Working with Grace

UV 753/10,000 Working with Grace But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them –yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. I Corinthians 15 v 10 God explained His identity to Moses in these words, “ I am who I am.” He is self-existent and self-sufficient. But we His creatures are dependent on Him for our sense of identity, empowerment and enablement. We need to define ourselves as Paul defined himself: “ I am what I am by the grace of God.” Everything I am is received as a free gift from the Lord. Paul perceived himself as the least of the apostles and the worst of sinners. Yet, he worked harder than all of them. He travelled to more places. He pioneered more churches. He shared in more places. He suffered more trials and afflictions. He took more risks. He taught more believers. He impacted more lives. He worked hard to make tents to support himself. He recognized that it was not he who was doing all this but the grace and power of God that was at work in him. The grace of God is given to us freely but it is given not so that we can rest on our oars but so that we can go places for the Lord. It is given so that we become a channel of light, deliverance, healing and blessing to many in our generation. It is given so that we move out of our comfort zones and enter uncharted waters and territory. A ship is safest when berthed in the harbour but its destiny is to move out to distant ports, taking its wares and cargo where it is needed or where it is commissioned to go. Similarly, we are commissioned so that we move out of our safe zones into areas of challenge and turbulence. The grace of God is not given to us in vain. We receive an impartation of grace to fulfil the will and specific purpose of the Lord. When we have so received the grace of God, we cannot boast that we have done it all. Neither can we be crestfallen that we have failed. When we attribute all that we do to the outworking of the grace of God, we always remain humble in the presence of God and we are confident that we will exceed or excel whatever goals we have before us. For people of the world, the accomplishment of goals is due to hard work, their abilities and their favourable circumstances. For the children of God, accomplishment of goals comes from God’s grace or favour and His active help and hard work. Hard work is our commitment to use God-given talents, abilities, resources and opportunities while grace is God’ s commitment to help us as we work hard. Grace is the Ebenezer manifestation of God’s glory. In the absence of hard work, we are taking the grace of God for granted. For a long time, I wanted to write many books but I failed as long as I depended only on my own ability. But, the Lord knowing my desire told me, “ I will teach you how to elaborate on ideas.” He inspired me with the concept of uni-verse. Each uni-verse contains the whole truth on that teaching or idea covering the entire Word from Genesis to Revelation. It contains a model to emulate or avoid, a metaphor or symbol to enable us to understand the spiritual in more tangible terms, a precept or truth to obey or practice. I worked hard and consistently on this over the past two years or more, spending the first three hours of every morning on writing uni-verse regularly. Now I have the content of seven books ready for publication. Every hundred days produces the equivalent of a book. Writing the uni-verse has become the top priority activity of my days. Even on days when things did not go my way or when I was travelling, I endeavoured to write what the Lord has laid on my heart and mind. Yet it was not I but the grace of God that is with me. If God is with us, then the grace of God is with us. If the grace of God is with us, then we will not work in vain. Working only for gain in this lifetime is working in vain. Prateep V Philip