Posts Tagged: John 1:29

“ONE GRACE AFTER ANOTHER”

On May 11, 2017 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another” (John 1:16, New Living Translation).

“For we have all received from his fullness one gracious gift after another” (John 1:16, New English Translation).

Commentators and translators disagree about what the last phrase of John 1:16 means.  An older commentator named Matthew Henry lists six different possible understandings of the Greek phrase.  He seems to favor all of them at once.

The truth is that I don’t know precisely what it means.  I’m not sure that John did either.  Sometimes we all (including those who wrote the Bible) speak of mysteries that they didn’t understand, and that we don’t fully understand either.

However, whatever the phrase means, this much I believe with all my heart: It sounds awfully good!  Linked with the first phrase about receiving from the fullness of Christ, the phrase seems to be saying that there is an endless supply of grace.

Grace means many things, and I have not even begun to understand it.  Leon Morris, in his commentary on John, has some good thoughts.

“Clearly John intends to put some emphasis on the thought of grace.  Probably also he means that as one piece of divine grace (so to speak) recedes it is replaced by another.  God’s grace to His people is continuous and is never exhausted.  Grace knows no interruption and no limit.  . . .  But grace is always an adventure.  No man can say where grace will lead him.  Grace means an ever deepening experience of the presence and the blessing of God.”

But, of course, if I am receiving an endless supply of grace, I need to also show grace to others.  This is part of the adventure which is grace.  However, there is a catch: I don’t always want to show grace to others.  Sometimes (often?), I want others to get what they deserve.

Perhaps I need to keep reading.  A few verses after John 1:16, in verse 29, John the Baptizer says concerning Jesus, “Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”  If that is true, then passing along grace to others is not an option.  If Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, who am I to try to dam up the flow of grace?

But while showing grace to others is not optional, it is a choice.  I can choose to withhold grace from others.  However, if I do that, those others may be harmed.  And I will most certainly be harmed.

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