Seize the Moment – Day 378
The Unforced Rhythms of Grace in God’s Creation!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Tuesday, March 30.
Did you know that Jesus invites you to live in His unforced rhythms of grace?
This has been God’s intent from the very beginning. This was revealed in the ancient pattern of thought found in the creation account of Genesis 1, “And there was evening and there was morning, one day… and there was evening and there was morning, a second day… and there was evening and there was morning, the next day” for six days, but not on the seventh day for that day was set apart as different; it was consecrated or made “holy.”
Read Genesis 1 to see how deeply imbedded this refrain is into the entire creation account—it’s all grace! Pastor Eugene Peterson explained the importance of this refrain:
The Hebrew evening/morning sequence conditions us to the rhythms of grace. We go to sleep, and God begins his work. As we sleep, he develops his covenant. We wake and are called out to participate in God’s creative action. We respond in faith, in work. But always grace is previous. Grace is primary. We wake into a world we did not make; into a salvation we did not earn. Evening: God begins, without our help, his creative day. Morning: God calls us to enjoy and share and develop the work he initiated. Creation and covenant are sheer grace and there to greet us every morning. George MacDonald once wrote that sleep is God’s contrivance for giving us the help he cannot get into us when we are awake.[1]
Seize the moment and rest in the unforced rhythms of grace that God designed you for, from the beginning. Get in the easy yoke of Jesus Christ today.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from Exodus 6:7a, “I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God.”
YOUTUBE:
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Eugene H. Peterson, “The Good-for-Nothing Sabbath,” Christianity Today (Carol Stream, IL: Christianity Today, 1994), 34.