increasingly rare these days: a well oiled guilt machine where people gathered each week to feel bad, and feel little else. It was exactly what she didn’t need.
I’m not suggesting that she was typical at all. I bump into thousands of Christians in my life of endless travel, and by far most of them are emotionally rounded and healthy people who know well that they are loved by God, and live positive, joy tinged lives as a result. But I also meet those who are wounded, mildly (or compulsively) saddened Christian people, for whom the good news has apparently not been that good. And it’s not that their sadness stems from a lack of commitment to Jesus – on the contrary, many of them are dedicated stalwarts of the faith - but they are dedicatedly austere, contained people, hopeful for heaven but emotionally corseted for life on earth. Grace is an idea but not a transforming kiss.
Grace is not some magical, yet impersonal commodity – but is rather One of God’s wonderful qualities, as He has chosen to deal with all that He has made with a heart of grace. Our Jesus is the most beautiful person who has ever been, and ever will be: God Himself. Grace is not some vague, wishy-washy sentiment that prints us a licence to immorality, casual living and self-centredness. On the contrary, grace is an invitation to a Jesus centred, noble lifestyle that sees through the deceptive con-tricks of temptation and sin, brushes aside the pushy condemnation of shame and false guilt, and chooses to adopt the posture of a servant. In short, we need to declare war on “ungrace”, which can build new Berlin-type walls between us and God, between friends. God wants to touch and impact us with His grace as we continue our journeys.
We live in a world loaded with sacramental fingerprints: God is to be encountered in bread and wine shared, but in a host of other ways He wants to place his hand upon us. We need to challenge our breathless living, hurtling along as we do in what Bob Dylan describes as “the fury of the moment”. Most of live under the shadow of a mountain of emails, to do lists, phone calls to make, chores to complete. We need to consider our need to take our feet off of the accelerator, so that grace might be noticed.
And grace is not by any means just about us: it is a planet shaking force that flows from God’s heart. Graceless and godless living is destroying our planet at a pace unparalleled by any ecological threat. Yet unwittingly the world stands on tiptoe waiting for the good news. The world, Philip Yancey says, is thirsty for grace. Our culture is increasingly stained by a million smears of ungrace, as our streets are marred by incessant spewing of crass language, by ignitions of road rage, by violence and disrespect and day to day unkindness. Ultimately, the only answer is found in the One who is filled with grace and truth: the living Lord Jesus Christ.