A Year with Jesus

Note from Jesus

Dear Child of Grace,

Paul powerfully tells the truth about where each of you was before grace:

You were the offspring of the prince of the power of air - oh, how he owned you, just as he still controls those living in disobedience.

Many of the people to whom Paul was writing had been worshipping idols, "living in disobedience."

Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome that their prior spiritual failure was not just a problem of too little effort or ineffectual worship of the one true and living God. People had failed even in the proper religion of Israel. No one kept the law perfectly. All, even the most zealous for the law, failed to measure up to the righteous character and gracious compassion of the Father. Paul reminded these Roman disciples that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23 NIV). Everyone needs the Father's grace!

Today's short passage on grace is one of Paul's most powerful statements of reversal and redemption based on the Father's great love:

But God, with the unfathomable richness of His love and mercy focused on us, united us with the Anointed One and infused our lifeless souls with life - even though we were buried under mountains of sin - and saved us by His grace.

You are a recipient of grace. Your Father in heaven treasures you. Your life is now united with My life. Your future is now salvation because of grace. You did not earn it. You did not deserve it. There is no room for bragging about your good deeds because they could not achieve this new life of salvation:

For it's by God's grace that you have been saved. You receive it through faith. It was not our plan or our effort. It is God's gift, pure and simple.

Verses to Live

Read and then re-read this passage. Let the wonder of grace sweep over you. Let the promise of salvation undergird you. Remind yourself of the Father's great love. Remember My great sacrifice. Trust in the transforming power of the Spirit. Then let your praise to the Father flow out of your heart. You are saved by grace. You are alive in Me to accomplish the Father's will. You are made new and empowered by the Holy Spirit.

As for you, don't you remember how you used to just exist? Corpses, dead in life, buried by transgressions, wandering the course of this perverse world. You were the offspring of the prince of the power of air - oh, how he owned you, just as he still controls those living in disobedience. I'm not talking about the outsiders alone; we were all guilty of falling headlong for the persuasive passions of this world; we all have had our fill of indulging the flesh and mind, obeying impulses to follow perverse thoughts motivated by dark powers. As a result, our natural inclinations led us to be children of wrath, just like the rest of humankind.

But God, with the unfathomable richness of His love and mercy focused on us, united us with the Anointed One and infused our lifeless souls with life - even though we were buried under mountains of sin - and saved us by His grace. He raised us up with Him and seated us in the heavenly realms with our beloved Jesus the Anointed, the Liberating King. He did this for a reason: so that for all eternity we will stand as a living testimony to the incredible riches of His grace and kindness that He freely gives to us by uniting us with Jesus the Anointed. For it's by God's grace that you have been saved. You receive it through faith. It was not our plan or our effort. It is God's gift, pure and simple. You didn't earn it, not one of us did, so don't go around bragging that you must have done something amazing. For we are the product of His hand, heaven's poetry etched on lives, created in the Anointed, Jesus, to accomplish the good works God arranged long ago.
(Ephesians 2:1-10)

Response in Prayer

O Father, thank You for Your glorious and amazing grace. Thank You, Jesus, for paying the price to give me this grace. I thank You for this new life of purpose and meaning. I praise You for the power of the Holy Spirit to make me new and empower me to a lifestyle like Yours. I long for my future of eternal glory with You. I praise and thank You. Amen.