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June 11, 2006
Grace and ungrace
As you will have gathered, I am finding juggling work, ministry and the reading I am required to do in order to prepare myself for the discernment and testing I must undergo for possible selection for ordination, a little fraught. Looming pension and the need to establish some sort of small business for myself is also a bit of a minefield and and very demanding of my time. Sleep and relaxation have become luxuries shelved for the moment on the "Pending" tray. So perhaps it is apposite that I am currently making my way through a book by Phillip Yancey entitled "What's so amazing about Grace?"
Well, for one thing, its free. Grace, not the book. Grace is a somewhat abused term in today's world, it is also probably a very misunderstood concept. You see, put in simplistic terms, grace is that spiritual state where nothing gets to you. It is the state of mind that allows the lamb to offer itself to the lion as a meal, and for the lion to respond by giving the lamb a good cleaning and sending it home to mother! You cannot have "grace" and "ungrace" at the same time, you simply cannot refuse to forgive someone who has caused you some hurt, and still claim to be "filled with grace". It simply doesn't work that way. Several times in Yancey's descriptions (he draws on experiences with people he has known and ministered too over his career) I have had a sense of deja vu and not just for 'other people' but for my own attitudes, responses and baggage.
Now I dare say that this could be because I am in a very subjective and introspective mood at the moment, but it has certainly made me look at a number of aspects in my own life which, dare I say it, are somewhat less than satisfactory. In short I am carrying around one hell of a lot of "Ungrace". Perhaps this is why I found myself identified with some of Yancey's examples. Perhaps too, as was pointed out to me in a recent interview, I do have a tendency to be my own harshest critic, setting myself very high standards - and consistently failing to achieve them! Even so, I have to recognise that I am frequently very unforgiving in my attitude towards those I do not like or who I have learned I cannot trust. It is something I will obviously have to learn to deal with and possibly change.
Another thing this book has reinforced for me, is the fact that we are, in the end, a product of our genes, our nurture as children and the life experience which we accumulate as we go along. It takes a very special, or very privileged, person to manage to get to my age without accumulating quite a few mental and physical scars, and it is those scars which make us respond in certain ways. In a way, it is those lumps, bumps and scars which make us respond to the world in the way we do. Why do I not trust certain people? Why am I reluctant to let go of certain hurts acquired in my teens? Perhaps more importantly, can I change?
According to a work I have also recently had to wade through on Eneagrams (WHAT?), essentially a personality profile, I may be able to act outside of my inherent personality type for short periods, but to do so long term is simply to cause myself damage. Ergo, they are saying that I cannot change! Yet, if Yancey is right about the experience of "grace" - there are certain things I must change, even though they are deeply embedded parts of my character.
Perhaps I am more in need of Grace than I thought.
Posted by The Gray Monk at June 11, 2006 07:51 AM
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