Paul’s Understanding of Grace
November 2, 2008
Jonathan Slater
There are some things in Paul’s letters that are hard to understand, and which have been interpreted and used in ways that have been harmful. Which is not to say that we should not read him, but be forewarned so that you don’t get “carried away with the error of the lawless and lose your own stability.” (2 Peter 3:16-17)
This warning from the second epistle of Peter seems like an apt way to begin this sermon, particularly with respect to the warning about the error of lawlessness. My assignment today is to preach on Paul’s understanding of Grace, and there is a long history of reading what Paul has to say about grace as in opposition to “law” – interpretations that appeal to texts such as the one which we just heard Romans from 11 where Paul writes “if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace would no longer be grace.”
For the past month or so, however, we have been re-reading Paul in light that the “Angular Adjustment” that the so-called “new perspective on Paul” brings to his writings. So in preparation for this sermon I have waded into the vast ocean that is contemporary Pauline scholarship, with its array of new perspectives, including re-articulations of some older perspectives. Those of you who are my “facebook friends” may have noticed how my “status” has reflected this – for those of you who may have missed those events in my life, I’ll give you a recap:
Oct 23: Jonathan made soup
Oct 28: Jonathan is less and less sure he knows what Paul meant
Oct 31: Jonathan needs to realize that he can’t discuss all of Romans in one sermon
Grace is just about the ideal sermon topic – in fact, I would argue that every sermon should ultimately be about God’s grace. But working on this sermon has been a challenge for me. It has been challenging to allow my understanding of God’s grace to be grounded anew in a fresh reading of Paul. I pray that the Holy Spirit will use what I have to say to increase our faith in God’s gracious love, empower us to love our neighbours, and inspire us to bear witness to a hope in God’s future redemptive work
One of my favorite images of grace is one Paul nowhere explicitly evokes, but which resonates strongly with what he has to say about God’s gracious patience with Israel. It is the image of the Father, having waited for the younger son to return, seeing him at a distance and running to embrace him.
I won’t talk too much about Rembrandt’s portrayal of this story – Though I would recommend Henry Nouwen’s excellent reflection on it in “The Return of the Prodigal Son”.
That tender embrace is grace. The Father embraces his son, a son who had essentially disowned his family and wished his Father dead, without asking for an apology or even an explanation. No confession or penitence was needed on the part of the son – simply being there was enough.
So what does Paul say about grace in the epistle to the Romans?
“If it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace would no longer be grace”
Or, as Paul writes in Romans 4, “Now to the one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due. But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned to him as righteousness.”
Grace is not like wages:
God’s grace is not something you have to do anything to deserve or to earn.
God’s grace is not something you have to worry about losing.
Consider Israel: They were God’s chosen people, his treasured possession, not because of anything that they did; They did not bring it about, nor did they nullify it, even through repeatedly turning their backs on God. The prophets, such as Hosea, testify to God’s faithfulness to Israel even when they turned their back on God and wanted nothing to do with God. No matter how far they travelled into the far country, God never gave up on them but remained ready to embrace them upon their return.
It is God’s past faithfulness to Israel that is the ground of Paul’s confidence that the rejection of Jesus by the majority of Israel was not an indication that they had been finally rejected as God’s people, but was a temporary stumbling which allowed for the good news of salvation to come to the Gentiles. Yes, some of Israel were broken off of the olive tree for a time, and other branches, the Gentile believers, were grafted in – but in the end, the branches of Israel will be grafted in again – They will return from the far country:
Paul writes: “A ha
rdening has come upon part of Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel shall be saved.” (11.25) In spite of having rejected the good news of Jesus Christ, “as regards election they are beloved, for the sake of their ancestors; for the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable.” (11.28-29)
Exactly when this will happen, how it will take place, what it will look like – I think even Paul had little idea
And if God will ultimately save all of Israel, will he also save all other peoples? Is this what Paul means when he writes: “For God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all” (11.32)? I’m not sure we can say –
I think it is telling that Paul ends his discussion of the election of Israel with a doxology: In the face of God’s grace to Israel and the world, perhaps we are ultimately before a mystery:
“O the depths of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” Or who has given a gift to him to receive a gift in return?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory. Amen. (11.33-36) [Isaiah 40.13]
It might be tempting just to leave things here;
There is a place for silence before the gracious mystery of God’s love.
