Strong In God’s Grace
You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. 2 timothy 2:1 NKJV.
Wow! This is amazing. In my reading the other morning this verse spoke volumes to me. Prison is the last place from which you’d expect to receive a letter of encouragement, but that’s where Paul’s second letter to Timothy originates.
He knows from personal experience, what God’s ability was like. So he says be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. What he’d experienced he wanted for Timothy.
We are living in the days of the end. There is an outpouring of evil in the world and the enemy is increasingly active as he knows his time is short. Jesus is coming soon to take us home! In the meantime, we need to be strong. We need to be filled with the ability to resist the evil of the world, to serve Him with joy, and be a living witness of His love.
It’s an almost impossible task. But, thanks be to God, there is a way. A great way!
What’s your understanding of grace? Because it is important. We can be strong, in Christ’s grace. Not in ourselves, not in anything of ourselves, but in His grace.
This is how I explain grace.
God’s grace is His ability to do for us what we could not do, and to make us what we could not become. (Adapted from an unknown source).
That’s God’s grace. It’s all his doing, it’s all His power. Our salvation, and our position before God is all a work of grace. There’s nothing we can do to earn or deserve it.
Paul was encouraging Timothy in God’s ability. The spiritual and physical strength we have, is His.
Everything we receive in the Christian life is because of grace. God’s ability. His doing.
- We’ve been saved by grace. Ephesians 2:8.
- We’ve been justified by grace. Romans 3:24.
- We’ve been redeemed by grace. Ephesians 1:7.
- We’ve received strength by His grace. 2 Timothy 2:1.
- We’ve received all sufficiency by His grace. 2 Corinthians 9:8.
- We’ve received our identity by His grace. 1 Corinthians 15:10.
- We’ve received the exceeding riches of His grace. Ephesians 2:7.
This is incredible. Paul is saying in Ephesians 2, that God made us alive, even though we were dead in our sins. God was rich in mercy, and made us alive with Christ. That is the richness of God’s grace, and Paul wants the Ephesian Christians to know this; just how rich, and extravagant, and abundant, and overflowing is the grace of God. (See Ephesians 2:1-10).
Do you and I have an understanding of the absolute richness of God’s grace, His ability, His working for us?
Grace is a huge doctrine, and one that has been misrepresented. It has been misunderstood. God’s grace is not licence to sin, freedom to do absolutely anything we like. No far from it. God’s grace equips us to live in the realm of His blessing, in the centre of His ability, and in the boundaries of His word. There’s always forgiveness, yes, but grace is not cart-blanch freedom, to do whatever the flesh desires. That is a self-driven attitude. But grace is the motivation to do whatever the Spirit initiates. The Holy Spirit motivates, inspires, invites, leads, and guides us so that we live a life of honour to Him and His glory.
It’s all a work of grace. Grace is God giving us what we do not deserve. Mercy is God not giving us what we do deserve. He is full of both for us.
All of these things, justification, identity, calling, provision, strength, peace, redemption, forgiveness, freedom, salvation, ability — are what we could never get to, we could never earn or deserve them; but God in His grace and mercy just does it! That is amazing. That’s good news! That is the Gospel. O thank God for His grace.
But it is more than good news. It is much more! It is phenomenal news! It is unbelievable news. It is out-of-this-world news! This is what God does for us when we don’t deserve it, but He does it anyway. That is just unfathomable. It is beyond human comprehension. We just have to receive it and believe it.
So, Be strong; in the grace; that is in Christ Jesus. There’s a strength to be found, in His grace. In His ability there’s strength for us. All the strength, all the ability, all the power, that we need for life and living, and serving, is found in His grace, in resting, in His ability.
It’s like this.
- The less we strive the more He thrives.
- The more we focus on Him the more fruit He brings.
- The more we trust in Him the more He triumphs through us.
Grace, mercy, and peace will be with you from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love. 2 John 1:3 NKJV.
Notice where this grace mercy and peace comes from. It comes from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the source of this ability.
Nehemiah says, the joy of the Lord is my strength. (See Nehemiah 8:10). It’s not joy itself that is our strength, it is the joy of the Lord. It is God, it is Him in us that brings the joy, which is supernatural. We can have joy in the midst of incredible sadness and amidst the evil all around us, but there’s something in us, the very presence of God, who is joy in us. So it is God, by His Holy Spirit (who is the Spirit of Joy) who is the strength we receive.
We can be strong, in Christ’s grace. Not in ourselves, not in anything of ourselves, but in His grace. remember: God’s grace is His ability to do for us what we could not do, and to make us what we could not become. That’s God’s grace. It’s all His doing, it’s all His power. That’s what we are to be strong in. In His ability. It’s not in positive confession, it’s not in our own abilities, it’s not in our reputation, it’s not in any inherited blessing, it’s not in our qualifications, it’s not in any family status, it’s not in our physical prowess, it’s not in any way of us, but it is all of Him.
What a wonderful place to be, in God’s grace. Here in the centre of His ability. It’s a hard place in some ways to get into because of the battle we have with self. But when we crucify self, and reckon, or rest in Him, His power rises, His ability grows and we find it is a rest of faith, a journey of being in Him and with Him.
What are you facing today? Is it beyond your ability?
This is my encouragement to you as Paul did to Timothy, to be strong, not in and of ourselves, but strong, in God and in His ability.
Cover Photo by Ketut Subiyanto: https://www.pexels.com/photo/muscular-man-lifting-barbell-4720780/” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Pexels.com
