What should the world see when it looks at us?
Christ. But we've come up with hundreds of principles and thousands
of rules attempting to be Christlike. It's too complicated to wrap
our minds around. And Christ gets buried under lists, rules and formulas.
John 1:14 boils down for us what it means to be Christlike. It
means to be full of only two things: Grace and Truth. Instead of
a dozen, this gives us just two balls to juggle. It's succinct,
a two point checklist of Christlikeness. Everything we do can and
should be measured by the test of grace and truth.
Christlikeness means living by grace and truth, extending both
to others. Instead of the world's apathy and tolerance, we offer
grace. Instead of the world's relativism and deception, we offer
truth.
If we minimize grace the world sees no hope for salvation. If
we minimize truth, the world sees no need for salvation. To show
the world Jesus, we must offer full-orbed, unabridged truth and
grace, magnifying both, never downsizing or apologizing for either.
The grace question:
Why
did sinners want to be around Jesus, but don't want to be around
us?
The truth question:
Why
did sinners crucify Jesus, but have no problem with us?
Truth without grace breeds a self-righteousness legalism that
poisons the church and pushes the world away from Christ. Grace
without truth breeds moral indifference and keeps people from seeing
their need for Christ.
Truth is quick to post warning signs and guardrails. Yet it fails
to empower people to drive safely, to avoid plunging off the cliff,
and fails to help them when they crash. Grace is quick to post ambulances
and paramedics at the bottom of the cliff. But without truth, it
fails to post warning signs and build guardrails, and therefore
encourages the very self-destruction it attempts to heal.
Grace without truth deceives people, and ceases to be grace. Truth
without grace crushes people, and ceases to be truth.
Any attempt to "soften" the gospel by minimizing truth ultimately
keeps the world from grace. Any attempt to "toughen" the gospel
by minimizing grace keeps the world from the greatest truth—His
redemptive work on man's behalf. Christ went to the cross, in the
ultimate act of grace, because He would not ignore the truth of
His holiness and our sin. Grace never ignores or violates truth—rather,
it offers restitution and joy by satisfying Truth's demands. ("Go
and sin no more.")
Like a binary star consisting of two suns that revolve around each
other, truth and grace are equal and inseparable. Luther said the
devil doesn't care which side of the horse we fall off of—as
long as we don't stay in the saddle. A saddle has two stirrups.
To stay in the saddle, the church needs to mount the horse with
one foot solidly in the stirrup of truth, and the other solidly
in the stirrup of grace.
Grace and truth make us live in such a way that there is no human
explanation for our lives—in the absence of human explanation,
people turn to God as the reason behind what they see. Our children,
our neighbors, and we ourselves long for Jesus—we can offer
Him only by offering His grace and truth.
Readers' Responses to The Grace and Truth
Paradox
This book (The Grace & Truth Paradox) is an amazing delight
that brings together grace and truth in a way that makes it crystal
clear and puts it in a new perspective! Randy Alcorn has an incredible
way of explaining these two crucial descriptions of Jesus. It will
help you in reaching the unsaved, the make-believer, the legalistic,
the "seeker sensitive," the confused and those who are burdened,
or discouraged. I have never seen such clear truths in a book presented
in such a fabulous way. There is not one shred of anything remotely
unbiblical. Refreshing to read something so right on and helpful.
I keep reading it over and over. A must-read. -K. B.
More Readers' Responses
to The Grace and Truth Paradox
Reviews of The Grace and Truth Paradox
"Reading a Randy Alcorn book is like opening a treasure chest.
This is truth seasoned with grace and presented with excellence.
A jewel you dare not pass up!" -
Hank Hanegraaff, host of The Bible Answer Man,
author
of The Covering
"The Grace and Truth Paradox may very well be to our generation
what Francis Schaeffer's Mark of the Christian was to his." -
The Right Books
"I'm not a big fan of very short and easy reads, since in my experience
most are as superficial as their size suggests, but Randy Alcorn's
The Grace and Truth Paradox (Multnomah, 2003) is simple but
elegant in its succinct presentation of the mighty truth that grace
and telling the truth work together."
- Marvin Olasky, editor-in-chief, World
magazine, May 3, 2003
Audio Questions & Answers
From the book The Grace and Truth Paradox:
