All Of Grace

Chapter 7

By Grace Through Faith

I think it well to turn a little to one side that I may ask you to observe adoringly the fountainhead of our salvation, which is the grace of God. By grace you are saved [EPH 2:8]. Because God is gracious, therefore sinful men are forgiven, converted, purified, and saved. It is not because of anything in them or that ever can be in them that they are saved, but because of the boundless love, goodness, pity, compassion, mercy, and grace of God. Tarry a moment, then, at the wellhead. Behold the pure river of water of life as it proceeds out of the throne of God and of the Lamb!

What an abyss is the grace of God! Who can measure its breadth? Who can fathom its depth? Like all the rest of the divine attributes, it is infinite. God is full of love, for God is love. God is full of goodness; the very name God is short for "good." Unbounded goodness and love enter into the very essence of the Godhead. It is because His mercy endures for ever [PSA 107:1] that men are not destroyed; because His compassions fail not [LAM 3:22], sinners are brought to Him and forgiven.

Remember this or you may fall into error by fixing your minds so much upon the faith which is the channel of salvation that you will forget the grace which is the fountain and source even of faith itself. Faith is the work of God’s grace in us. No man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Spirit [1CO 12:3]. No man can come unto Me, said Jesus, except the Father Who has sent Me draw him [JOH 6:44]. So that faith, which is coming to Christ, is the result of divine drawing. Grace is the first and last moving cause of salvation, and faith, essential as it is, is only an important part of the machinery which grace employs. We are saved through faith, but salvation is by grace. Sound forth those words as with the archangel’s trumpet: By grace you are saved. What glad tidings for the undeserving!

Faith occupies the position of a channel or conduit pipe. Grace is the fountain and the stream; faith is the aqueduct along which the flood of mercy flows down to refresh the thirsty sons of men. It is a great pity when the aqueduct is broken. It is a sad sight to see around Rome the many noble aqueducts which no longer convey water into the city, because the arches are broken and the marvelous structures are in ruins. The aqueduct must be kept entire to convey the current. Similarly, faith must be true and sound, leading right up to God and coming right down to ourselves, that it may become a serviceable channel of mercy to our souls.

Still, I again remind you that faith is only the channel or aqueduct, and not the fountainhead, and we must not look so much to it that we exalt it above the divine source of all blessing which lies in the grace of God. Never make a Christ out of your faith, nor think of it as if it were the independent source of your salvation. Our life is found in looking unto Jesus [HEB 12:2], not in looking to our own faith. By faith all things become possible to us, yet the power is not in the faith but in the God upon whom faith relies. Grace is the powerful engine, and faith is the chain by which the carriage of the soul is attached to the great motive power. The righteousness of faith is not the moral excellence of faith but the righteousness of Jesus Christ which faith grasps and appropriates. The peace within the soul is not derived from the contemplation of our own faith, but it comes to us from Him Who is our peace. the hem of Whose garment faith touches, and virtue comes out of Him into the soul

See, then, that the weakness of your faith will not destroy you. A trembling hand may receive a golden gift. The Lord’s salvation can come to us though we have only faith as a grain of mustard seed. The power lies in the grace of God and not in our faith. Great messages can be sent along slender wires, and the peace giving witness of the Holy Spirit can reach the heart by means of a threadlike faith which seems almost unable to sustain its own weight. Think more of Him to Whom you look than of the look itself. You must look away even from your own looking and see nothing but Jesus and the grace of God revealed in Him.

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This Page Last Updated:12/10/98 A. Allison Lewis aalewis@christianbeliefs.org