As many of you know by now, I was raised in the Church, as was Shellby. I grew up a Pastor's Kid, and experienced the highs and lows associated with that. During that time, there was a lot taught to me about the fact that I've been saved by grace through faith, but that was essentially as far as we took it.
When people lived life in a way that didn't line up with the scripture, the assertion was often that they weren't doing enough in order to live their life in the right way.
Whether this was the goal or not, this created a picture, a concept, in my mind as a teenager and young adult that grace was what it took to get saved, but that was as far as it went. Grace was enough to save you, but once you were saved, the onus was on you to maintain your salvation. Saved by grace, maintained by works.
The only trouble was, the more I seemed to work, the harder maintaining my salvation seemed to be. There were always new things to be learned, new i's to dot and t's to cross, and God forbid I missed the mark in one small area - be it my confession, love walk, honoring my parents - if I failed in any one of 100 different spots, that could be the difference between seeing my prayers answers and what I was believing for come to pass or being left waiting...but thankfully, that isn't how God views the situation.
Colossians 1:17 tells us that God is before all things and in Him, all things consist. Literally that He is the One who holds and sustains all things.
There's a picture being painted here in this letter is what John Wesley referred to as Sustaining Grace. In fact, a Wesleyan understanding of Grace states that, "God's grace remains steadfast, ever blessing, sustaining and beckoning us toward wholeness and salvation."
This is the picture of grace that I've begun to grasp over the last 9 years more and more...a picture of the grace of God that is constantly at work in us. A grace that has performed the work of salvation inside of us but still is perfecting us, sustaining us, growing us, driving us onward in Christ.
Grace that sits on the line between now and not yet. Grace that declares we have been saved and are still being saved.
I know that's a hard concept for us to grasp, but this is what Paul was referring to in 2 Corinthians 4:16, "Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day." In other words, even though you've been saved, made perfect in Christ, and more, God is still working on you, changing your heart, your mind, and life to line up with Him.
It's the sustaining grace of God that leads us from where we were to where we desire to be, that keeps working on the inside of us, shaping the rough edges, and bringing us into full alignment with the person of Christ. Now we don't have to live our lives anymore in this idea that we've been saved by grace and must maintain it by our works.
No, we've been saved by grace, and it's grace and grace alone that will keep us and sustain us. We are to live our lives entirely sustained by the grace of God.
By Grace,
Dave