Daily Devotional 8/16/22

Ephesians 4:7

In The Christian Reader, Paul Francisco wrote about his experience as a child in church. On the first Sunday of every month, before Communion, a benevolence offering was taken. One Sunday, for the first time, his mother gave him a dime to put in the offering. That Sunday, he stood up to take the bread and cup along with everyone else, when his mother said, “You can’t take Communion yet.” “Why not?” Francisco asked. “I paid for it!”

We are amused by that young man’s logic: we pay our money to God and get to partake of the privileges rightly ours. It’s the American way! While we smile at a child’s reasoning, how many adults view the grace of God the same way—something for which we must pay? Free grace takes a lifetime to contemplate—the idea that there is nothing we can do to earn God’s love and forgiveness. Did anyone pay a price? Only Jesus, who resisted temptation, walked in holiness, and died as a sacrifice for our sin. Jesus paid for the gift that is freely given to us.

Few people would turn down a free gift, especially one of eternal value. Make sure you have embraced the gift that is yours.

Mercy there was great, and grace was free; pardon there was multiplied to me; there my burdened soul found liberty, at Calvary.

WILLIAM R. NEWELL