Finding Grace

Preston Sprinkle wrote a book called Charis – God’s Scandalous Grace for Us.  Charis is the Greek word that means Grace.  Sprinkle uses this book to both define grace, and to show what grace is.

I am listing a few excerpts from this book to lay a foundation for the topic of GRACE.

“Grace works without requiring anything on our part. It’s not expensive. It’s not even cheap. It’s free.”

“Grace is unconditional acceptance given to an undeserving person by an unobligated giver.”

“Grace is the most dangerous, expectation-wrecking, smile-creating, counterintuitive reality there is.”

“Divine grace is God’s relentless and loving pursuit of His enemies, who are unthankful, unworthy, and unlovable.”

“Grace is God’s aggressive pursuit of, and stubborn delight in, freakishly foul people.”

“Grace does not mean that God encourages sin or discourages righteousness.”

“Grace, on the other hand, means that God is pursuing you. That God forgives you. That God sanctifies you. When you are apathetic toward God, He is never apathetic toward you. When you don’t desire to pray and talk to God, He never grows tired of talking to you. When you forget to read your Bible and listen to God, He is always listening to you.”

“Grace is not leniency. Grace is what compels God to act on His own initiative for His own glory to do what no other god can do: forgive those who don’t deserve it and cannot earn it.”

“God, out of His own free choice (grace), took the initiative (grace) to step down into our humanity (grace)—and not just any part of humanity, but one clothed with humility and shame (grace)—in order to bridge the gap between God and man (grace) and therefore reclaim that genuine relationship He desires with us (grace).”

“Grace—God’s stubborn delight in you—snuffs out apathy and brings healing to trolls under the bridge. If you’re living in sin, don’t run from grace. Run to it. You don’t possess the moral power to create obedience. Only God does.”

I have a friend that wrote a book called Praying the Word of Grace: 31 In-Depth Prayers of Declaration, Crafted from Over 200 Scriptures, Forged in the Fire of Testimony.  I have read books about “praying the word” which usually encourage the reader to read the scripture back to God.  In this book, the author leads you into personal prayer based on scripture.  He carefully weaves scriptures together to form a theme, then prays that theme.  The author says, “this book is intended to lead you into personally experiencing the God of grace for yourself in greater and greater ways. Encounter after encounter, grace upon grace.”

This book does not define grace.  It shows you what grace looks like.  The author reveals how grace was elemental in his life as he experienced tragedy that tried to drown him in sorrow.  The book is informational, instructive, and enlightening.  It will lead you into the richness found in the grace of God.

This book is available from Amazon:

If you read this book, and I hope you do, please help my friend by leaving a review.