Grace be with you

DEVOTION

ROMANS

GRACE BE WITH YOU

Rom 16:20-27

The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you.

21 Timothy, my fellow worker, sends his greetings to you, as do Lucius, Jason and Sosipater, my relatives. 22 I, Tertius, who wrote down this letter, greet you in the Lord. 23 Gaius, whose hospitality I and the whole church here enjoy, sends you his greetings. Erastus, who is the city's director of public works, and our brother Quartus send you their greetings.  

25 Now to him who is able to establish you by my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, 26 but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all nations might believe and obey him— 27 to the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ! Amen.

NIV

We have come to the last concluding statements of Paul to the Saints who are in Rome, but also to us saints who live now. We probably could spend our whole time on just the phrase, “The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you”. But we already know that his grace is with us, we experience his grace everyday of our lives. Again this is the grace which is not the one some believers think is unmerited favor, but it is the Greek word which carries more of the meaning of the divine influence upon our heart and how that is reflected in our lives. So then the Lord is saying through Paul that the divine influence of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us. That may we live our lives according to his influence. This would mean that we do not live our lives according to the influence of the world. Whether the Lord or the world influences our thinking, consequently our lives can be seen in how we live. Oh, and yes it is not just going to church on Sunday. And it is not just looking good in front of other believers, all smiles and praise God! It is not about making a list of rules to abide by, because we going break one or two every so often and then what? What is it about? Is it just loving our neighbor as ourselves, well we fail at that pretty much. Is it about not storing up wealth for ourselves? Well many believers break that one too. We might think way too much about money if we are under the influence of Jesus. In fact he said it can’t be both, it has to be one or the other. Could it be about how we act in front of non-believers? Is that more like putting up that façade so they think we are good Christians? What does it mean to have the divine influence of Jesus on our lives? What did Jesus do when he was living on earth as a man? That would give us a clue as to how he would be influencing us. He healed, he forgave people of their sin, oops how can we do that? We can pray for healing. We can forgive those who sin against us. He said and when we pray the Lord’s Prayer we say forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. So we can forgive sin. We can pray for healing, forgive sin, and teach about the kingdom of God. That is pretty much what Jesus did during his whole ministry, except he died for us. Yet we have been told to die to self, putting others before ourselves, our own interests. It looks pretty simple once we consider what it means to be under the influence of Jesus rather than under the influence of the world. Our law prohibits driving under the influence of alcohol because it effects our reactions, our behavior, and our ability to think clearly to make proper decisions. The world has about the same effect on us as alcohol. But the effects of Jesus are totally different. So let us live under the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.