From time to time I hear Christians say how much they are undeserving of God’s grace and salvation through Christ. Well, that is the definition of grace: unmerited favour.

Do people think about God’s grace as an award? If you won an award or a prize for a competition, and there were many better entries than yours, yet you still won, you may well feel it was undeserved. Or if you won by default, because others were disqualified or couldn’t compete through illness. But it’s really not worth mentioning when it’s about our salvation, for two reasons. Firstly, we’re on a level playing field—we are all sinners and therefore all are undeserving of God’s grace. It doesn’t matter if you swore once in your life or slaughtered millions, any sin disqualifies us from perfection, it’s in our DNA (spiritual and physical). There’s nothing we can do to correct that status through our actions or inactions, or to turn back time. In this race we have all already lost. But…

Secondly, God in His infinite love believed that we are worthy of His grace and sacrifice—not because of our deeds, but because of His love—so who are we to say no to God? It’s about the perspective of worth and value. Many years in the future, my son may ask me why I still keep something he drew or made, that’s not very attractive (according to his mature perspective). I can tell him that I know how much time and effort he put into creating it, and that’s what made me value the object enough to keep it for so long. Now God made Man as the pinnacle of His creative effort—He made us winners and was prepared to restore us to that position when we fell. Who are we to say that His salvation effort was not really worth it because we think we are undeserving of His redemptive plan fulfilled through Jesus’ sacrifice? God thinks we are worth it—let’s always praise Him for that and live accordingly, so that in our daily lives we continue to reflect His grace and show others how much we are loved by God and how we try to love Him in return.

The challenge for us today is this: what are we doing with our lives after having received God’s grace when we accepted Jesus as Saviour and Lord? Are we doing the good works that please God, which don’t save us but which God prepared in advance for us to do (Eph 2:10) and which testify to our faith in Him (James 2:17,18)?

Editorial by Andrew Chan