“The entire Christian life from start to completion is lived on the basis of God’s grace to us through Christ.
The Christian’s total debt has been paid by the death of Christ. The law of God and the justice of God have been fully satisfied.
The debt of our sins has been marked “Paid in Full!” God is satisfied and so are we.
We have peace with God, and we are delivered from a guilty conscience (see Romans 5:1; Hebrews 10:22).
Not only has the debt been fully paid, there is no possibility of going into debt again. Jesus paid the debt of all our sins: past, present, and future.
As Paul said in Colossians 2:13, “[God] forgave us all our sins.”
We don’t have to start all over again and try to keep the slate clean. There is no more slate.
As Stephen Brown wrote, “God took our slate and He broke it in pieces and threw it away.” This is true not only for our justification, but for our Christian lives as well.
God is not keeping score, granting or withholding blessings on the basis of our performance.
The score has already been permanently settled by Christ. We so often miss this dimension of the gospel.
We are brought into God’s kingdom by grace.
We are sanctified by grace.
We receive both temporal and spiritual blessings by grace.
We are motivated to obedience by grace.
We are called to serve and enabled to serve by grace.
We receive strength to endure trials by grace.
And finally, we are glorified by grace.
The entire Christian life is lived under the reign of God’s grace.
What, then, is the grace by which we are saved and under which we live?
Grace is God’s free and unmerited favor shown to guilty sinners who deserve only judgment.
It is the love of God shown to the unlovely.
It is God reaching downward to people who are in rebellion against Him.”
–Jerry Bridges, Transforming Grace: Living Confidently in God’s Unfailing Love (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2008), 19–21.
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