Grace Abounds

Romans 6:1b-11

In the verses just preceding today’s passage, Paul is attempting to explain in clear terms the impact of sin and the overwhelming reality of God’s grace. He says that after the fall, after humanity chose to turn from God and began to experience death as the ultimate consequence of sin, “where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.”

What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means!

In one breath, Paul is saying that God’s grace will ALWAYS outdo sin, and that just because this is true does not mean we should embrace a life of hedonism and utter disregard for the commandments of God. To put it another way, Paul is trying to explain two things – the ledger will always, always come out in favor of grace; and, our response to that generosity and abundance can only reasonably be a life of striving to leave sin behind.

It is clear from the tone that Paul has gotten the same or similar questions that I remember hearing from teenagers at summer camp. “If God forgives us, we can do whatever we want, right? If God loves me unconditionally and I am already saved, does that mean I can [insert sin here] as much as I want? If God’s grace absolves me, can’t I just keep doing whatever I feel like doing and then confess it and be forgiven and do it all over again?” They are good, developmentally appropriate theological questions, even though they’re usually asked with a heavy dose of giggling or sarcasm or defiance. Teenagers are by virtue of their age learning to push boundaries, to poke and prod and question, to find out where they end and the adults in their lives begin. Many teenagers push back against the trusted adults in their lives, including their camp counselors, challenging them to test whether or not they will be abandoned or rejected. It makes complete sense that they would think to do the same to God; will God still love me if I shoplift? Will God still love me if I hate my sister, or yell at my parents, or start smoking?

Always, the answer is the same. Grace abounds. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. We have been buried with Christ Jesus by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. No amount of pushing, or testing, or challenging, or rejecting God will cause God to abandon us to our sin. But, as Paul stresses, this by no means justifies our choices when we give in to temptation that leads to harm of self, harm of neighbor, or harm of creation. The faithful response to Grace is not to abuse it, but to treat it as the unearned gift that it is.

We almost always saw the same pattern play out among the teenaged campers. There were always a few who acted out to varying degrees, always pushing the boundaries and challenging their counselors to get angry or to respond in kind. But by the end of the summer, almost without exception, the misbehavior fizzled out. It took time, and patience, and usually one particular counselor or another making the choice to bear the brunt of the challenging behavior, meeting the young person over and over with graciousness. There were natural consequences of course, we could not allow dangerous or harmful behavior to continue. But the ultimate goal was always redirection and reintegration into the wider camp community. And almost always, as the campers learned that their counselors cared about them, that we wanted them there and were working hard to make their experience a positive one, their behavior changed. After receiving comfort and trust, they started to give it back. After being treated with care and respect, they started to reach out to other campers and staff members and to show care in their own ways. They received grace, and once they knew that grace to be trustworthy and constant, they started to act out that grace in their lives.

Of course, there is a difference between developmentally appropriate adolescent boundary pushing and the kind of sin that Paul is concerned about. Most of us are well past the adolescence of our faith, whether it happened simultaneously with our physical transition from childhood to early adulthood or if we came to it later in life. We may not be tempted to ask the question “Should we continue to sin in order that grace may abound?” But the reality of sin cannot be denied or ignored. One look at the news or a Facebook comment section is enough to convince us of that. Lemuel Haynes, the first Black person to be ordained a Christian minister in the US, wrote on this verse as it pertained to the enslavement of African peoples and their descendants in this country. Haynes pointed out that one justification of the sin of slavery was that it led to the conversion and Christianization of enslaved people. White Christians perpetuated the horrors of the slave trade and its descendant systems and justified the sin by claiming Grace abounded in the baptisms of their hostages. And it is true that God’s grace has flowed abundantly over the enslaved and their descendants, not because of but in spite of the white priests and pastors who baptized them. The grace does not permit the sin, no matter how abundant it might be. It is a cheap grace, thin and incomplete, that inspires such sin. The newness of life for which we have been saved is worth much more than that.

When we truly know the fullness of God’s grace, when we allow ourselves to ponder the depth of God’s love and what God has done for us in Jesus, the most natural response is not sin. Sin is unnatural, a denial and rejection of our true nature. What comes naturally, what flows easily from the reception of God’s abounding grace, is more grace. When we even scratch the surface, when we start to comprehend the magnitude of God’s love for us, the logical outcome is a life lived with that same magnitude of love for ourselves, for others, and for the creation that God so tenderly shaped for us. When we know how the heart of God breaks at cruelty, oppression, and degradation, our hearts begin to break too. It is impossible to have hearts of stone once we have recognized the sacred heart of love. Once we have known this, it begins to feel like a betrayal of that sacred heart every time we cause ourselves harm, or hold back from loving, or disregard our own needs. It becomes unbearable to witness harm while doing nothing to stop it. It is the story of every martyr in church history, every saint who died taking care of the sick or defending the helpless or fighting for the humanity of those the world relegated to subhuman status. It is the story of brave and faithful people everywhere who refuse to remain passive bystanders and instead step forward as witnesses. It is the story of communities like ours that choose to feed people because grace is far too abundant for our neighbors to go hungry. It is the story of communities like ours that choose to recognize the educators caring for young people who are struggling, many of whom are trapped in cycles of heartbreak and fear, because it is through the patience and grace of those educators that some of those young people might see themselves as worthy to receive such care. It is the story of prayer shawls making their way to the right hands at the right time, and homeless mothers receiving the support they need to keep a roof over their children’s heads. It is the story of this church family, and it is the story of the family of God. Grace abounds in our lives, and so let grace abound all the more through our lives. Amen.