Dear brethren,
To continue from last week, we began to define grace by looking at the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. We said, Jesus Christ is grace personified. Someone wrote: “Unmerited favor is not a subject, it is a person, and His name is Jesus.“
Grace is embodied in His entire being and in His finished work at Calvary. When you get to know Him, you are having communion with grace and growing in grace. Whatever you fellowship with is what will fill your life.
Luke 2:40 says … and the grace of God was upon Him.”
John 1:14 says: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
When He spoke, truth came out of Him. When He ministered, grace flowed out of Him. Whatever you’re full of is what will flow out of your life. A person that’s full of envy, bitterness and strife when they speak, criticism, faultfinding and gossip are what will flow out of their mouth. A person that’s full of grace will flow with edifying words, words of blessing, health and strength to others. With Jesus, Luke 4:22 tells us that people who heard Him marveled at the gracious words that proceeded out of His mouth.
So, to fellowship with Him and His Words is to partake of grace. 2 Peter 1:2 tells us that grace is multiplied to us through the (full, personal, precise and correct) knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. The more you have intimate knowledge of Jesus and His finished work at the cross (His death, burial, resurrection) the more grace is multiplied in your life. No matter what you need, the grace on Jesus will flow in that area of your life and meet that need as you fellowship with Him and His gracious words.
John the Baptist testified that of His fullness we have all received, grace for grace. John 1:16. New Living Translation says: “We have all benefited from the rich blessings he brought to us — one gracious blessing after another.” The Amplified Bible says: “For out of His fullness (abundance) we have all received [all had a share and we were all supplied with] one grace after another and spiritual blessing upon spiritual blessing and even favor upon favor and gift [heaped] upon gift.” Out of His fullness flows what He has: grace and more grace. No wonder Jesus Himself said, “I am come that you may have life and have it more abundantly.
Remember the story of Mary and her sister Martha found in Luke 10:38-42? Mary chose to sit at Jesus’ feet when the Lord came to visit them. Martha her elder sister was busy working in the kitchen making sure that everything was in order and ensuring there was enough food for Jesus and his company. In their Middle Eastern culture, it was right for Mary to be in the kitchen as well preparing for their guests. But this was no ordinary guest to her. She saw Jesus as God in the flesh with something she needed to draw out of Him. She was beholding His beauty, His glory, hanging onto every word that proceeded out of His mouth. She was partaking of grace. After a while, her frantic stressed out sister shot out of the kitchen and blamed the two of them. Jesus said Mary had chosen the good part that would not be taken away from her.
One sister saw Jesus in the natural, the other sister saw Him as God veiled in flesh with a fullness to draw upon. Brethren, learn to partake of Him, His grace makes everything beautiful in your life.