There are times when we need to simply rest in the tender embrace of the Father
But I don’t think we are called to remain in silence – certainly, that is not where Paul left his readers. He moved from doxology to exhortation: “I appeal to you, therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice…” He continued by giving them general instructions concerning how they were to live – how there were to love one another, to contribute to the needs of other, extend hospitality to strangers, bless those who persecute them, live in harmony with one another, and welcome the poor.
And he finally summed up these instructions with an exhortation to love: “Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet” and any other commandment are summed up in this word, ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore, love is a fulfilling of the law.” (13.8-10)
Love is a fulfilling of the law
Grace is not grounded on law. It is not something earned, or even maintained, by adherence to the law.
But is Grace in opposition to Law? By no means!
God’s Grace does not depend on one’s keeping of the law, but calls forth a life which fulfils the law. Grace creates space for the us to love: Confidence in a gracious God is what makes possible radical, self-giving love. Assurance that we are secure in God’s embrace – that God loves us and will sustain us enables us to embrace others.
We see this in the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, in his life of welcome, of table fellowship with both despised outcasts and with respectable religious people. To take some liberties with the parable, Jesus is an elder son who travels into the far country to be with the prodigal even before he has begun to return to the Father; who both walks alongside the younger son, and invites him to return home.
In Romans 10, Paul writes that Christ is the end of the Law. What he means is that Christ enacted what the Law was aiming at all along. The faithfulness of Jesus Christ is the faithfulness that the law intended, and is the faithfulness to which we are called.
Grace creates space for us to also to live faithfully, secure in the confidence that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ; We need not fear hardship, or distress, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword, for “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.” As God has been, and will remain, faithful to Israel, so God will be faithful to us.
On the one hand, grace is not something that is difficult – it is not something we have to earn or work for. On the other hand, however, accepting and living out of God’s grace is about the most difficult thing we can do. What works of love would we pursue if we had no fear whatsoever of hardship or distress, peril or sword?
Is it not fear that often keeps us from love – from embracing those who are truly different from ourselves. What does grace look like? How is grace lived in our places of work, in our families, in our neighbourhood, in our church?
For all of the twists and turns of Paul’s argument in Romans, in the last few chapters he gets quite specific. In Romans 14 he writes: “Welcome those who are weak in f
aith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions.”
Extend grace to one another, welcome others in their difference. Gracious welcome is welcome which embraces the other in their difference, without demanding that the stranger assimilates to our way of thinking and doing.
Gracious welcome does not first require apology or explanation. Gracious welcome is not a conditional welcome that will dissolve if it turns out that differences can’t be resolved.
Some of Paul’s readers will continue to eat anything, and others will eat only vegetables. Some will keep special days as holy, and others will judge all days to be alike. Paul insists that they ought not pass judgement or despise each other. Nor should they simply go about their business without consideration of the other, but care should be taken not to cause others to stumble.
True welcome involves the difficult work of making room for the stranger, for those different than ourselves. This is difficult work that requires that we be open to adjusting our own identities to make room for the other. It requires that we open ourselves up to the stranger, leaving us exposed, vulnerable.
This is where grace comes in: Grace creates the space for us to welcome the stranger. Confidence that we are safe in God’s hands, that nothing will separate us from God’s love, is what makes it possible for us to embrace the stranger in their otherness and difference.
Who are the strangers among us? Who are the strangers in our lives? To whom are we called to extend God’s gracious welcome? May God give us eyes to see, and hearts to respond in love and welcome. Let us welcome one another just as Christ has welcomed us, for the glory of God,
Amen.