Karma can be one of those things we toss around. It’s easy to conceptualize: you get what you deserve, you reap what you sow…and then God swoops in blows up the formula with one word, grace.
Grace is the opposite of karma.
We were created to take this gift of grace that we are undeserving of, but that He wants to give us. To accept a gift of something we are so undeserving of takes humility. It takes us positioning our hearts to say, “God, I need You. I need what You offer.” To take the gift, we must leave our self-sufficiency behind.
It may take familiarity to get there.
When I go into someone’s home that I don’t know well and they offer me a glass of water, sometimes I have a hard time taking it even if I am thirsty. It feels awkward, and I don’t want to inconvenience them and dirty another glass.
If I feel awkward taking as simple as water, it would be understandable that it would feel unnatural taking undeserved favor, the gift of grace from my God.
You are not an inconvenience to your God. You are His child. When I walk into my father’s house, I dig through the cabinets to find the cup that I like, and I pour my favorite drink into it. I know him, and I rest in the reality that he wants to provide for me, that he likes me, and that I am his child.
We were created to get what we don’t deserve. Grace is undeserved favor, and when we accept it, God says, “When I see you I don’t see all of the rubble, I see you restored…not because of what you did, or what you deserved, but because I am God who makes all things new, and I am making you new. The old is gone and the new has come.”
We were created to accept what we could never deserve. Are you living in the freedom of this gift? Maybe you took it at first, and then as you look back to find yourself trying to pay Him back, or earn the right to have accepted it. It does not honor the Giver when we try to try to pay them back perpetually. Can we find rest in the eyes of our God and accept what we could never deserve?
Grace is the opposite of karma. It’s the formula that only our God would offer, and one that He so freely gives, where we get what we do not deserve forever…grace.
