Epic Grace

There’s a lot of grace on my desk today.

My coffee mug and recent book I read remind me to keep looking for God’s grace. That’s what I love to do on the GraceNotes blog.

The book, Epic Grace: Chronicles of a Recovering Idiot by Kurt W. Bubna shows how God offers second chances and unconditional love through grace.

Throughout the chapters, Kurt shares with honesty and humor about God’s grace during perseverance of trials, the restoration of our hearts to Him, and how grace helps us see ourselves as God’s masterpiece when we see failure. He writes about the challenge of loving the unlovable, relying on God’s grace to extend love to others as our calling.

One chapter that that particularly blessed me was the one entitled Lost! In it, he recalls the adventure with friends of climbing Mount Adams. Seven hours into the treacherous climb, he decided he couldn’t endure any more. He chose to turn around and hike down the mountain by himself. Tired and not thinking clearly, he headed away from the group, trudging through deep snow. The moving snow under him created an avalanche. Tumbling down the mountain, he feared he would not live. The choice of hiking by himself nearly cost him his life.

The lesson learned the hard way? He writes:

“I learned how foolish it is to get isolated. We need each other. We weren’t made to be alone.

The first time the word alone is used in the Bible is in Genesis 2:18, when God, after creating Adam, says, “It is not good for the man to be alone.”

Even Jesus told his disciples, “I am not alone, for my Father is with me” (John 16:32).

We weren’t made to live life on our own. It’s not healthy for us to be alone. When we get isolated, we get into trouble.”

It’s easy to believe the lie that we don’t need others.

Isolation hurts. When it happens perspective is lost. And, when we are withdrawn from other believers, we become a target for the enemy (Satan) to pick off.

God created us with a deep need for connection.

We may not like it, but we need each other. An ember lying outside a fire will soon die down. When it’s placed near the others, it will keep burning. We need others to be help the fire burn brighter.

Even as Jesus went to the garden of Gethsemane to pray, He took His closest friends with Him. He said, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me” (Matthew 26:38 NIV).

Although He prayed alone, Jesus requested the presence of trusted friends. This shows His humanity.

Can we be vulnerable to ask for others to help us through the rough places of life, to ask for direction when we’d rather not? While it is true that God is always with us, sometimes we need the encouragement of someone with flesh on.

God’s epic grace flows through us to encourage each other in this broken world. <Click to tweet>

Epic Grace: Chronicle of a Recovering Idiot is available now at christianbook.com, amazon, and Barnes and Noble.