What is Grace Anyway?

This was taken just moments after giving birth to Tinslee Hope. A very special time in my life where God was showing me the beauty of not only being saved by his grace, but living in it daily as well.


Grace. I love Grace. For it is by grace that I have been saved.

What is grace?

Grace is God's merciful activity that gives undeserving people like me the desire, power, and resources to live as he designed.

I have been a Christian - a lover of God - for 14 years now. It has been and continues to be the most amazing journey of my life. Just when I think the lights are coming on and I am "getting it" I realize there is so much more. I want more.

Our church is in the middle of a sermon series on grace, our small group is studing it, and H and I can't stop talking about it.

Can you really study grace? Can we as humans ever understand it? Our equipping pastor compared it to trying to fit the ocean in a bottle. I couldn't agree more.

Do you ever sit and wonder how your children will describe you when you're old, and what they will tell their children you were like as a mom? Do you wonder what will be said of you at your funeral? How will the ones you loved most deeply describe the heart of who you were?

There are alot of things I would love to be remembered by, but one thing that drastically stands out is grace. I would love to be remembered as a woman who lavished (give in great amounts or without limit) God's grace on people.

Why do I want to be known for Grace? Grace was lavished on me at a very difficult and pivotal time in my life. It was a time when I couldn't see or even feel God. He used a beautiful woman to pour his grace into my life, and it forever changed me and my legacy.

For me, at this particular place in my journey, grace just sums up who God is. He is just this daddy with this perfect love for me and there is nothing that can seperate me from it. Not death or life, angels or demons, present or future, or any powers. Not height or depth or anything in all creation could make God love me less or more than He allready does. I don't want anyone I know and love to miss this beautiful, life-changing gift. Therefore, I want it to make up every part of who I am. I want to just breathe grace. I want people I encounter to be different because I showed them some of who God is.

I'm not sure if you've experienced grace, but experiencing it daily I'm convinced I couldn't breathe without it. When I'm left to having to be good enough, or feel as though I need to measure up in some area, it feels so suffocating. As I cling closer and closer to the one who just makes grace what it is, I begin to see it sneak out in my life. I'm surprised sometimes by my reaction to things and find myself wondering....where did that come from? I am realizing that the more I cling helplessly to my creator, king, and lover of my soul, I'm receiving his grace. As I receive this beautiful gift of God for myself I am somehow more able to give it away.

God would you lead this heart of mine into the place of living from your grace daily? Then Lord Jesus would you equip me to share it with every single person I can.

I once was lost, but now I'm found, once blind, but now (most days) I see.

Grace - it leads me here in my everday life, and it is the very heart of what will one day lead me home.

This is dedicated to a very special woman who was someone that stood out in my life as a living, breathing example of God and his grace.

Thank you Sue.