Thoughts from The Bible

Thoughts from the Bible

Monday, 16 September 2024 09:21

Grace and Peace
by Sarah Wootten Corinth Missionary Baptist Church

When was the last time you stopped and looked at the moon? For me, it was last night. My almost two year old niece is fascinated by the moon. Every night we go to the laundry room window and gaze up at the sky. She tells me that the moon is yellow, and I’ll sing a song while we watch. Then, we say, “Night, night moon” and go back to playing or reading.
Childlike wonder is an amazing thing to watch. I guess it is unsustainable for us adults to be amazed over everything like toddlers. After all, we have jobs, families, and other responsibilities that demand our attention. My concern is that we’re too easily bored by what seems normal. The moon has been doing the same thing it has always done since the day we were born, so it’s likely lost its luster to us. I hope we don’t do the same thing with the truths of Scripture. Today, we come to a verse that is so normal and repeated that I’m afraid we have forgotten how amazing it is.
As we finish looking at Paul’s greeting to the church of God at Corinth, we come to a simple, yet rich, sentence. It reads, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” (1 Corinthians 1:3, ESV). This sentence is found in every one of Paul’s letters with some slight variations, so we may have a tendency to gloss over it like I did the moon before Annie began pulling me to the window every night. But His grace and peace is truly something worth slowing down and marveling at.

God, who created the universe and all it contains, came as a man to the earth as a humble servant. We would expect Him to reign from a throne, yet He served and lived among mankind. He was tempted in every way as we are, yet He never succumbed to that temptation. He taught the truth, healed the sick, and raised the dead. He was never unjust or selfish towards anyone. Yet, when mankind in his sinfulness was presented with the One who is perfectly good, we killed Him. When given the One who is holy, we tried to eradicate Him because we are evil. In our sin, we are violent enemies of God. And this is why Jesus came to die – to save His enemies. We owed a debt of death. Jesus came and paid that debt for us through His own death and reconciled to God all who trust in Him (Colossians 1:21-22). Enemies don’t pay debts for one another. Yet while we hated God, He loved us and paid the debt of death that we owed. This is an act of God’s amazing grace.

But it doesn’t end there. All who trust in Jesus have been reconciled to God. We are no longer considered enemies of God; instead, we are His children. We enjoy eternal peace with God because of what Christ has done in removing our guilt of sin. There is no part of me that deserves to have peace with God and access to Him through faith, and yet, by God’s grace, I do (Romans 5:1-2).
As Paul opens his letter to the Corinthians, he reminds them of this grace and peace that they have received. The believers at Corinth had a lot of problems going on. They were following man instead of God. They thought too little of holiness and too much of power. They were trying to put people with positions, money, or giftings on platforms that they may be exalted. Lord willing, we’re going to dive into each of these problems in the coming months. And as we’ll see, if they truly understood the grace that they had received, many of these problems would have never occurred. Paul is going to teach the Corinthians how the gospel is the answer to the issues they were facing.