What are you still struggling with? My struggle is with an ingrained perspective change, one that I lived by for years and that I have now learned wasn’t right.
Growing up Roman Catholic, I was taught that I would get into heaven based on my good works. Now I realize that according to the Bible, I have it wrong. The more I study and learn, the more I’m seeing that my understanding was wrong, very wrong. Not sure how it happened, but it did.
Romans 9 Verse 31-32
But that Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law. 32 Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone.
I was living to try to do good works so that I would be accepted, rather than by what I’m learning to be true. I see now that it is the opposite. Once I had accepted God, I was trusted. Therefore, I should do good works as a sign of appreciation and thankfulness.
It is still sinking in and getting clearer. I thought that I had to earn my way into heaven, but what I’m understanding is that I am accepted, and I do good works because of that.
Part of why I’m writing this is to deepen my own understanding. Did you ever struggle with understanding that one?
Thank you, God, for Grace, Truth, Love, and Laughter,
Darren
P.S. Thank you, especially, for grace.
(Reminder, this is just a journal of my mistakes, experiences, and thoughts along my journey to having a closer relationship to God. I do not claim to be an authority on the subject. If you want to know The Way, read The Bible.)
Want to see more God Blog posts? https://darrenlacroix.com/category/godblog/
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This is a toughie and you simplified it well and gave this clarity. As Paul notes we are justified by faith and you are right when you say we do this as an act of thankfulness and also to follow Jesus’s great commandment when he says we must love our neighbour as ourselves. That;s a tough one too and my prayer is that we will see more of this in our world.
Darren,
I like how you sign off on your God blogs–“…grace, truth, love, and laughter… especially for grace.” Hadn’t realized you’d gone through (are going through) that tough struggle between works and grace. Just doing a little editing on a book I’m writing, and thought of what you said, and wanted to help you.. Hope this quote does.
In ‘Shaking the Foundations,’ Paul Tillich writes: “Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life…. It strikes us when our disgust for our own being, our indifference, our weakness, our hostility, and our lack of direction and composure have become intolerable to us. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection of life does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage.
Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness and it is as though a voice were saying: “You are accepted. You are accepted, accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now; perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything now…. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted.”
Sorry the quote is so long. I talk a bit about this subject in my little book, ‘Want to Renovate Your Life?’ but he says it better than I do.
A confession: One of my secret dreams is to share the stage with Darren LaCroix and give my inspirational speech ‘The Wheelbarrow’ or ‘Welcome to Serenity.’
Blessings, Darren!
Murray
Hi Darren,
Thanks for that great insight!!! I too was brought up Catholic.
This means our lives are “Gratitude in Action,” demonstrating our thankfulness for our God-given gifts by using them—using what He has given each of us. His way of showing His acceptance of us is to loan us gifts. So, each of us has “Talent On Loan From God.”
And we do good with what we’ve got.
It’s not what we cannot do that makes us who we are, it’s doing good with
what we’ve got that makes each of us a star. —which is what I said in my
2004 talk at the World Championship—coming in 4th to my friend Randy Harvey.
Thanks Darren.
Rich Breiner, Three-time WCPS Finalist 2001, 2004, 2007