We’ve all heard the term “Pay it forward” in order to bless someone financially, but today, our Guest Author Ross Smith encourages us to “Pass grace forward” so that it can become the catalyst to pursue peace. This is priceless advice. Ed.

I remember being told that ‘God helps those who help themselves’. This begs the question, if we can help ourselves, why would we ever need God to help us? After 30 years of doing life on my terms, I discovered that God’s grace helps me precisely because I cannot help myself! By the way if you think it is weak being meek, try being meek for a week! One of our greatest ‘weaknesses’ is either trying to cover over our weaknesses or pretending that we don’t have any. More and more we see the painful personal costs that ensue from these wrong beliefs.

Paul advised Timothy to “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.” (2 Timothy 2:1) His grace is the buffer that we all need to fill the space that we struggle to fill with our own resources. Grace is God’s supply to occupy and to fill every gap that we cannot fill. Grace is heaven’s supply of provision, peace and power for any person who calls upon His help.

The believer is exhorted to not “fall short of the grace of God…” (Hebrews 12:15).The new covenant is grace based. Jesus who is the essence of grace, fulfilled the terms of the old law-based covenant, so that every believer in His work can freely download His grace to do life. Doing life under the terms of the new covenant is all about receiving and dispensing His grace.  By the way it is His grace that we pass forward. He is the source. We are the resource. When grace is passed forward to others, it will also become the catalyst to “pursue peace with all people…” (Heb.12:14-15).Grace empowers us to pursue peace. By contrast, judgement diminishes our capacity to pursue peace.

When David re-entered Jerusalem with the ark of the covenant, “he was leaping and whirling before the Lord” but his wife Michal, “despised him in her heart.” (2 Samuel 6:16). She mocked him. In mocking David, she was also mocking the Lord.  She tried to shame David, but David determined to continue to honour the Lord. He declared that “I will be even more undignified than this and will be humble in my own sight.” (6:22)To be undignified was to be empty of pride. David’s posture of humility attracted the grace of God. By contrast, Michal’s judgement of David, left her empty. She had “no children to the day of her death.” (6:23)

Judgement can result in spiritual barrenness. Spiritual barrenness can impact the believer’s communion with the Lord. It affects relationships adversely. It will affect a person’s confidence and his inner state of mind and heart. Believers are empowered to speak grace into the lives of people around them and to resist speaking judgement over people. When grace fills the ‘space’, room is created for the Spirit of Christ to shift both hearts and minds.

You and I are created to receive His grace so that we can live. To receive grace is akin to breathing oxygen. You know you are struggling to breathe freely when there is an oxygen deficit. Similarly, when we are struggling to do life, we need His grace. We are not made to live without His grace.

I remember a salesman demonstrating a fancy serrated knife. He said these words. “Let the knife do the work”. We need to learn to let grace do the work both in us and through us.

Ross Smith
19 March, 2025