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Theme: Re Think Grace
Philip Yancy says the following about Grace
“Grace like water flows to the lowest part”
I remember a time in my life, in fact not so long ago, that a sort of conflict was going on in my
mind. I had a sense of confusion & disaloushiment as to was what I believed, the church and other
aspects of religion. It was a combination of having more questions than answers and a feeling of
being hurt by people. I remember thinking, “ Im just not cut out to be a Christian” I didn't feel I
deserved God's Grace or indeed the Grace shown by people who supported me.
If grace is God's love for the undeserving, then what does it look like in action? And if Christians
are its sole dispensers, then how are we doing at lavishing grace on a world that knows far more of
cruelty and unforgiveness than it does of mercy or Grace?
Can grace survive in the midst of such atrocities as the Nazi holocaust? Can it triumph over the
brutality of the Ku Klux Klan?
Should any grace at all be shown to the likes of the former Bosnian Serb army chief Ratko Mladic,
when over two nights in July 1995, his fighters shot 8000 Muslim men and boys in and around the
town of Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia only a 2 & half hour flight from here!
Burying most in mass graves.
It was Europe's worst mass killing since the holocaust.
Should grace be shown to Sean Quinn who recently as 2008, Sean Quinn was listed by the Sunday
Times as Ireland's richest man, worth €4.72bn. By 2011, Sean Quinn was filing for bankruptcy. In
2012, Sean Quinn Jnr finds himself behind bars.
Should Grace be shown to Sean FitzPatrick and the other two, Willie McAteer and Pat Whelan, who
were charged with providing unlawful financial assistance as a result of the bank’s loans to six
members of the family of Seán Quinn and the Maple 10 group of investors to buy shares in Anglo.
They nearly single handedly brought our country to our knees.
Is Gods grace enough to help me forgive those who hurt me, because I dont think they deserve it?
But God would say, neither did you!
Is Gods grace and the outworking of that enough for my marriage to heal?, because I dont think she
or he deserves it? But God would say, neither did you!
Why should I be gracious towards my family, the prostitutes in our streets, the homeless, the
wealthy, the woman who left her husband or those who because of my faith think I am simple
minded & foolish?
But God would say, I was gracious to you so you in turn show grace to others!!
You see Grace does not excuse sin, but it treasures the sinner.
True grace is shocking, scandalous & at times very unfair. It shakes us out of generally accepted
standards of Grace, with its insistence on getting close to sinners and touching them with mercy,

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forgiveness,love and hope. It forgives the unfaithful spouse, the racist, the child abuser. It loves
today's AIDS-ridden addict as much as the tax collector of Jesus' day.
How can we then as Christians contend graciously with moral issues that threaten our communities,
towns & cities? Why is it easy to show grace to those we have a connection with or we feel they
deserve it, compared to those who we think dont deserve it? Perhaps its someone who was in
Government ( Bertie Ahern or Charles Haughy), Ronan Keating who had an affair or a member of
our family.
Perhaps the challenge for us is to become living answers to a world that desperately wants to know,
God's Grace? Maybe we are called to be living answers of God's Grace to everyone despite what
class of people they are, the color of their skin, how much money they have or the private education
they were given.
We are all in need of God's Grace! AND Gods Grace is for everyone!
Therefore lets be living answers of God's Grace in action, not just on a Sunday but every day of our
life and to everyone!
Conclusion.
“But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on
me”
We all need God's Grace an his Grace is for everyone!! But what I find most difficult is putting
Grace in action...
I Know in my own life, that when I acknowledge my weaknesses, my failures, my pride, my pre
conceived ideas, my stubbornness -
That Gods Grace is sufficient to forgive, listen, to understand, to reach out, to heal and to help those
who who don't always deserve it... never the less neither did I..
“Grace like water flows to the lowest part – Philip Yancy”