Grace Upon Grace

"From his fullness, we have received grace upon grace."

John 1:16

     During the summer, I generally step away from my usual preaching practice of following the Revised Common Lectionary (a three-year cycle of suggested preaching texts [Old Testament, Epistle, Psalm and Gospel selections] that flow with the rhythm of the church's liturgical worship calendar), and try my hand at some kind of sermon series.

     Admittedly, I don't do sermon series particularly well in my estimation.  I really do prefer the order of the Lectionary.  Beginning with the text, instead of a theme, just feels more right to me.  Sometimes the sermon series is still guided by the suggested Lectionary readings.  One summer, for example, I chose all the selections from the Psalms.  On another occasional, I focused on all the epistle (letter) readings from Romans during the summer months.

     And my original plans for this summer, were to preach from the Old Testament Prophets, as guided by the Lectionary.  However I shifted away from that line of thinking before June arrived, and I decided I would use the sermons of John Wesley as the inspiration for the summer sermon series.

     Which leads me to John 1:16.

     I'm actually not sure if Wesley ever used this as a sermon text.  I haven't run across it yet in the various sermons I've read and studied.  However, if he didn't, he really missed a good opportunity, because John's "words" about the "Word" made flesh are certainly formative to Wesley's theology.  It's all grace, grace upon grace!

     Woven throughout the theological DNA of Methodism is God's grace.  Grace is understood as God's favor, God's unmerited favor.  Grace is God's gift.  We cannot earn it, we do not deserve it.  It is simply God's gracious gift that flows freely from God's abundant and extravagant nature, which is love.

     When Wesley preached and taught about God's Salvation offered in Christ, it was always grace upon grace.  Its God's grace that reaches out to us before we know God, inviting us, loving us, wooing us, drawing us and ultimately enabling us to choose the God who has already chosen us.

      It's God's grace that brings us a sense of conviction about the disease of Sin with which we are all afflicted,  it's grace that draws us to seek forgiveness for our sin through the atoning blood of Christ, it's grace that regenerates us through the new birth, making us new creations in Christ by grace through faith ("For by grace you have been saved through faith.  It is not your own doing, it is the gift of God." Ephesians 2:8)  

      It's God's grace that continues working in and through us in the gradual work of Sanctification, enabling us to grow in holiness and righteousness, in Christian maturity and Christ-likeness.  It is a process that can be described as having our hearts "habitually filled with love" of God and love of neighbor, and as love increases - sin decreases, until the the Image of God, previously marred by our human sin is fully restored in us.  Wesley understood this to be the goal of the Christian life, a restored image and renewed relationship with God, which he described as "full salvation."

     And, its important to point out that, in this theological scheme of things, there is never an occasion for boasting, never a point of "arriving", never a point where we are designed or destined to plateau.  In good Wesleyan theology, we are never really standing still.  We are either going forward or backward, either growing in grace or backsliding.  And we never get to a place of holiness and righteousness where we are no longer in need of the atoning merits of Christ' blood, or the continual interceding of Christ on our behalf.

     I am discovering that spending the summer with Wesley is a very rich experience for me.  Its a good discipline for me as a United Methodist Preacher, forcing me, to re-visit and re-claim the basic beliefs of the founder of Methodism that have served to shape the church through which I have experienced my call to ordained ministry.

    But beyond that - how good it is to immerse myself again in the rich, cool, refreshing well of God's grace.  It is good to be reminded that any good work I may accomplish, any good endeavor upon which I may embark, any higher level of faith I may reach, will always be dependent upon the initiating work of God's grace. 

     I'm glad for this summer reminder that it's all grace, grace upon grace!

     Thanks be to God!


Grace and Peace!

  Pastor Randy