You are sitting across a table from me at my favorite Starbucks.
I’m playing with the paper cover on my coffee cup. I’ve drank it all, almost, and I have just the bare little bit left to sip. I’m going to try to make it last.
You are holding your chai tea in both hands and you are listening to your own words as you share your story with me. It’s a journey that has twisted and turned, risen and fallen. There are doubts. There have been failings. There are hurts and wounds, and some of them are deep.
I’m nodding. I’m hearing you and I’m beginning to see who you really are. It’s beautiful and I’m thankful for you. We’ve invited each other into community.
Grace.
You have grace for me. I have grace for you.
It’s easy to give grace for people who need another chance, those who have come out of a dark corner into the center of the room, light shining in from a window. Grace for the second and third chances: it is becoming part of the spiritual journey of all of us.
You have to go. And so do I in a minute. I hug you goodbye and then with the ten minutes I have left before I pick up my four-year-old from preschool I open up my laptop.
I read your blog. Then I read a friend of mines. And then I cross over a blog that often riles me up. I read her post. I shake my head. She spews judgment and disguised hatred. She writes with an air of arrogance because HE
R way is RIGHT. Always. I know it’s not just me: I’ve heard other girls say that she makes them feel badly about themselves. She seems to desipse freedom and props up lists of rules as God.
I shake my head again, do not leave a comment {because what would I say?} and shut my computer.
For the fifteen minutes it takes to drive to the preschool I get angrier and angrier at her. I’ve never even met her but she makes me mad anyways. How can she propagate the open lack of grace for other people? How can she provide a place for others to YES her, pat her on the back and say, I agree? How, in 2010, can she actively show so little grace and so much judgment?
Amazing. I just do not understand.
But then, grace.
Just as much as I have been called to give grace to you, sitting across the Starbucks table from me, I have been called to show grace to her as well. If I do not, then I am as much of a grace-hater as she is.
Grace for a grace-hater?
That’s just too much to ask.
Not for Christ, who gave and gives grace for Pharisees {such as me}.
Dear blogger, who doesn’t even know me, please forgive me for not extending the grace to you that Christ has. I will do my best, with His power, to give you as much grace as I would want Christ to give to me. Thank you for helping me see my weaknesses.
Do you have trouble extending grace to those seem to hate grace themselves?
{Inspired by my real life coffee dates with some of you and by Mike Foster’s Graceonomics which I’m still only halfway through. You can buy it here.}
As I learned through tweets from the Relevant Conference, Angie Smith shared that we have to set blog boundaries not only it what we write, but also in what we read. Sometimes it is wise to stop reading a blog that leaves you wanting to run to the crazy house instead of wanting to run to Jesus.
Thank you Shelli for the suggestion. I probably should be more careful around the ones that make me angry.
However, i’ve realized (in the past) that some things that make me angry it’s because I have to take a hard look at myself. sooo, with that in mind, i will read carefully but attempt daily to extend grace.
thank you for your comment shelli. =)
i forget sometimes that those who do not extend grace need it poured upon their lives, just as desperately as i do. {and sometimes i fail to extend grace, too}
it’s diffcult to extend grace to those are shake their fingers in disgust.
such a difficult area that needs constant refining in my life.
if Christ models it, then we follow suit, right?
thanks for this reminder.
so, i am thinking, ‘is it me? is it me?’ (because it’s always about me, you know. since my blog is so important with its’ 15 readers…) lord have mercy, i really hope it’s not. but i don’t think i’ve run across a blog like that. i’m pretty sure it would upset me to read something like that, too. and it would be hard to hold my tongue but there are enough people like that in my life -grace-haters, like you said (which i love, by the way)- who i know better than to say anything to because, yes, they are always right. boo.
lord, help me to know and be willing to be told when i’m wrong.
i hate knowing that there is someone out there who is hurting other women. but, yes. grace. for her and for her followers. and i have to remember that the ones who YES her are on their own journey. and may that woman have such an encounter of grace with the holy spirit -because he’s the only one who can infuse us with that- that her heart and words change for god’s glory instead of her own.
lord help us.
xo
oh please, mary. not you.
i left a more general comment down at the bottom about this.
and yes, i agree, “Lord Help Us!”
i can pray that daily, i think. sigh.
i saw (after the fact). but, still! isn’t it funny that so many of us second-guessed ourselves? i guess we needed that! still, relieved to know it wasn’t me.
xo
Grace is a beautiful thing to give and to receive, it’s sad to know that there are those in this day and age who still do not understand this concept or know this beauty.
