Giving Grace

Earlier today I posted on facebook and tweeted this: "Let's give grace today, friends." I want to unpack that a bit.

1. What do I mean by giving grace?
   1. I mean being kind to, patient with, forgiving of, and assuming the best of those all around us. I mean demonstrating what Colossians 3:12-14 talks about. "Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony." (Or see Ephesians 4:1-3.)
   2. But they don't deserve it! That's why it's called grace.
2. Why give grace?
   1. We have been shown grace upon grace. We who have been forgiven much should be quick to forgive those who wrong us.
   2. And often, we've not actually been wronged. We just perceive we've been wronged because we've assumed the worst of someone. So: 1 Corinthians 13:7 "Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." If we're hoping all things, we'll be much more likely to not take offense and to give grace.
   3. It is the giving of grace that promotes unity and not division. Both the Colossians and Ephesians passages above make this point. And could we ever use some unity today.
3. To whom should we show grace? Here are 10 suggestions flowing out of our experiences recently. There are others, of course. But I hope these will move us to think of our daily interactions and whether they are grace-giving. I'll tuck a reason or two in parentheses why we might hope the best regarding them and so give them grace.
   1. Give grace to that person at the store who's not wearing a mask. (Maybe they have a condition which makes a mask inadvisable or dangerous.)
   2. Give grace to your children who are getting on your very last nerve. (They're kids. And these days are hard for them too.)
   3. Give grace to the person who seems afraid of you or mad at you because you're not wearing a mask. (Maybe they have a condition which would make contracting Covid-19 especially dangerous for them.)
   4. Give grace to your spouse who didn't quite hit the mark today. (They may have had a hard day at work dealing with lots of new regulations and expectations. It might have been rough time at home with the kids or a husband working from home!)
   5. Give grace to the superintendent of your school district making decisions. (They have been given an impossible set of circumstances. The federal, state, and local guideline are probably conflicting. And there are myriads of parent, faculty, staff, and student opinions on what they should do. Whatever decision they make, someone, is not going to like it.)
   6. Give grace to your governor, mayor, president, US or state senator or representative, etc. (They are under enormous pressure to do what is best for thousands and millions of people and have to do it with incomplete data and conflicting interpretations of that data being fed to them. Like your local school officials, whatever they decide will be met with scorn and criticism from one side or the other or all sides.)
   7. Give grace to your frazzled check out clerk, store worker, server at the restaurant, etc. (They are working under previously unknown guidelines that are hard to remember and implement while still providing the same level of service in an environment that was stressful without a pandemic.)
   8. Give grace to your friends and acquaintances in real life and online who disagree with you. (Again, we're all working with incomplete data with varying interpretations. Someone reaching a different conclusion than you doesn't make them the enemy or evil or malicious.)
   9. Give grace to your pastor whose sermon may not have been quite as scintillating as usual. (He may not have thousands or millions of people to think about, but he is trying to do what's best for your congregation of whatever size, and that's taking extra time and work these days.) 
   10. Give grace to your child's teacher. (They're trying to figure out how to provide the best possible in-person instruction during a pandemic while following the guidelines for their district, planning for the possibility of more remote learning, trying to do a hybrid of in-person and remote learning, all while being concerned for their and their family's health as well.)
4. What are some practical ways to give grace?
   1. Meet the reflex to criticize someone with prayer for them instead. Put yourself in their shoes, hope the best, and pray for them with compassion.
   2. A smile (they can see it in your eyes), goes a long way.
   3. A kind, encouraging word instead of a grumpy complaint.
   4. Disagree with with gentleness and love instead of harshness, smugness, superiority, and condescension.
   5. When you're sinned against, forgive. When you sin against someone, repent and pray for the humility to seek their forgiveness and acknowledge the hurt you caused.
   6. (Gently) remind ME of these things when you see me not giving grace. Again.