Greetings to everyone! Today we are in Talk 3 of our series, looking at what is grace.

In our first Talk, when we defined the popular meaning of Law and Grace, we identified that Grace typically means, for many, “forgiving people even though they have done wrong, doing good to others even when they have done wrong to us, overlooking wrongs done against oneself to still be kind and good to the other”. This is the popular understanding of grace.

We have further defined the biblical meaning of “Law” in the second Talk. There are significant differences between the popular meaning of law which is seen at human level, and the biblical meaning of law which covers many aspects from relating with God, to human life, animal life, environment and even the physical creation; all these are governed by God’s law. So, today, in Talk 3, we will look at what is “Grace” in the Bible and in Christian Understanding.

The Basic Meaning of Grace in the Bible or in Christian theology or thinking has the core meaning that is based on the Bible use of the word “grace”. Grace is what God does for us that is NOT based on our merit or dessert. It is what He gives us for our good that is NOT due to our earning it, achieving it, or deserving it.  This is His Grace for us. If something can be earned, that is not grace. If we can do it by our own effort, it is not grace. If it is something due to us because we deserve it, it is not grace. Grace is the thing we have and God does for us or give to us; it is not something we can achieve, not something we can earn, not something we deserve. We can simply say that it is out of the goodness of God’s heart; He gives it to us. That is the essential meaning of grace in the Bible.

The Grace of God is acted out in many ways, in particular three levels. Firstly, Grace is seen as His creation of everything. Secondly, it is seen as how His grace is active even for us in our life on earth. Thirdly, it is God’s grace in term of God’s salvation —how He saved us in Christ. So, three levels: creation, life today, and salvation. We can see grace across these three dimensions in these three acts of God.

Creation is an Act of God's Grace because there were no human beings before He created us and the earth and the universe in which we live. Therefore, we do not exist at the time when God acted to create; we cannot deserve anything, cannot earn anything or achieve anything because we are not there. Therefore, the act of creation is the act of grace because we cannot deserve it, cannot earn it, and cannot achieve it. It is simply given to us by the goodness of God. Yet, out of His own purpose and design, God created us to have a valuable, important and meaningful place in His creation.

Let us pause for a moment to think about this. God could have created us to suffer forever, created us for His own good fun to torture as He likes — all these are possible, but He didn’t do so. Instead, He created us and gave us value, indeed very high value. The Bible tells us in the Book of Genesis that He created us in such a way that we reflected Him, and we are created in His image. We are given an important place; we are higher than animals; we are higher than the plants and we manage them. So, our life has a purpose; we have a role to play in God’s creation. Why did God create us in this way? Why did He give us a purposeful and meaningful life in the midst of all things that He created? We cannot answer that question. And that is precisely the grace of God. He has given us value, purpose and meaning in the midst of all things He has created. All these are for our good and that is His grace.

The fact that the earth in which we live sustains our life and enables us to thrive are all acts of God's Grace. It is absolutely remarkable that we have an atmosphere with the right range of temperatures, the right mix of gases that enables us to breathe and to be healthy. Too much carbon dioxide, the atmosphere heats up, the climate changes, and we are poisoned and we die. Too much oxygen, it can become so rich that burns us up. So, the balance we have is not accidental; it is created by God’s design. We have animal life and vegetable life that we can eat, cultivate and care for, and that can work for us. We have land and sea that can sustain these life forms, as well as our own, with their mineral composition and topography. All these are not by accident but by His Grace.  We deserve none of these; we earn none of these.  They are not our achievements; yet we live because we have them. In the whole universe of billions of suns, planets, moons and astronomical objects, there is not a single one of these that even sustain one single type of life form. But on earth, the entire planet is alive with millions of types of living creatures, from the microscopic to the gigantic, from the coldest to the hottest parts. That is incredible! It is not by accident; it is by the grace of God. Nothing we deserve; nothing we can achieve; nothing we can earn. But it is all given to us.

The entirety of our life in the here and now is based on the creation God has made in which He has given us a vital place. The life we have in the here and now is only possible because God have provided all we need in creating this world.  Even though this life is transient, we still find meaning and purpose in it. It is sustained by the meaning God has given us. Without all the resources of the land, the sea, the animals, the plants He provided, not only can we not exist or live, we can have no economy, we can make no tool, we cannot invent anything.  For all these require the resources He gave us in the first place. Money is made of paper or based on the gold standard; gold and paper are provided by God. Without that, there is no economy. Steel and iron are made from earth minerals. Without these, there are no tools. So, we cannot have economy; cannot make any tools; cannot invent anything, except for the fact that, in the first place, God has created the resources in which we live and all of these things are provided. Then we are able to have economy; make tools and invent things. So, even this transient life is possible by the grace of God. Again I stress, it is not something we deserve; something we can earn; something we can achieve. But it is all given to us. That is His grace.

Salvation is an Act of God's Grace because in sin we have condemned ourselves to face His Righteous Judgement.  Yet, instead of destroying us as we deserve, God acted to save us! Everything God does to save us is an Act of Grace because none of it is deserved; none of it can be earned; none of it is something we can achieve ourselves. Everything God has done for us is an act of grace. In particular, sending Christ to die for us and rise from the dead is His Supreme Grace.  Christ died so that we do not have to die a death we deserve.  He rose from the dead to give us Eternal Life, a life we do not deserve. We shall expand of God's Supreme Act of Grace in Christ in our later talks. In this talk, we hope we have a good sense of what grace means in the Bible.

In the next Talk, we shall consider how Law and Grace may relate with each other. Let us close in prayer. “Father, we thank you for your enormous grace that in sin we can be so blind to death. We often think that we are entitled to everything. In fact, we are entitled to none of these. That is entirely by your grace we have all these things that sustain our life now. We receive Christ into eternity. May we honour you and worship you, for truly You are a gracious God. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.”