Grace Alone

 February 22, 2022

St. Paul’s letter to the church in Galatia (located in the center of modern Turkey) begins and ends with grace.

“Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ…Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen.” —1:3 and 6:18

In between these two verses, Paul points to the catalyst that activates grace within us: faith. Grace is God’s heart attitude towards us sinners, his unfailing love and favor to those who deserve it least. The problem is, if I don’t believe in that favor, it becomes impossible for that grace to engage my soul. 

God’s grace is to us and for us (1:3-6) to the end that we be delivered from “this present evil age” (He doesn’t pull any punches in describing our world. It is no friend to the Christian). But we easily turn from grace to works, abandoning the only means of salvation there is in the futile hope that we can justify our behavior and pat ourselves on the back for the effort made.

How easily I speak of grace; how hard it is to truly believe and live in it. I want to feel I’m contributing something to my salvation, that my efforts make a difference. And when I fail, I feel like I ought to be punished for that failure. We’ve been taught (rightly so, I might add) that if we do good, we are rewarded, and if we do bad, we’re to be punished. This mindset, and the system of law and justice behind it are what make life in society work. But on the personal level, it can be destructive.

 It’s always tempting to turn to the works of the flesh (as Paul calls them) for salvation. We try harder, make promises, but the flesh can only produce fleshly results, ending in the sad list of 5:19-21. 

“Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

These are the inevitable result of abandoning grace, and their presence in our lives are proof positive that we have done so. Grace alone saves. Only grace saves.