Falling from Grace

Galatians 5:4 “You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. “

This situation is mentioned only here in the Bible where Grace is the tremendous outflow of God’s love upon mankind and yes there can be a situation where we can withdraw from this grace even after receiving it.  Satan’s one method of deception is that he convinces us that we have to try hard with our might to please God. This marks most of us as failures causing discouragement. But, this condemnation from a loving God comes not as the end result of our diversion towards law, but at the beginning. As soon as we try to use any other method other than grace to come towards God, then He is offended as we do not value His ultimate gift of grace.

This can be compared with a situation when a powerful person had come to visit us to our home and we ignore him and go try to get an appointment to meet the same person through his secretary. We need this understanding of grace where God has directly come to save us with His mighty wisdom , power and love. We have to note that the fall from grace has happened as soon as they attempted to be justified by law and not after they did that. Even a small thought of using our own strength offends Him.

From verse 2, we can understand that Christ will profit us nothing if we go back to law. During the dispensation of grace, God is very patient at our sins and weaknesses but is furious when we reject grace. This happens when we go behind celebrity pastors, prophets and trust in them completely than in Christ Himself.

Verses 5 and 6 explain that the only response we need to give back to grace is faith by love. In Luke 17:6 when Jesus was requested to increase the faith of the apostles, Jesus mentions about the power of faith even in the size of a mustard seed. This tiny faith becomes powerful not by of any of its characteristics, but because of its presence there. Sin does not remove faith, but deviation from grace removes the complete presence of faith. That’s why Jesus was excited by the faith of the Centurion in Mathew 8.

 The same incident as recorded in Mathew 17:20, the reason for the lack of ability to do miracles was that the disciples did not have faith (verse 17). There is a difference between absence of faith and presence in the size of a mustard seed. Any disbelief will automatically make us faithless. There are many verses (John 16:9) which point to the lack of faith leading towards sin. Faith is the license we are expected to have for Christian growth and the Holy Spirit helps as the fuel. Lack of faith distracts us to make drastic decisions in our personal and spiritual lives. If we are faithless and do not believe in God’s grace, we will try to do things on our own for salvation. Faith is total dependence on God’s might, wisdom and love.

In John 3:36, we see faith and obedience positioned in opposite directions. If somebody has faith, he will automatically obey and progress. If we do not have faith, then there is wrath of God. There is condemnation for people who do not have faith in the Son. There are many other verses like Mark 16:16 where lack of faith becomes the only reason for Christians to fail into sin.

In Mark 6:6, we read Jesus wondering how it is possible for people to not believe. These people were just the relatives of the Lord and we have higher expectations now as recipients of grace. After receiving grace, if we still cannot trust in Him, God is puzzled why man is so selfish that even the ultimate sacrifice would not make him believe. Satan has always been using deception as the best weapon against grace. Churches like the Roman Catholic church had failed because at some point they mixed other traditions and rituals in the church. This happens everywhere including protestant churches and now even Pentecostalism has started to fail because spiritual experiences and some partial sacrifices are being emphasized more than faith and grace. At some point everybody become church-goers and not true Christians.

Verse 8 portrays Christ as the one who had called us. The reason Paul uses this name is because we forget our purpose on why we had been called. Calling has been done after pre knowledge and  predestination. We have progressed these levels and after being called we are about to be justified by the blood of Christ. We are all in this level and will be glorified soon only because of our submission to grace and our possession of faith. Let us hold on tightly to grace.

Amen.