Sarah-
I coined a phrase when I was beginning to understand grace in light of my own moral failure. I was getting lots and lots of judgment from individuals who wanted to be punitive and not redemptive.
“You know you understand grace when you can give grace to those who don’t think they need grace.”
You are right…offering grace to those who have put it in the ditch is fairly easy. Offering grace to legalistic Pharisees who are so caught up in their behavioralism that they honestly think that are justified in being critical and passing judgment is a bit more difficult.
I remember the days when I lived in that camp. I remember the days when grace was not amazing because I had convinced myself that I was a “little sinner” and not a “big sinner”.
thanks Traylor. i love your journey and your story. thank you for offering your insight on this “girl” blog. we love hearing from our few-and-far-between men. thank you. =)
Oh no! I missed the sign that said this was a girl blog! Please forgive me!
you know i’m only kidding. =)
oh Sarah you always give me so much to think about. Thank you
This ties in perfectly with the message from over the weekend. Jesus died for all of us, including the ones that hurt us. To shut them out (or refuse to extend them grace) would be the same judgmental and exclusive behavior that the world sees in the church today.
very true Jenelyn. =)
Wow, excellant post. I have been blessed by your thoughts and writings and thank God you are yeilding to His will in your life to share this with us.
It is definately easier to judge than to offer grace…
I am so in the middle of this with a friend right now. And thought this very thing, how do I expect her to be graceful when I have no grace for her lack of grace?
Ugh.
Praying for you this morning, Lindsey. It just sucks to have that on a Monday morning, that weight on your shoulders. Praying God shows you His tender love for you, and for your friend too, even when it just sucks and hurts to be hurt by someone who doesn’t extend grace to us well…
Thanks Jessie!
on my long roadtrip the other day, i went through a bunch of crosspoint messages i’d missed. in one, pete talked about having “grace for the grace killers” and i haven’t been able to get that out of my head. your post has just churned up the waters of my heart even more.
this is so hard for me right now. well, always… but seemingly a lot more right now. i wanna get this right…
i think the grace that is hardest to extend is the grace that matters the most. it’s the grace that makes my heart more like His.
dangit. i’m on my friend’s computer so inadvertently commented as her. feel free to change it on the backend…
love you broccoli…
loved that series tracee, i mean alece
love you tia mary. and i had no idea tracee read my blog. tell her thanks.
Maybe this is me being naive, but I didn’t realize there are blogs that are like this, probably because I’ve never come across one. I think we have to be careful, especially when we say our cause or in this case, our blogs are for Christ. We have no idea who is reading, and how our words can affect their lives eternally. Yes, I do know a couple grace-haters, and I admit that I have at times done the same to them as a result. But the thing that I keep going back to is how would HE treat them? Aren’t I required to do the same?
Extending grace, especially when we feel it is unwarranted, is a true testament to God’s transformative power within us. Well done, Sarah.
I literally was just hashing it out with Jesus over this very. exact. thing. Why can’t she just…?! How could she say…?! And here I am, in the middle of 31 Days of Grace on my blog – your post fell perfectly, appropriately in my lap this morning.
thank you, Sarah. Wish I could sit across from you at Starbucks before we get our kids from preschool and tell you so.
thanks friend. i love you, your blog, your attitude, your gentleness. thank you for the comment and for searching for grace in a grace-less world.
i’m sure we’ll see one another in 2011.
This was such a good post..its so easy to get caught up in the grace-hate of others…sort of like they deserve less because of how they are..but it’s not suppossed to be that way…we love, we give grace, and we forgive those who seem to be deserving of it but also those who don’t seem to deserve it, but probably need it the most…have a great day!!
You have touched a real issue here. It’s so easy to forget (especially when reading posts on the internet) that grace is extended to all…even grace haters. It can be so easy to fall into judgement and not even realize your doing it. Thank you for sharing your real life experience at the coffee shop and suggesting Gracenomics. I’m going to have to give it a read.
Sarah… love your posts… I don’t always comment, but you bring such a breath of fresh air to my spirit daily
thank you!
My thought is this… if I was the Grace-hater, and no one reached out and told me I was being rude or snarky, I could potentially stay that way… keep spewing yuk, keep haterating on my blog. I am my own worst blind spot sometimes. So I would hope that folks would comment, and let me know I was being a hater, and let me know that my blog impacted them negatively… because I may need the hard words from someone else so that I can hear the tone of what I am saying.
