I just Googled “Define Christian grace” and received the following response:
the spontaneous, unmerited gift of the divine favor in the salvation of sinners, and the divine influence operating in individuals for their regeneration and sanctification.
I usually hear it preached as this “divine favor,” or “undeserved favor.” It is sometimes said that mercy is not getting what we deserve, and grace is getting what we do not deserve. Our faith becomes very easy with this simple definition. Consider what Merriam-Webster has to say about the definition of grace:
unmerited divine assistance given to humans for their regeneration or sanctification
What is this “divine assistance” for? Consider the words of Messiah in John 14 where He is telling his disciples that He must leave but He will send a “Helper.” This Helper is the Holy Spirit. In John 14:16-17, Messiah says:
I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, so that He may be with you forever; the Helper is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him; but you know Him because He remains with you and will be in you.
Just a few verses later, He says in 21:
The one who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and the one who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will reveal Myself to him.
This is the context in which He spoke of the Helper. The Helper will assist the disciple in knowing and keeping His commandments. He says that the evidence that someone loves Him is that he or she keeps the commandments. A problem we frequently run into is that we want to redefine “His commandments,” as if that definition changed in the New Testament. Consider His words in Matthew 5:17-19:
Do not presume that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke of a letter shall pass from the Law, until all is accomplished! Therefore, whoever nullifies one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
“The Law” that He is talking about is the Law of Moses, the Torah. He continues expounding on this subject of “the Helper” in John 16:7-11:
But I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I am leaving; for if I do not leave, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. And He, when He comes, will convict the world regarding sin, and righteousness, and judgment: regarding sin, because they do not believe in Me; and regarding righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you no longer are going to see Me; and regarding judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.
He discusses sin and righteousness as what the Helper will be helping with. What is sin? 1 John 3:4 has that answer:
Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness.
Sin is lawlessness. The law here is Torah. Sin is violating the Torah. Righteousness is “observing all of the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly,” as it says about Zechariah and Elizabeth in Luke 1:6:
Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly.
This is the Grace of Messiah, that He would send us a Helper, the Holy Spirt, to enable us to not sin. To enable us to keep his commands, His Torah. The Holy Spirt is the “divine assistance,” the very definition of grace.
Paul discusses this in Romans 6:1-2:
What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?
He is saying that grace is not a license to sin. He is saying that grace should enable us to stop sinning! He sent us a Helper so that we could be successful in that.
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