Logos -- Romans 5:1-5

I'm sitting outside this morning, on a rare, quiet day off, and enjoying our patio. The birdfeeders are a blessing. How wonderful to be able to just spend some time sitting on our porch swing (which is actually a patio swing), watching the birds. So this blog post this morning is brought to you from outside (wireless internet is also a blessing).

This is Monday, and today the blog post will be based on a lectionary reading. For reference, all of this week's readings can be found at this link. Today I chose Romans 5:1-5.

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.

Three points to remember become evident to me as I read this text this morning.

1. We have been granted access to grace. I think that we sometimes take that for granted. We don't often realize the difference that it can make in our lives. Because of Jesus, we -- even me, even you -- have access to the grace of God. It's incredible.
2. The fruit of that grace is not always something that we expect. In the midst of suffering, do we really expect to find hope? This passage tells us that grace will bring us hope through suffering. I truly don't believe that God brings us suffering so that we can have hope or develop character and endurance, but I do believe that God has promised that we will not experience pain alone. He is with us. And when he is with us, he can create the unexpected -- hope.
3. I found one reference this morning which stated, in speaking about this passage, that "God is not finished." We forget that sometimes, too -- God is not finished. He has not given up; in fact, one of the blessings of grace is the realization that transformation is not only possible, but expected. We will be transformed. That promise is not dependent upon outside circumstances. God will rain grace upon us.

We have been given access to God's grace, and the gifts of that grace are vastly beyond our expectations. God is not finished with us, and the work that he is doing, out of love for us, is independent upon circumstance. Even in suffering, we are not separated from God.

Images: Two from our birdfeeders - a tufted titmouse and a nuthatch.