Hi – I liked your post and it is very convicting but I would be interested in knowing what you think it would look like to give grace to someone you see as a grace hater. Does it mean making polite conversation? Finding common ground and connecting on those points but never addressing the grace hating stuff? Does joining the conversation and addressing what you disagree with mean that one is not giving grace? Does it only have to do with what is in your heart and not with just what you say? I ask all of these questions sincerely because I am a woman who is trying to let grace rule her life.
Liz, I love your questions – these are the very similar to the ones I was also asking, of my self, of others.
Hi Liz
what great questions. my take on this is that it truly begins in your heart and then it moves outward to your actions. even if i treat someone perfectly kindly and with compassion, but retain a grace-less attitude in my heart, i’m really not extending grace.
in real life, when one has to deal with a person that it is difficult to give grace to, i would just begin with a silent prayer, treat them kindly and then go home and examine my heart. there are times that god works with our actions first, and then our heart.
does that help?
sarah, i’m a recovering pharisee myself. i use to be so legalistic and ritualistic. i’m so recently removed from that that others with the symptoms repulse me. i HAVE to ask God to help me..no make me have grace for the grace-haters. and i son’t know if they are grace haters, as much as they are grace-missers. they are just missing it i know. because i stood in the legalistic corner for too long. it wasn’t till i stood in the middle of grace that i had any idea i was missing it.
may God reveal himself to her (blog girl). heal her. humble her, and bring her into grace.
I promise promise that said blogger will neither be reading nor commenting today. She does not read my blog.
Beautiful, Sarah… I remember our coffee date. It was one of my favorite moments. Thank you for the grace you’ve extended to me…
mine too. but i’m thinking about the grace you are giving me…
As I’m reading this I’m thinking: “Oh God, I hope she isn’t talking about me.” Because in the midst of brokenness and hurt we all forget about grace. We all spout off filth and press the publish button or the send button or pick up the phone and let it flow from twisted tongues. When we should be taking our legalistic ideas, our hurts and anger and gossip to the throne of grace.
“A major step for returning to spiritual vigor and strength is to forgive all who have been part of the hurts of life. Forgive those who have failed you, who were not there when you needed them the most. Forgive the gossips who carried the news…to every believer in the vicinity. Forgive those leaders and elders who have hurt you with their words and actions. And forgive those who you thought were spiritual giants, but were found to have feet of clay and a set of weaknesses just like everyone else.” -Malcolm Smith
wow Jessica! i love that quote so much. thank you for your comment and for the quote. might be using that.
My husband and I were just talking about this yesterday, not with a blogger, but with a pastor. When I think or talk about this person I get so worked up. I have not been extending grace to them, and God showed me that yesterday. Loved this post, Sarah, and your comment about it not being one of us cracked me up!
Have a great day today!
One of our family mottos is that ‘We give Grace’. We’ve really tried to instill the concept of grace into our children. Sometimes when they’ve done something wrong we’ll say “Today you get Grace” and explain God’s grace.
I am now re-examining our teaching and wonder if we’ve taught our kids about giving grace to the grace hater. You always make me think, thanks Sarah!
Of course, like some of the other gals you have me thinking about my own blog hoping you’re not talking about me but I don’t even know if you read my blog. I will be thinking as I write in the future.
Coming from an other angle, and thinking along the lines as Liz, I am wondering about some things. Like how we need to be grace living and grace loving – and that when someone’s grace-hatred is more poisonous we need those prayerful boundaries for our own safety, and to keep ourselves from being another view, click or comment feeding their hatred. As an abuse survivor I know that there are times when a relationship – even by being a reader or a bystander – needs to be given to God so that He can tend to it. We prayerfully surrender it, and we stay away. When we get worked up with no way of offering grace or correction as believers should we need to stay away from feeding that grace-hating way. Pray for that person, I’m praying for her (the blogger) now, but I wouldn’t go to her page.
Just my humble thoughts as I approach this prayerfully…
i agree with you Shanyn. Thank you for your insight. It is much appreciated.
Hugs you Sarah, bright blessings – always and in all ways…
Excellent, excellent reminder for me. And as someone that can be a bit quick to spout off opinions, I admit that I may often need to be on the receiving end of others’ grace. Merci.
sarah, you are an incredible writer! so thankful for your thoughts on grace. btw, i have just bookmarked your wonderful blog! awesome stuff! mike.
Thank you so much Mike. Your book is awesome and I’m telling people about it. we enjoyed hearing you speak at Newsong the other week. Wonderful.
Thank you for taking the risks you do and for inspiring the rest of us.
