top of page

Your Morning Coffee 08/30/2023

Writer's picture: Colby AndersonColby Anderson

Good morning!


Welcome to your morning coffee! May our Heavenly Father help us to better understand His grace, and how He gives it to us. Father, we do not deserve your grace. And yet you give it! But Father, you do not give your grace without thought, without reason, without purpose. Forgive us, for how easily and how often we profane your grace by assuming we have already received the amount we need. Forgive us for ever thinking we have enough. Forgive us for ever acting like we can take a small bit of it at the beginning of our walk with you, and then living however we please. Father, in the name of your Son Jesus, and by the guiding power of the Holy Spirit, please help us to move away from self-sufficiency and self-satisfaction. Help us to depend on you. Help us to please you. Help us to move towards and into your grace. Amen.


Your Morning Song: "Truth Be Told" by Matthew West


Your Morning Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:9


But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

...


I've noticed more and more that people are talking about God's grace, His love for us manifested in a million different ways in our every day life. We can, or at least should, all agree that we do not deserve it. But He gives it to us any way. But how? How do we receive God's grace in our everyday lives?


Let's start with the same grace that all people receive. In Matthew 5 Jesus tells us that our Heavenly Father makes the sun rise for all people, and sends rain for all people, just and unjust, good and evil. There is the general grace in which we all live. God sustains our world and all those who live in it, giving life to all, even our very breath. We all go to sleep in this general grace, wake into it, and exist in it. And for all who are not God's children, the general grace culminates in the coming of the Gospel to all, the spreading of the hope all could have in Christ, if they would repent and believe.


But what of God's children? What of those of us who have repented and believed? Is there anything more to God's grace than what He has graciously chosen to share with all? Yes. Of course. And today's verse is a helpful look into this special grace that God gives only to His children.


As we chew on today's verse, let us remember well Jesus's terms for who is actually a part of God's family. Anyone who does the Will of His Father in Heaven belongs to His family. As God's obedient children, invited to obey by the work of Jesus and then made able to obey by the Holy Spirit within us, we receive a special grace given only to us.


Paul had been asking God to remove what he called a "thorn in my flesh" and "a messenger of Satan." He claimed it was given to him to torment him and he was begging God to take it away. And how did God respond? He said no. Instead of removing the thorn, God graciously removed Paul's self-sufficiency instead. He said to Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you."


The special grace we receive is an intimate relationship with God in which we come to Him and are formed by Him into who He wants us to be. And God's grace is often, "no." It is often reframing our understanding of our lives, our suffering, our struggles. The special grace that God gives us, that which is sufficient to meet our every, actual need when we actually are in need, works according to God's Will, not ours.


How dependent on yourself are you? How functionally independent from God's Word and Will are you? Do you consult Him in all things? Are you mindful of His Word in all things? Or do you depend on yourself, defaulting to God only in desperation?


God special grace is when He meets our needs according to His desire to become more like His Son, Jesus. Not when He gives us an easier life. Not when He gives us luxury.


And so we do not wake up each morning covered in this special grace, strong and ready to face the day. No. We wake up in the same general grace granted to all. Life. Sun. Rain. Breath. We wake up weak, desperate for God's grace. And when we boast in our weakness as Paul did, we are moving into God's grace. Similar to how the Armor of God is not put on us but instead we are commanded to put it on. God's special grace waits us as we daily move in faith. As we obey Him, we will receive His grace practically. Courage, peace, joy, steadiness, in all things. God's grace awaits us out and about in our day. He meets our needs, as we need.


Wake up and pray earnestly and honestly to our Father, in the name of His Son, by the guidance of the Spirit, and receive the grace of God's peace guarding our hearts and minds. Be at peace!


Work at whatever you work at heartily, as if for the Lord and not man, and receive the grace of God pleasure and delight at the chosen attitude of your heart. Be content!


Love one another as though they were more deserving than yourself, and receive the grace of God's joy filling you up from weakness into steady, solid, sweet strength. Come alive in the strength of His joy!


Slay your self-sufficiency by daily declaring yourself helpless to obey God without His help. And receive the grace of God agreeing with you, and then making you able to do all that He has commanded you to do, and more than you could have dreamed of. According to His Word and His Will.


Wake up. Pray. Work. Love. Submit. Give up any hope not found in God Himself. Let us move according to God's Will.


His grace is waiting.


18 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


(515) 523-1570

©2022 Stuart First Congregational Church. 
224 N Division St, Stuart, IA 50250

bottom of page