One of the words we hear quite often in spiritual talks, or read about in spiritual books, is the word “grace”. It probably conjures up different pictures when heard by different people. For some it is regarded as a kind of supernatural fluid that enters our souls and makes them holy. For some it is connected with the idea of something graceful, as opposed to something disgraceful or ugly. The grace of God, if we mean sanctifying grace such as we receive at baptism or restore through confession or contrition, could be described as a kind of supernatural glow in the soul because of the living presence of God within it.
However, one aspect of grace, and one that seems to have influenced the choice of the Latin word gratia from which our word grace comes from, is the fact that it is a freegift that comes to us from God. . . This is an important fact about grace . . . It is an unearned gift. This does not mean that we receive grace whether we live a good life or a bad one, but it does mean that grace is not a reward for having already done well.
The danger is that we may tend to get the idea some of the Jews had in St. Paul’s time, namely that if you keep the law you get God’s favor as a result. There are some devout people today who feel that if only they could keep God’s law perfectly, they would automatically receive the reward of great graces. But it is not true that those who want to get very close to God and become very holy will do so by making themselves a strict plan of life and a rigid obedience to a rule of life and by a great perfection in their life. It is not our goodness that brings us the grace of God, it is not by our initiatives in the way of effort and plans and rules that we shall get it . . . it is through the free gift or grace of Christ Our Lord, through our faith in Him, and is not a reward for our fidelity to rules.
In our Christian and Catholic path to God, the initiative is with God, and the progress we make is due to His free gift of grace. What we have to do is to respond to that grace. . .
The whole point about our life for God and with God and in God is that it comes from Him as a grace . . . Our part of the process is to accept and correspond with grace. If you feel uneasy with God because you feel you are not doing enough or are not austere enough or strict enough with yourself, it may be true that it is so, but it is wrong to start with a look at rules of life and disciplines and ascetic practices and then by comparing your life to these schemes to become depressed. These ways of life are only worthwhile and useful if they are a response to an invitation, which comes to you freely from God. He does the calling; we do the answering. . . We live our lives as a response to the will of God and the particular graces He gives us. Do not start off with a plan of spiritual life and then try to find God. Start off with faith in God . . . and then do what that leads you to. . .
If instead of seeing our path as a struggle to get closer to God we saw it as a struggle in which He is already with us, fighting in us and for us and in full favor of our cause, backing us up, or rather moving us by grace, then the battle, which lasts our whole life-long, will be to us not a battle to win God’s favor, but a battle to correspond with it. If you struggle to find God, you are uneasy and anxious in your struggle. If you know He is already with you, then you struggle to get rid of obstacles, knowing that He is on your side and is not frowning at you all the time, or any of the time.
Let God act. Expect God to give you grace. Feel at peace with God, even when you fail, because you are sorry at once. Have confidence in Jesus, for He has overcome the world, and His grace is given to you free of charge, day by day.
