Christ’s grace is like that one last big wave.
My heart doesn’t see it coming; can’t resist it.
What has held so firm to legalism, so doggedly to joyless living, is at last carried away in the roil of a final wave I never saw coming.
It’s a violent crest, and it fights harder for me than I can.
I go under.
No matter how hard, how meaninglessly hard I try to swim against it, I am under the current.
Once again, I find the rigid lovelessness inside me melt like wax on a flame. Once again, I find my fears give way to a resting trust in the ocean above and beneath me.
And I am carried away once more.
. . reminded at last that it is only He who can drown me in His love . . not I . .
. . that He is not not working hard to beach me on the sand . .
. . but rather that He has fought excruciatingly hard against the whirlpools of my misunderstandings and the current of my failures . .
And that, at last, I can rest, I can really rest, and let the tide of His mercy carry me out . .
. . without struggling to swim towards Him – choking on mouthfuls of grace – terrified He will leave me behind if only He gets the chance.
Oh, to drown in the love of Jesus Christ. To glimpse the treasures buried deep within the waters of His peace. To chance to see the unearthly beauties of a secret grace under the surface of what I have struggled so hard to stay above . .
Under the crimson sea of His blood, there is real rest . . delight . . peace . . and a world in which I already have God’s favor.
How can I possibly allow myself to drown in such reckless love, when I am such a wretch that I would choke on the very grace that keeps me far from the shore of my sins?
But how can I possibly resist, when the ocean that carries me to Heaven’s shores is the very blood of God?
But unfathomably, audaciously, resist I would, and that is why He sends His last big wave to catch me off guard.
The grace of Christ proves too much for me–even me in my most abased soul–to conquer.
I am too far under to swim up to the surface.
And, truly, this is why I am a Christian.
Over on the shore of sin, take a walk right by the coastline, and you will find a shell from a far-away land washed up on the shore. The waves gently touch it, nudging it toward you.
Within this shell whispers the music of Heaven.
This shell has a name. Hear: we call it John 3:16.
Pick up the mysterious shell of John 3:16, hold it close to your ear, and you will hear this breath-snatching, unforgettable melody within. It is the melody of how to drown in God’s peace–musical notes far more beautiful than I could ever capture in any song I could write here. I am just one carried in the Wave.
This is music written by the Wave Himself, music so mission-critical to Him that He would trust the music to no one’s mouth but His own. He Himself spoke the words within this shell. If you listen, you will hear Him calling to you from Heaven’s shore.
But He is not only over there . . on an infinitely far-away Shore you can never reach no matter how good a swimmer you think you are.
He is also over here . . He is the Wave who will drown your finest efforts of swimming and bring you to His Perfect Lands and, best of all, carry you to Himself.
Listen to the song He’s singing to you.
Open your heart and surrender to the Wave.
“For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”
Jesus, John 3:16
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Wave photograph by Kelly Cookson, profile on http://www.flickr.com/photos/mscaprikell/with/11433860/
Sea shell photograph by Karunakar Rayker, profile on http://www.flickr.com/photos/krayker/with/2118533122/
Shore photograph by Romain Muller, profile on http://www.flickr.com/photos/romainmuller/with/6581917647/
Photographs are under Creative Commons License.
God’s Word from the New Living Translation.
gracestories 