What Is Grace? 
by Pastor Cornelius R. Stam
“The father of lies” always hates the
truth, but he does not always oppose it by the same methods. If he fails to
succeed as a roaring lion he may appear as an angel of light, suggesting
that surely a God of love will not condemn Christ-rejectors forever.
Sinners, he will contend, are not responsible for their sins anyway, for
does not Eph.
1:11 teach that “[God] worketh all things after the
counsel of His own will”? And thus God Himself is supposed to have
conceived the idea of sin as “a gracious means to a glorious
end,” and to have caused man to fall into sin so that He might
finally save him from it!
Why an almighty, all-wise, all-loving God permitted sin to enter the
universe must, for the time being, remain an impenetrable mystery to us,
but one thing is certain: He is not the author of sin, and never accepts
the responsibility for it — except that in grace and love He bore its
penalty for man.
God calls sinners “children of disobedience” and
“children of wrath” (Eph. 2:2,3), explaining in the clearest
language that He hates sin and that His anger is kindled against it (Rom.
1:18; Eph. 5:6; John
3:36). But if God meant man to sin and caused him to
sin, how was man disobedient and what cause could God have to be angry?
Those who would shift the responsibility for sin from themselves to God
should remember that He proclaimed His standards of righteousness in the
Law “that every mouth may be stopped and that all the world may be
brought in guilty before God” (Rom.
3:19).
The contention that all will finally be saved may at first sound like
wonderful grace, but actually there is not one particle of grace in it, for
it is based on the theory that since God got us into sin it is only just
that He save us from its penalty. But grace is God’s mercy and
kindness to the undeserving. In Eph. 2, after calling sinners
“children of disobedience” and therefore “children of
wrath,” the Apostle Paul goes on to say:
“BUT GOD, who is RICH IN MERCY, for His GREAT LOVE
wherewith he loved us… hath quickened us… raised us up…
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus; that in the
ages to come He might show THE EXCEEDING RICHES OF HIS GRACE IN HIS
KINDNESS TOWARD US THROUGH CHRIST JESUS” (Eph.
2:4-7).
To the Reader:
Some of our Two Minutes articles were written many years ago by
Pastor C. R. Stam for publication in newspapers. When many of
these articles were later compiled in book form, Pastor Stam wrote this
word of explanation in the Preface:
"It should be borne in mind that the
newspaper column, Two Minutes With the Bible, has now been published for
many years, so that local, national and international events are
discussed as if they occurred only recently. Rather than rewrite or date
such articles, we have left them just as they were when first
published. This, we felt, would add to the interest, especially
since our readers understand that they first appeared as newspaper
articles."
We hope that you'll agree that while
some of the references in these articles are dated, the spiritual truths
taught therein are timeless.
