In the previous lesson, we learned that grace is God’s favor, blessings, and goodness toward His people. Although God’s grace has always been in the world, it is something more revealed in the New Testament through the coming of the Lord Jesus into the world.

Some good verses about grace are John 1:14, 16, 17, “¹⁴ 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. ¹⁶ From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. ¹⁷ For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” (NIV)

Another very good one is II Corinthians 8:9, “⁹ You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Though he was rich, he became poor for your sake, so that you through his poverty might become rich.” (NLT)

Today we are going to talk a little bit about the difference between Christianity and other religions. The big difference has to do with this idea of grace. The basis of Christianity is that it is not a religion, but a personal relationship with God.

All religions, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, and all the others have their lists of laws and rules. Things that everyone must comply with, with the idea that if you comply with this list of duties, then you could earn or obtain grace and be able go to heaven. In other words, it is something you need to earn through your efforts and work. Even with all this, it is difficult to obtain, and maybe you can’t. But what does Christianity say about grace? Grace says that you don’t have to earn anything, we already have it. Because of God’s great love and goodness, we have this blessed grace. In fact, there is nothing we could do to earn it; rather, it is given to us by God’s love. We already have it, and this is beyond our efforts. We have it because of what Christ did 2,000 years ago. We have it because he paid the price for all our sins and failures when he died on the cross. He received the punishment for our sins there on the cross. That is why today we have this grace, that is, God’s blessings, favor, and goodness. Not because of what we have done, but because of what Christ did.

For us, this grace is a gift, it is free, but this grace we enjoy was very costly for Christ. He paid with every drop of his blood so that we might have this grace in our lives today. This grace includes not only the forgiveness of sins, but also eternal life in heaven and abundant life in Christ now.

Someone might say or think, but you Christians also do works like other religions. Yes, but the difference is the motivation. When we do Christian disciplines such as praying, reading the Bible, attending church, it’s because we want to and not because we must. We like to serve Him by helping and serving others and evangelizing, they do it to try to earn God’s help and blessings, and we do it because we want to. They do it to try to get God’s help and blessings, but we do it because we love God and because we have already experienced this grace and want to share this good news with others. It is out of love and not out of obligation or to gain something.

How good is God’s grace, and it is available to everyone. You only need to surrender your life to Christ and seek Him to experience this beautiful grace.

Now, there is a mistake that some people believe. They say that because we are in grace, we can live any way we want. We can continue sinning or living for ourselves because we have grace. No, my friend, people who think that way have not truly experienced grace yet. Because when someone receives or experiences His grace, they no longer want to sin and want to live for Him out of love and gratitude because they have experienced this love and freedom and life that is in Him.

Friend, there is grace from God to help you today. This grace can forgive you today, or strengthen you, or whatever you need. You just need to receive it by faith and ask for it.