Sin vs. Grace: Romans 5

"When it's sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that's the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life—a life that goes on and on and on, world without end." -Romans 5:20b-21, The Message

I will admit right now that I have already sucked it up big time at this 21 Day Challenge. It's been almost 8 days and I am just now reading the 5th chapter of Romans. My first instinct is honestly to feel like a bad Christian. Why? Because, engrained within me, is this sense of earning salvation, this lack of understanding of what grace means.

Last year, Paul preached a sermon that ignited a fire, taking the spark planted in my heart during college regarding grace and letting it completely consume me. It was a series entitled "Breaking the Rules," and you can download it here by scrolling down to the 3 sermons from March/April of last year with that title. Believing that my acceptance of God's gift of salvation was enough was a hard pill to swallow, especially for a perfectionist like myself. I think that even in my most advanced understandings of grace, I still maintained a pious attitude about service and feared that if I stopped being a Super Christian, I would fall away from the grace given to me.

It means a lot to me to know that, no matter what the circumstance, grace wins. No matter what I have done in the past, do in the present, or are tempted to do in the future, His grace covers me. It is this love that pierces my desire to sin. When I hear about people who are in the midst of struggling to do right, I think that the most necessary action to take is to first try to understand the love of Christ. Because, once you truly see how much Jesus loves you, more than any individual on this earth, the desire to stray away from Him becomes such a distant murmur. Yes, it still exists and occurs, but it no longer drives you.

I feel very blessed to be loved by many people. I have a wonderful family, and a wonderful set of friends. I have a great church, and a man who I am in love with, and loves me back. Taking all of this into consideration, the love I receive from all of these individuals is a speck, a fragment of the love that God has showered over me in the death of His Son. How can I help but be radically changed?

I would like for people reading this to take a bit of a self-assessment as well as an assessment of me, simply for accountability purposes. Ask yourself if your actions stem from religious duty, a fear of disappointing God, or genuine love and adoration for Him. Then, as a personal favor, I would ask you what you see from me. I know what's in my heart, but I would hate to send a different message than the truth of what's going on. If you are brave enough to share, and to be completely honest, I'd love to hear your thoughts!