This is the age old reason that people give when they say they don’t want get involved in Christian churches. It’s the “church lady” syndrome, those souls that walk as if they are not sinners, and the rest of the world must meet THEIR standards according to how they see the demands of being a “good” Christian. The best Christians are the ones that admit we are not perfect, we struggle, we are sinners! Otherwise why would Jesus have to die for us?
This is a tough one Sarah….
We all have “opinions”. We all try to justify them. I think by reading your many comments that it is obvious that immediately the response is from anyone who happens to “blog”, “Is this me?” I think it’s safe to say that if someone is willing to admit a wrong, that they hold a semblance of grace. I have so often doubted myself in this area… I feel often times that I can give too much grace. I doubt if I give it enough even then. Grace is not conditional. At least God’s isn’t. I think we all struggle with this one. One’s opinion is just that… a opinion. I so hear your heart in regard to touting God. Gosh! I can’t tell you how often I fear that I will come across that way… ungraceful, lacking in love, being too
full of myself. That is one of my hugest dislikes. We all have the ability to sound self imposing, full of ourselves and lacking in so many areas when we take the leap into cyberspace with our all important words and ideas. It’s hard. So tough at times…. how do you be hard and soft? How do you speak truth in love when that is your deepest desire and yet you are at the mercy of your readers? Not knowing how they will translate what you have tried so hard to convey? You can hope and pray that your heart will be heard, but sometimes, and often times, it might not. This is one of my greatest fears as a writer. I have been called to truth. I have been called to write it. But I have also been called to love in, around, and through every aspect of it. I miss the mark I’m sure more than I hit it. But I can say this… I feel sorry for the blogger that you described today. My heart hurt immediately for her. She may not even know. It could be any one of us. To speak bold and true is tough. I am hoping that her heart really is good. That it really is in the right place, she just hasn’t been told the truth herself, in love, that she is a little off sometimes. I hope that whoever ends up doing this, does it soon. It breaks my heart that she thinks that she is sharing the things of God and is instead wounding with her words. Thank you for making me think today… thank you for allowing us the opportunity to share our input with you. I pray that today we all will have a bit more grace… especially for the ungracious, and the unlovely in all of us. Blessings. ~melissa
thank you melissa! i kinda responded below to this and a few other comments that were similar. =)
I believe we have to watch what we write and also what we read. I have come across blogs that have made me so miserable. I am such a useless Christian why would God ever bother with me, then i remind myself of his eternal grace. I also remind myself that sometimes what we read isnt always what is true. xx
i agree. sometimes i get stuck in that cycle: reading what I know makes me upset. thank you for the suggestion.
At Relevant this weekend, Sally Clarkson said “we cannot share what we do not possess.” Though I realize some people withhold grace (or as Serena Woods said, “hoard grace and kill it), there are those who simply don’t know – I mean, really know Grace.
This is timely for me. I defriended someone on facebook yesterday, because seeing their profile was causing me so much anger. I found that finding forgiveness was easier without an ever increasing story… so I did it. This person and I no longer communicate anyway… but as the first commenter talked about avoiding blogs here I needed to avoid this person. I feel lousy for cutting them out of my life, feeling a bit like I’ve cut my ability to show them grace but it became the best thing for my family.
Chris, I just had to give you some love, and let you know I’m praying for you as well. When you set those sorts of boundaries you are giving yourself access to grace – and giving God a chance to work in your heart and theirs without the anger. You’ve set a good boundary, and it’s one I’ve set before as well. Prayers for you and for them.
In my egotistical thinking, I thought to myself “oh my gosh is this my blog? Am I a grace-hater?” t
This was such a convicting post for me because there are times when I get so fired up about a cause and other blogger’s views that when I write…..somehow grace exits the building. And when I read other blogs and I see hateful comments, again grace exits the building. There is a very delicate balance between judgement and spiritual correction.
Tiffany, i promise that this post was not about any one of you. please believe me. =) we are all on a journey, right?? i’m still learning so much and i think it will be that way for a very long time.
i lack givng grace to my ex… he is a christian who yells cusses and puts me down. my prayer for him is for God to break him because i got tired of asking God to forgive him
interestingly, i really did not think any of you reading/commenting would think that I’m talking about one of you. I won’t qualify it any more than this, but she does not read this blog. we don’t run in the same circles. I had not meant to worry anyone at all.
regardless, i need to extend grace every day. even now, right this minute.
thank you ALL for continuing to give me grace on a daily basis.
yay it’s NOT me…coz we met already! woohoo! LOL
btw. great post. His kindness leads people to repentance, we must share the same kindness He gave us to others as well. amazing grace indeed.
