The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

As part of a discipleship initiative at our Church in Nacogdoches, FirstNac UMC, I was asked to contribute to daily devotions which are emailed to visitors and members of FirstNac, as well as posted every day on social media platforms. These devotions include a scripture passage, a teaching based on the passage by a member of the church, and a reflection and prayer written by one of several contributors, also church members. In the past nine months that I have been writing these reflections, I have found that I enjoy the challenge of being assigned scriptural passages that are, alternately, and sometimes altogether, unfamiliar, opaque, beautiful, sad, and perplexing. 

What follows is one such passage I was assigned through the course of this initiative, along with my reflection on its words and stories as they speak to me.

Originally posted February 21, 2024, one week after Ash Wednesday

Ephesians 2:1-10 (NIV)

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

My mother is fond of expressions. No matter the situation, conversation, or problem, she always seems to have one at the ready whenever we talk. If I tell her I’m trying out a new hobby or genre of book, but am unsure if I’ll like it, she will bolster my confidence with “variety is the spice of life!” If I bemoan how hard it is getting three wild kids anywhere on time, it’s “better late than never.” Or when I tell her how good it felt to sit down after a long day: “You can say that again!”

It’s easy to get “bent out of shape” when you “miss the boat,” but you just have to “bite the bullet,” “get your act together,” and before you know it, everything will be “coming up roses.” 

I could do this all day.

While these sayings can bring comfort and normalcy to otherwise stressful and unmanageable situations, some aspects of our faith often become like this as well. We boil them down to these little pithy statements, and don’t dive any deeper. Maybe because we don’t fully understand them. Or maybe because we take them for granted.

It’s probably even like this with the most important aspect of our faith: unwarranted, undeserved, unimaginable grace. 

We write it on plaques, stitch it into clothing, stamp it into the leather covers of our Bibles. But we don’t stop to think on it, to really “dig a little deeper.” We don’t consider what our lives would be like without it. 

Imagine how much worse it would be if we knew that we would someday have to pay, “penny for penny,” for all our mistakes? That there was nothing to erase them? That God turned a deaf ear to our pleas, and that Christ wouldn’t be “cutting us any slack?”

Life would get pretty bleak, pretty fast.

There are many people out there, though, who don’t regard grace as the free gift that it is. They seem to skip over the “saved by grace, not by works” part. “No such thing as a free lunch,” some say. Or “you can’t get something for nothing.” So they condemn others for their sins, and try to appear as pious as possible so they can earn God’s favor. 

But that’s just it. Grace isn’t “something for nothing.” Grace is “everything for all of me.”

All of my ugliness, jealousy, pettiness, shameful secrets, things we often think are better “swept under the rug” are the exact things we are to bring and bare to God so He can say “keep fighting the good fight” and I love you and love you and love you.

And when we know God loves us and is on our side, “the ball is in our court,” and we just might find we cannot help but to share that love and grace with others, and help them on their journeys. Because we ourselves were loved first.

Now isn't that just “the best thing since sliced bread?”

 

God,

Please grant me the insight and understanding I require to not take your grace for granted. Give me wonder anew every day for the earth-shaking, groundbreaking, humble power of your love. And then, God, help me to bring your grace and love to the world around me.

In Jesus’ powerful name, Amen.