Grace
Grace is the manifest presence of God with you. When God shows up, grace shows up. Grace is the glory of God coming upon an individual to transform his or her life. Glory and Grace are two sides of the same coin. Where there is no grace, there is no glory.
1 Peter 5:10 teaches that God will strengthen, support and settle anyone that has suffered any form of deprivation, discomfort, lack or injustice. Grace is the intervention of God. It is God taking over your battle and fighting for you. And when this happens, even you, will feel sorry for your enemies.
When grace is at work on one’s behalf, God fights their battles. The people of God must never entertain fear, because fear is not of God. When faith grows, fear disappears. But if fear grows, faith diminishes.
Believers must live and operate in the consciousness that God watches over them. The believer has been empowered by the grace of God to tread upon serpents and over all the schemes of the evil one. The Bible declares emphatically that no enchantment, i.e. evil powers, magic charms, spells, curses, witchcraft, divination, etc., can work against or have effect on God’s beloved ones. (Numbers 23:23). As the seed of Abraham, believers possess the gate of their enemies. The goodness and severity of God works in our favour and would even give lives for our sakes because we are very precious to Him.
Grace is God revealing His love to you. If the love of God is not revealed it cannot be known. Romans 4:4-5 (KJV) says that “Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.”
This scripture depicts the difference between work and grace. Struggles, toiling and skills cannot grant you access to the littlest of what grace will do for you. God does for you that which you cannot do by/for yourself. In the Old Testament, the blood of animals covered or atoned sin but the blood of Jesus remits sin. It blots out sin so that it no longer exist.
The acts of grace are evident throughout the Bible. The infilling of the Holy Spirit is an act of grace. Every true or genuine call into the ministry is an act of grace. (Ephesians 3:3,8). Every genuine miracle is an act of grace. No human being can by himself produce authentic miracles. Charlatans and magicians who do the so-called ‘miracles’ only try to usurp God’s work deceiving and ripping people off. Grace is the ‘H’ factor. If anything is impossible, append the ‘H’ before it and it becomes Him-possible!
You need more than power -the ability to perform-to succeed in life. Grace is the ability to become what God had purposed for you to be. God can never change or alter His nature. (Malachi 3:16, Hebrews 13:8.) Right from the beginning, His beloved creation, man, had always enjoyed His grace. Genesis 3:15- grace took over when man fell. Genesis 3:21- God covered Adam and Eve with warm clothing made out of the skin of an animal, even after they had attempted to cover themselves with leaves (a typology of religion, morality, self-righteousness).
Many times, the grace of God is revealed in His name. All through the bible, we see people experience the manifestation of God’s grace in their specific situations. In Jeremiah 23: 6, He is revealed as Jehovah Tsidkenu- God, our righteousness. In Psalm 23, He is our Shepherd. In Judges 6:24, He is Jehovah Shalom, our peace. In Exodus 17:15, He is revealed as Jehovah Nissi- our Captain who fights for His people. In Genesis 22:13-14, He is Jehovah Jireh- not just the Lord who provides, but He who also supplies. Providing means He makes available what you need and in supplying, He brings your need to you. In Exodus 15:26, we know Him as Jehovah Rapha- our healer. He is your physician.
All those names and appellations are summarised in one name- JESUS. The New Testament, indeed, unveiled the I AM who appeared to Moses in the burning bush. In John 6:35, He is the bread of life. In John 8:12, the Light of the world. In John 8:28- He is “I am”. In John 10:7, He is “the door”. In John 10:11, the good shepherd. In John 11:25, the resurrection and the life. In John 13:14, He is our Lord and Master. In John 14:6, the way, the truth and the life. In John15:5, He is the vine.
Grace is what God does for you, not what you do for yourself. (Philippians 3:9).