‘Grace, Mercy, and Peace’

The Third Sunday Service – September 15th 2019

Our ‘Third Sunday Service’ offers an opportunity to consider some of the main and essential elements of the Christian faith and to do so in a little more depth than perhaps our other services of worship allow. For this reason, this service is a good one to which to bring friends and enquirers, those who have no experience or understanding of what it is Christians believe and seek to put into practice; and, yes, also those who have misunderstood, or been misled, or who have some reason or other to oppose Christianity.

In a world where increasingly, sadly, reasoned and reasonable debate is conspicuous by its absence, and where an unwillingness to listen to other people’s points of view and simply no-platform what they don’t want to hear has become popular practice, it surely has to be a very valuable thing to have the opportunity both to consider and to question in an atmosphere of openness and love - or what I would prefer to call ‘Grace’; for grace is love of a very special sort because it is the particular way in which the Christian God loves those whom he created and then commands those who say they love him to love others.

The Christian belief is in the Good News or ‘Gospel’ of God’s grace as revealed by and in Jesus Christ of Nazareth; and, as I am going to be saying a little later on this morning, is characterised by ‘mercy’ and ‘peace’, both of which, like God’s grace, have very special and particular meanings which are intended not only to inform or teach about God but also about the world, about existence, about us. So, the theme for this morning’s service is ‘Grace, Mercy, and Peace’: it is the greeting with which we normally begin our main gatherings here.

If we want to know what characterises Christianity – Christianity at its best, that is - and here it is important for me to say to you that Christianity is not about rules and regulations but about RELATIONSHIPS, though I realise many people do not see it that way! – what characterises Christianity at its best and distinguishes it from other religions is this wonderful thing called ‘grace’.

I said that it is a very special kind of love. And as John says in his gospel (v 14) and Paul in his letter to Timothy (v 2) (on your Notice Sheets), it’s source is God himself. We need to note (v 14) as elsewhere in the bible that this grace is intimately connected with truth: they go hand in hand; and they are to be seen and understood supremely in the person, life, and teaching of Jesus, who claimed to be God. That claim alone raises many questions: but I would simply ask you to take the time to examine that person, his life, and teaching, and then give me your well-argued reasons and evidence for not believing him! But not this morning! Let’s just consider these three: Grace, Mercy, and Peace.

I have just returned from a pilgrimage in Portugal where I met many people on the way searching for meaning and answers to life and to their questions. Very few were Christians: but they sensed both a loss and a need to fill that void in themselves and in their lives which the world, with all its amazing material benefits and offers of fulfilment and happiness they had found unsatisfying. Particularly interesting were the many approaches I encountered to truth and to belief: ‘Truth is whatever you make it’; ‘truth is what makes me feel good’; I like to believe that….’; ‘there is no right or wrong; the world just is’; etc, etc. But all were searching, and most felt deeply that there had to more to life, more meaning, more purpose, more truth than they had so far encountered.

And it is to such deep needs and loss and hopes and fears that the Christian Gospel of God’s grace speaks, offering not only answers but relief, fulfilment, and even assurance.

The Christian faith is not the same thing as the Christian Church. The Christian Church ought to be the same as the Christian faith in what she believes and practices but the truth is that the latter, the Church, is a very human institution. And so it contains failings and failures, people who make mistakes, people who are very aware of the gap between what they are and what they ought to be, but also people who realise that they are or ought to be wholly dependent upon God’s grace, mercy, and peace.

But what are these three, and why are they so essential in the Christian faith?

We cannot understand the message of the bible if we do not understand the meaning of grace. But in understanding it we need to be humble in our approach. Why? Because whilst this message has some wonderful things to say about God and his love for us, it also strongly implies some truths about human beings and human nature that are not music to every ear!

God’s grace is his message of love and forgiveness to those who do not deserve it – which means everyone, because none of us is perfect. To claim that we do not need to be forgiven or do not need God’s grace is to cling our pride.

The first hurdle then is to realise that we need God’s grace, and that without it we cannot know God and be reconciled to him. Yes, he loves us more than we could ever imagine, but because he is perfect and we are not, there is a barrier of sin and pride between us. The very purpose of Jesus’ mission was to remove that barrier and make it possible for anyone to be reconciled to God and to know and live with God for ever. All the while we think that we are good enough for God as we are, or that we can earn his favour, , or that my morality, my philosophy, my respectability, my success will get me to Heaven, or even that God owes me in some way, we delude ourselves. To our pride in ourselves God’s grace says you are all guilty. But to the humble who recognise their need of his grace, he is always willing to forgive. Everyone then needs to say sorry genuinely and to accept God’s offer of forgiveness: He can make no exception.

And he does this by asking us to believe in Jesus; to believe that he, Jesus, is God’s chosen way of reconciling the world to himself; to believe that his sacrificial death was the price he was prepared to pay for our reconciliation because he loves us so much that he was prepared to lay down his life for the whole world and for me; to believe not only that we needed to be reconciled but that he has indeed reconciled us; to believe that his resurrection from death proves that all that Jesus claimed and did and taught could be believed; to believe that however terrible or however wonderful our personal track records, we are all in the same boat of need of God’s grace.

God’s mercy is what we receive when we personally accept that grace: we are forgiven and need no longer fear either about God’s love for us or about this life or the next. And therefore we have the promise, and the knowledge, and the comfort of God’s peace, the knowledge and assurance that in this life we can ourselves be at peace because we now have peace with God. We have been forgiven and accepted because we have admitted our need of God’s grace; and our faith in what Jesus has done for us, his most amazing act of self-sacrificial love, has set us free: free to live without emptiness and fear because not only has he answered our deepest questions about the meaning and purpose of life and what will happen to us when we die, but also because he has come by his spirit to live in us (V 14) so that together we can live life abundantly…’to ALL who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God’.

Grace – God’s free gift of reconciling love to the undeserving

Mercy – his forgiveness of those who believe in Jesus, his unique and universal mediator of reconciliation with him

Peace – the knowledge and comfort that we have nothing to fear either in this life or the next because we are at peace with our Creator and Heavenly Father.