Amazing Grace

Jesus tells a story (Luke 15) about a young man who insults his father, destroys the family’s inheritance, lives among foreigners, and loses his faith. In desperation he finally decides to go back home. And is warmly and lovingly welcomed home by his father. But instead of celebrating the love of his father for his brother, his older brother jealously rejects him. He correctly points out that this younger brother has done nothing to deserve his father’s love.

And I recognise the older brother every time we Christian people evaluate the lives of those who seek the Love of the Eternal Father. We are the older brother whenever an unmarried mother seeking the baptism of her child is judged unworthy by Christian people; or when a gay couple is refused God’s blessing in a Christian church because we believe that they do not deserve their union; or when a person of another faith is not welcome to pray with the Christian community because they have not learned to do it ‘our’ way. We are so convinced that people must earn the right to be loved by God. And so bewildered by the concept of God’s unconditional Grace.

“Please Lord – unmake our hardened hearts. And convince us Christians that your Grace is best revealed in the way we show mercy to the outcast.”