What About Grace?


        A few snow falls ago, I curled up with Netflix and binge-watched the show “The Good Place.” The premise of the show is this: there’s a woman named Eleanor who dies and goes to the Good Place. The problem is there’s been some kind of mix-up and she’s not supposed to be there. But, she doesn’t want to go to the Bad Place, so she tries to learn to be good: to earn her place there. At some point during her stay in the Good Place, she learns about this point system: each time you do something good, you get points. And when you do something not good, you lose points. Eleanor learns about the point ticker and, hoping that you can still earn points for the Good Place after death, she spends a whole day just doing good things: holding doors for people, saying nice things to people, etc. Later in the day she looks down at the ticker and she’s shocked to see that the number hasn’t changed. She’s still in the red. With the help of her companions, she realizes the problem isn’t that the ticker is stuck. The problem is her motivation. As long as her goal is for her own personal gain, none of the good things she does matters.
            As a pastor (and a Christian), I have to watch “The Good Place” with blinders on because honestly, it’s full of questionable theology. But it’s a funny show. I do enjoy it. I also enjoy the questions it makes me think of, like the questions surrounding the “good deed ticker.” The biggest question that comes to my mind is “What about grace?”
            As Christians, we believe in grace. We don’t believe there’s someone out there with at ticker-counter keeping track of all the good we do and subtracting points for all the bad we do. We believe in the truth of Ephesians 2:5 that it is by grace we have been saved: “this is not of your own doing; it is the gift of God – not the result of your own works, so that no one may boast.” This is the joy of Easter: the reminder that Jesus came and died and rose for us so that we don’t have to try and earn a place in heaven. Jesus saves us and I believe that even when we don’t believe in Him, He keeps believing in us. That’s unconditional love. That’s grace.
            It doesn’t mean we can do whatever we want. The Apostle Paul addressed this in Romans 6 when he said (from The Message), “Do we keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving? I should hope not!” And James tells us that faith without works is dead (James 2:14-26). God gives us grace so we don’t have to stress about whether or not we’re good enough for God. We do good things and love one another because of that love God has for us.
            Our motivation matters. Why you help someone matters because we don’t help people because we think it gets us a better seat on the heaven train. We don’t love one another because we think it makes us more attractive in God’s eyes. God already loves us. Unconditionally. That’s the joy of Easter. Living as an Easter people means we live every day remembering how much Jesus loves us: so much that He would die and rise for us.
            Grace sets us free. Grace frees us up to live: to make mistakes here and there, but always to learn along the way. Grace frees us to be children of God in the ways that make sense to us, which means we can be creative. You can be creative about how you live gracefully. I’m pretty grateful for grace. How about you? How will you live gracefully and show each other grace? And will you be honest about your motivations?
              Blessings to you!

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