As a child, I was taken to church at least three times a week to learn about God. The beliefs of the denomination emphasized guilt, shame, and a laundry list of suggestive sins that were denounced each week in the sermon. From a very early age, my understanding of God was based on learned fear. 

   It was not until early adulthood that I first heard the word grace. In a sermon, a United Methodist minister, Dr. Leighton Farrell, explained the meaning of grace—God’s love unearned, unmerited, and undeserved. He did so with deep theological understanding. He did so with a conviction born of personal experience. Years later he would become my husband.

   Grace was an unfamiliar, almost inconceivable concept to me. After years of conditioning in fear, it was slow work to accept the idea of grace as the gift of God’s love, a gift from the One who is love, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love” (1 John 4:18-19) . 

   An understanding of grace is something that grows, expands, and becomes richer over the course of a lifetime. Grace is a living experience that unites our heart with the heart of God. If we are attuned to moments when God speaks to us clearly and unmistakably. we recognize grace. Grace is the highest expression of God’s love for humankind. Grace intimates the power and presence of God at work in our life.

   Our human capacity to understand the limitless nature of God’s love is elevated by every experience of grace in our life, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8). When we see God’s love in action and feel God’s unearned, unmerited, and undeserved love, we experience the power of grace. This is about as close to God as we can ever hope to be on this side of heaven.

   In the overblown rhetoric of the internet, “amazing” has become one of the most prosaic words in the English language. The hymn we know as "Amazing Grace” with words by John Newton (1725-1807), was inspired by a life-altering personal experience of grace in his life.

   Newton grew up without any particular religious conviction. He was conscripted into service in the Royal Navy at an early age and later became involved in the Atlantic slave trade. In 1748 a violent storm battered his vessel so severely that he called out to God for mercy. Though this experience marked his spiritual conversion, he continued in the slave trade until 1755. When his seafaring career came to an end, he began a rigorous study of Christian theology and subsequently became an Anglican clergyman, a poet, and an impassioned abolitionist.       

   With its message of forgiveness and redemption through the mercy and grace of God, "Amazing Grace" is one of the most beloved songs in the English-speaking world. It was my father’s favorite hymn; if I close my eyes, I can hear him sing it, even now.

Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound)
   That sav'd a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found,
   Was blind, but now I see.

'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
   And grace my fears reliev'd;
How precious did that grace appear
   The hour I first believ'd!

Thro' many dangers, toils, and snares,
   I have already come;
'Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
   And grace will lead me home.
 

The Lord has promis'd good to me,
   His word my hope secures;
He will my shield and portion be
   As long as life endures.

Yes, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
   And mortal life shall cease;
I shall possess, within the veil,
   A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,
   The sun forbear to shine;
But God, who call'd me here below,
   Will be forever mine.         

   Until that day when our relationship with God becomes that of a different realm, there will be trials, struggles, tests, and temptations in this world. Through the power of grace, we overcome the adversities of life. Through grace, amazing grace, we experience sacred relationship with the God of all grace. There is no circumstance of separation, lost relationship, death, or life that cannot be overcome by the extravagant grace of God.

From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.
John 1:16