A Fresh Perspective - June 29, 2009
Did you know that golf is a game that makes room for grace? In most competitive sports there is no grace at all. I'm not a golfer, but I remember golfing with my brother a number of years ago. I hit one from the tee that flew deep into the woods. I started off to the place where the ball sailed into the trees, but my brother said, "Let it go. Take a mulligan."
"What's a mulligan?"
"Don't you know? It's part of the game. If you hit a real bad shot, you can take a mulligan. We don't count it."
"Really? How many mulligans do you get?"
"That depends on how many really bad shots you hit."
"Take a mulligan," he said. A gift of grace. Where bad shots abounds, mulligans doth much more abound. I wish there was grace in the sports I played. Can you imagine grounding out to the second baseman and saying, "I'm going to hit again; I'll take a mulligan." Or missing a jump shot from the top of the key and saying to the other team, "Right back at me guys; I'm taking a mulligan."
Grace is not usually to be found in competitive sports, but it lies at the very heart of the kingdom of God. Whenever we encounter grace in this world we are encountering a reflection of God. Some people have had very few, if any, grace/God experiences. Perhaps this is the reason some folks are so rigid, judgmental, narrow, and bitter. Those who have experienced little grace will find it more difficult to be gracious.
We are saved by grace, says Paul (Eph 2:8 - 10). Saving grace includes receiving and practicing forgiveness, but it involves much more. Saving grace is God at work in our lives and our communities—shaping, forming, changing, redeeming, restoring, renewing, and regenerating us.
Grace is God giving us everything we need to become the persons and communities we were created to be. Grace is God giving us God's self, God entering into relationship with us and giving us his Spirit. From a Christian perspective grace is God's activity on our behalf to heal and redeem and change us into persons and communities that reflect the love and goodness of Jesus Christ. Grace is God's power and provision for all of life.