“If it is all about grace, then people will just run amok.”  The issue this brother expressed to me recently is one that troubles many Christians.  Grace seems to leave itself wide open to be abused.  You show grace to another and he keeps right on sinning or takes advantage of the opportunity.  Is this a serious concern?

Well, yes and no.  We need to start by making clear that grace is not a quiet tolerance of sin.  The world wants it to be just that.  Just open your mouth to speak against a sin issue and you will hear the shouts of “You are being judgmental!” loud and clear.  But how do we confront sin in a gracious way?

The title of this piece is taken from John 8:11, where Jesus is speaking to the woman caught in adultery.  As He sends her on her way He gives her the clear charge to leave her life of sin.  Yes, sin matters and grace does not call us to simply tolerate it.  However if we look at this passage, John 8:1-11, we can see some principles of how grace reacts to sin.

  1.  Grace focuses on what the goal is, not what the situation is.  The Pharisees had their minds made up.  She is an adulterer, she needs to be stoned.  End of story.  Jesus however had a goal, that the woman would be free of condemnation and live a life pleasing to God.  Note that His “neither do I condemn you” precedes His charge to sin no more.  It is not “Go and sin no more and then I won’t condemn you.”  The world sees an adulterer but He sees, with eyes of grace, a woman who can be set free from condemnation.  When we need to confront sin with grace, we don’t want to focus on the problem (sin) but rather the solution (grace).
  2. Grace allows itself to be abused.  This one is hard to take but bear with me.  What happens to the woman after Jesus frees her from stoning and condemnation and charges her to go and sin no more?  We simply don’t know.  She is not seen again in Scripture.  Did she, in gratitude and love, respond to Jesus by becoming His disciple and seeking to serve Him?  Or did she simply go back to her life of sin?  Obviously John did not feel the answer to that was important.  Jesus gives her freedom and points to the path of righteousness.  His grace could have been abused, she could have “run amok”, but He took the risk.

When we desire to confront sin with grace these principles must guide us too.  If our acts of love expect and demand a favorable reply, then they aren’t grace at all.  No, we are not called to quietly tolerate sin.  But we must, in the sin, see the sinner as someone who needs forgiveness and freedom.  Right living is important, but not the central point.  The central point of grace is the offer of “no condemnation” that is not performance-based.

Is there someone in your life that needs to hear “neither do I condemn you”?

How should we respond to repeated acts of sinful grace-abuse?