How do you put grace into words? Is it really possible to tell someone what grace is? To capture the magnitude and almost indescribable nature of grace in mere words? Can you condense grace into a sermon, or a thirty minute youth lesson?

We are going over basic ideas of faith right now in our youth group. We've talked about sin, forgiveness, love, Christ, and this week we are supposed to be talking about grace. But I'm having trouble capturing this "grace" in a lesson.

Sure, I can pull out the old 3 types of grace- prevenient, sanctifying, and justifying. I can quote Scripture- "it is by grace we have been saved". But how do you really explain to people what grace does? What it is? How it works?

I don't know. I'm going to have to figure it out by Sunday afternoon though. I'm starting with the big three- the big three things that I know about grace.

Grace:

1. is costly- grace costs someone something. If you are the receiver of grace, the person who extended the grace paid a price. If you are the giver of grace, it will cost you. There is always a price with grace. Something that someone loses in order to offer grace up.

2. is undeserved- grace is nothing that we can earn or be worthy of. Grace is not something we can live up to or become deserving of. That is one of the distinct characteristics of grace, it is entirely out of our ability to earn.

3. produces change- you can not receive grace and remain the same. Being the receiver (or the bearer) of grace marks you. Produces a change. You can't experience something that deep and that special and remain the same person you were. Grace always produces a reaction- for every action (grace given/received), there is an equal or opposite reaction (what the person on the other end does with the experience). Its simple physics.


The "easiest" (although its not easy at all) way to learn about grace is to experience it. You can hear about, be taught lessons around it, sing songs about, and even read about it- but until you experience it- you don't really get whats so incredible about it.