Today's Devotional

September 29, 2005

Subject:  Teaching Grace

1 Peter 4:10 - "As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God."

So my first big issue as a school teacher was catching a whole class cheating on one of my tests.  You just wouldn't believe how easy the test was and so to see the students cheating really upset me.  After letting them know that they were all cheaters, I explained to them that I would make this experience as painful as possible so that they would understand the consequences of cheating in life.  In the end I simply failed them all on that test and of course it impacted their final grade for the first six weeks, but it wasn't nearly as painful as I could've made it.  About a week later, I found myself buying that class donuts.  Donuts for the cheaters, I thought to myself?  Before they ate the donuts, I asked if they knew what grace was.  Nobody knew and I explained to them that they weren't worthy of these donuts based on their conduct, but that I liked them and knew that they were much better than the cheating label that I had branded them with.  A few of them said, Colonel we love you and I immediately responded, "okay then don't cheat on me."

As I went through that whole exercise I couldn't help but think about how this is so much like us as believers.  We tell God that we love Him and we end up "cheating" on Him.  This was an opportunity for me to teach grace to the students and I realized that this is what we should be doing as believers, "ministering the gift of grace as good stewards."  We do that not just by teaching others what it means, but by showing it to them.  

Today, don't give people what they deserve because none of us are getting what we deserve.  God is gracious and so too should we be.  Show a little and give a little grace.

Carlen