“I’ll remove the stone heart from your body and replace it with a heart that’s God-willed, not self-willed.”- Ezekiel 36:26 (The Message)
Should anyone knock at my heart and say, “Who lives here?” I should reply, “Not Martin Luther, but the Lord Jesus Christ.”- Martin Luther
Max Lucado begins his book Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine by boldly proclaiming that God answers the mess of life with one word: grace. The problem is, Pastor Lucado adds, that the word grace has such commonplace usage in our vocabulary (grace period,, fall from grace, grace note) that we’ve settled for wimpy grace- a grace that never causes trouble or demands a response.
Max asks if we’ve been changed, shaped, or softened by grace. He then proceeds to describe grace:
“God’s grace has a drenching about it. A wildness about it. A white-water, riptide, turn-you-upsidedownness about it. Grace comes after you. It rewires you. Grace is the voice that calls us to change and then gives us the power to pull it off.”
Tara and Todd Storch lost their thirteen-year-old daughter Taylor to a skiing accident in 2010. Her hearts was donated to a woman named Patricia. Tara only had one request- to hear her daughter’s heart beating. After Tara and Patricia embraced, Patricia offered Tara and Todd a stethoscope. Although Taylor’s heart was in a different body, Tara and Todd heard their daughter’s heart.
Max notes that when God listens to our heart, He hears the beating heart of His Son.
Today’s question: How has God’s grace come alive during your desert, land between time? Please share.
Coming Monday: the new Short Meditation, “Heart and Soul”
Tomorrow’s blog: “Jesus stoops to conquer”