Great post Sarah! You make a great point by telling a great story. I’m right there with you….
Dan
From all the comments, we can see that grace is something that we love to receive . . .but can struggle to give. Thank you so much Sarah, for opening up our grace gates today!
I lost a friend to suicide, in part because she was sexually abused as a child. About a year later, I was sharing the Gospel with an accused rapist and pedophile at a Bible study in my house.
You can read about that here:
http://thenoreaster.wordpress.com/2007/11/26/when-lightning-strikes/
But, you know something? That was easier to do than to share grace with someone who hates grace.
And I am not kidding.
it’s hard to share grace with folks who don’t know they need it, isn’t it? another way of saying that is, if they don’t know they need it, then they can’t receive it. my experience is they almost become patronizing or defensive. i looove pouring grace onto someone who is desperate to have it. (probably because that was once me, and now that i’ve tasted it, i know i can’t live without it).
that breaks my heart about your friend, but isn’t it true that god uses ALL THINGS for his glory and our good. even the tragic things. thanking him for the opportunity you had and that you did.
xo
Um, wow. My heart breaks for the person who can not see grace… let alone US- who have trouble giving grace for people who feel don’t “deserve” it.
May I borrow your copy of Gracenomics when you’re finished:)? I’ll send you something from my little “library” in exchange, how about that? A cross-country book exchange.
Bless your heart, friend. D
I would if I could. I am reading it on amazons kindle app for the iPhone. How’s that for a digital generation?
You’re so stinkin’ savvy… will I ever lose my love for a physical book in hand? I can’t imagine. Although it makes perfect sense… In the meantime, I still have a physical lending library;). Bless you friend. D
I have a long way to go in being grace-filled, it’s really a new experience for me to even think of God in that way. I’ve struggled so much with being turned off to God by the angry blogs out there that I find myself being careful about the blogs I read consistantly because I can feel so horrible reading majorly judgemental or over generalizing. And yet I still wonder if I can come off that way to others.
i have been there.
i have been the lost son, welcomed home with the riches of the Father.
and i have been the older brother, resentful and angered of the wealth and blessings bestowed on the wayward one.
i can easily forget God’s outstretched hand of grace that pulled me out of my own miry clay.
may i long for grace. to give it, receive it and remember it in light of God’s resounding truth!
Oh yes… let me rest in this… GRACE!!!
This reminded me of that same post Tracee mentioned on Pete Wilson’s blog. I believe he was quoting Matt Chandler, when he said “We must give grace to the grace-killers, for if we don’t… we become one”. Never left my heart since. Doesn’t mean I’m always gracious. LORD knows, I need grace in my grace-less moments.
Thanks again, Sarah for being such an inspiration to SO many!
Gasp, yes! This is the hardest one for me. How easy it is to show grace to the humble, and how hard to show it to people who seem arrogant or callous! But they need it just as much. And if I can’t extend it to them, then really, I’m kind of arrogant too. Dang, it’s a hard road to follow!
Sarah, OMGoodness gurl, speakin some truth! It is truly so much easier to shed grace to those who are genuinely sorry, remorseful, grateful, longing to be restored… than to those who are too big for their britches, down-right-mean, right all the time. I want to be the one who can give grace to all. The Lord knows I sure do want enough for me.
I appreciate the reminder. The Father is using you. And I am thankful for those that are willing to be empty vessels looking to be filled…only with the goodness of the Lord.. pouring out. encouraging His children.
This hit me right between the eyes, Sarah. Great post. Thanks!
It’s hard for me sometimes to extend grace to others when I feel they hurt me or my loved ones… but then I remember how I have hurt my precious savior when I rejected His truth or put something or someone before Him and then with His help I can extend grace to them. Marvelous post Sarah!
ugh, i know. maybe it’s easier to have grace when we’ve connected in real life. but still we are called to grace. and love-even when it’s not easy. you are so insightful. and i love you!
This? THIS it it. This is lesson #1 in my heart right now… the thing God has pinpointed and uses something new every day to re-teach.
Oh, how I love you, friend o’ mine.
grace…
that’s what LIFE is all about, eh?
all else is WAY less!
love this post, girl!
love you,
dad
Hubby and I have had this as topic of discussion the last few weeks. It’s so hard! God, give me grace and more grace for them…you love them too. But, it’s so hard!!!
this was perfect, i felt like i really got coffee with you – especially because i always get chai and play with the paper around my cup too. grace is amazing.
thanks chels!! =)