Skip to main content

Grace Extensions

AS GRACE EXTENDS 
SO THE GLORY GOES
2Cor 4:14 knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence. 15 For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the glory (revealing? Fame? Beauty?) of God.

I am somewhat new to the hair style scene. At least to the scene that requires extensions. I asked my wife about a lady's hair and how beautiful it was and she remarked back, "Oh you mean her extensions?" After an explanation I was lead to believe that the extensions were not a part of the lady's real hair, but it did make it look more beautiful.

Extensions not only are for making things longer and more attractive but also for assisting in our getting across or over something that is in our way--a hindrance or hurdle. Take extension ladders for example. When you slide the extension part of the ladder up for use it allows for us to be able to reach much higher than normal. When you are finished you can retract the extension part, restore the ladder to normal size, and store the ladder back in the corner for later use. Then there is the extension bridge that utilizes engineering finesse to construction a longer bridge to span the distance from one side of the river to the other. Extensions are for attraction, to reach higher and too gain access. Grace is an extension for the glory of God.

“Grace extensions” lead to increased thanksgiving which in turn glorifies God. Evangelistic grace brings glory to God as well as edifying grace! Grace extensions are avenues for God to break into this world—through our circumstances so He might reveal Himself in us and through us to other so they might see Him and be drawn to Him. God is also revealed in us as we extend grace to others like He has extended it to us. Grace makes the glory shine--it makes you look beautiful, and as you reach out to extend a hand to another, it lifts them higher and helps them gain access into the grace within which you stand (cf. Romans 5:2).


How does grace extend to others? By believers being active in the world in love? I think so.

Are you needing a grace extension? A ladder of God’s grace extended to you to help raise you up?
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

"Just Thinking About Jesus"

I was wondering today about how I could start meaningful, spiritual conversations with others whom I know are not Christians but perhaps once were. I wondered how I would come across if I was deep in thought and he or she asked me, "What are you so deep in thought about?" and I replied, "I was just thinking about Jesus." I wouldn't want it to be annoying, just bridging. I was reading over an article adapted from The Evangelism Study Bible, that explored responding to people who have had a bad experience with Christianity. I found their five reminders worth repeating and good for keeping in the back of your mind, once practiced in your "holy imagination" (aka, spiritual reflection). 1. Don't be defensive. Remembering that it isn't so much that you do not agree, but HOW you disagree that will stick in their minds when they walk away. Take into yourself their comments as if you were the one who did them wrong and then reflect it back to the...
Read more

Revelation's Whore as Today's Culture

  https://thehustle.co/originals/why-you-almost-never-see-a-clock-at-the-mall The word “whore” may have different definitions to some, but I want to use it as a woman who markets herself for the sole purpose of robbing men of their life for her own gain--whatever her “gain” is: monetary, lust, or otherwise. She is the reverse-consumer and profiteer at the same time, a vampiress, a luxurious drunk, functioning alcoholic. Her appeal is a marketing scheme based on not just years of study, but an exquisite composition of research and development where she is both scientist and evidence, psychologist and client--in an endless cycle and sinister feedback loop of trial and error, hypothesis and investigation, feeding and consuming. All the while tricking you into believing you are the main character. But it isn’t about you. You have entered her Nirvana constructed for you to “remain inside” her. Once her legs are wrapped around you, she is sure to suck your life away. And as titillati...
Read more

What if Metallica Came to YOUR Church?

A reaction to John Van Sloten's, The Day Metallica Came To Church: Searching For The Everywhere God in Everything ,  2010. This book caused me to rethink some of my foundational theologies, specifically Creation and the Fall. If God created us in His image and declared His creation as ‘very good’, what consequences did the sin of Adam and Eve have upon us? How deep does it go? I have some very strong thinking patterns that hold everything as either good or bad, God’s or Satan’s, black or white. This either/or (dualistic?) outlook doesn’t leave room for the mysterious. But what if all of these things were meant to lead me to something more? What if I always stopped short because I was led to believe that when I came to a certain point I had arrived—mission complete--stop here and move on to another subject? And what if that wasn't true? I was challenged by the thought of how God speaks to us outside of the Bible. I have believed that God speaks to me through many things (...
Read more

Family Time Videos