Grace

It is very important to remember that all goodness comes from God.  Every single good thing that people think or say or do is the result of God’s goodness working in them.  We have no private source of our own.  Think of it this way.  All plants have a certain amount of juice, some more than others, like the orange tree with its juicy fruit.  But the plants themselves cannot produce juice unless they get water from the ground, because no plant can grow without water.

In the same way, whatever goodness we may have, we have drawn from God.  That is to say, it is the Holy Spirit of God who helps us to think and do what is right, and he gives himself to us for nothing – we do not have to pay.  This free gift of God the Holy Spirit we call grace.  And so the Collect for the First Sunday after Trinity includes these words:

“O God…
…because through the weakness of our mortal nature we
can do no good thing without you,
grant us the help of your grace,
that in the keeping of your commandments
we may please you both in will and deed…” (1)

We can think of the difficulty of doing right as being like climbing up a slippery bank and needing a helping hand.  And do you remember the time when there was a storm on the Lake and the disciples’ boat was battered by waves?  They saw Jesus walking towards them on the water and Peter tried to walk towards him.  But Peter became frightened and beginning to sink he cried out, asking Jesus to save him.  And “Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him…” (NRSV, Matthew 14:22-33).  That helping hand now, for us, is grace.