Thought of the week June 28

Thought of the week comments for June7

This week I had the opportunity to exercise grace to my daughter. She was so excited about going to an event at church Friday night and spending some time with her friends. We had a falling out after school and I threatened to take away her Friday night activity. Her attitude surely did not warrant this privilege of spending time with her friends. After some time of cooling down, we sat on the couch and talked about what went wrong. She realized her attitude was not respectful and apologized up and down by writing her mom a love letter. She was doing everything possible to ask for forgiveness hoping it would relieve her of her consequence. At that moment, I had to make a decision. Do I stick to my word or do I extend grace. I decided to extend grace. It was a teachable moment for me to explain how God extends his grace when we ask for forgiveness. I asked her what she thought the meaning of grace was and she said it’s when God gives us second chances. As soon as I extended grace and told her she could participate in Friday night’s activity, she was overcome with great joy and excitement. She knew she didn’t deserve to attend and I believe she treasured this time with her friends more than a normal situation. Thank God we are saved by grace and don’t have to work for our salvation. Eph 2:8 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.” Have you experienced God’s grace in your life lately? I bet if you have, it’s given you a fresh perspective of how much God loves and cares for you despite your sin. Do you need to extend grace to someone in your own life? When you do, it can be a time of pure joy like it was for me knowing that my daughter fully accepted it. Walk in God's grace today.