Disciples of Grace Today

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.      And what does the  Lord  require of you? To act justly and to love mercy      and to walk humbly with your God. – Micah 6:8 As Christians I don’t think we have a problem with loving mercy and walking humbly but that act justly or in other translations do justice is what trips us up. I hate that words like “Gospel” and “Disciple” are being used in such a way that they are robbed of their authentic power and meaning. The Gospel is the good news that God sent His Son Jesus to pay the penalty for sin that should have been borne by us, for we have all sinned and thumbed our nose at a just and gracious God, and were it not for His love and mercy toward us while we were still rebelling against Him we would all get what we so justly deserve, an eternity in hell. We can’t even come to Him on our own we need the Holy Spirit to open our eyes. It’s the Holy Spirit who convicts of sin and ...

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make straight your paths - Proverbs 3:5-6   Photo by  Mark Neal  from  Pexels This is a familiar passage and that makes hearing hard and if hearing is hard faith is difficult and if faith is difficult then transformation doesn't happen and if transformation doesn't happen then it's easy to call God unfaithful. We must first remember that transformation is a slow process so we have to be all in with God through Christ by the Holy Spirit, which is the first part of this passage. Trust. Trust implies that we submit to the lordship of Christ through obedience to God's commands as The Holy Spirit enables us. I'm hounding away on the Trinity up front because no amount of white knuckled discipline is going to bring this pass. The laws of God cannot be kept by sinful men. They were meant to show us our need for a savior, which we have only ...

Photo by  Javon Swaby  from  Pexels When He had called the people to  Himself,  with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and  take   up   his   cross , and follow Me. - Mark 8:34 I'll never forget the first time someone asked me to disciple them. I'd never been more terrified of anything more in my entire life. Truth is such a request still terrifies me. It's not that I'm unsure of doctrinal concepts or that my prayer life is somewhere between slim and none. What's terrifying is, that knowing all of what God has graced me to know and praying in the manner with which He has ordained for me to pray and the mercy that He has given me to love Him so deeply and profoundly, that I was and am still one messed up individual. Who am I to teach anyone anything? What's more, all of this was worked out in me in the wrestling match of prayer. How does one teach that? This is how you wrestle w...