Formative Grace

So a question in the Covenant Group manual actually caught my attention. Why do we resist understanding that most of our formation is a work of God's grace? (82).

This is something that I personally have struggled with, continue to struggle with, and will probably never cease struggling with. And the answer is that I don't know why. I don't know why something that should be so easy is actually so hard. My good hunch would be that its because of pride. Especially in America. Especially in Protestantism.

The hole "Protestant Work Ethic" is so ingrained in our societal mindset that we can't get around it. It's the idea that we pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps, that we are self-made men and women. If I work hard enough, I'll reach the American Dream. But we are really kidding ourselves. There is no American Dream, just American nightmares. We struggle individually with what we should struggle with communally. In chapel today, Rev. Curtis spoke of discordance in our lives, those curveballs that are thrown and that we can either get thrown with it, or we can just carry on. And I think that pride prevents us from just carrying on. Pride stops us from being dependent on others. Pride stops us from being dependent on God. The hardest thing I ever had to learn was that I had to make myself vulnerable to others- that I had to have faith enough to let people in. And I resisted. I wanted to be let into other peoples' lives, but I denied that for them.

We ask for God to be in our lives. We all want to believe that there is some great purpose for our existence, but we only want it if we can control it. We want to be able to control how God works in our lives. I want to be able to control how God works in my life, and if I'm unfortunate, I'll get my way.