Features
“Safe” H O W
IS SAVING GRACE? By Alex Tung, PJN1
PART 1
From Amazing Grace to Abusing Grace
In his book “What’s So Amazing About Grace?”, Philip Yancy speaks of a conference at which leaders of the world’s various religions had come together to compare which aspect of each faith made it unique to others. What aspect of Christianity did they think distinguished itself from other faiths? What did they think made Christianity unique? Was it the concept of life after death, or was it God’s appearance in human form, or perhaps it was the covenantal relationship between God and humanity that made Christianity unique? The leaders were at loggerheads and in the end, it was a wandering C. S. Lewis who chanced upon the debate stating conclusively that the answer was simple – it was simply, “grace”.
Grace: The Christian Exclusive “Grace” is the hallmark of the Christian gospel and is uniquely Christian. No other faith, no other god, and no other grace is like
the grace expounded in Christianity. In order to appreciate Christianity, one would need to understand this concept of grace and to understand how grace is essential and how profound it is. Perhaps the best place to start is to imagine life without it. As a result of the fall of man, humanity became sinful and each generation thereafter until today is born into sin. Given that the wages of sin is death and humanity would never be able to sufficiently atone for its own sins, humanity would be eternally condemned to death. As such, humanity’s only redemption out of eternal condemnation was if its sin could be atoned for on its behalf by someone who, unlike humanity, was pure and sinless. For Christians, this redemption came in the form of Jesus, the one and only pure and sinless Man who surrendered His life as an atonement for our sins, taking our place in a death meant for us.
