Grace. The bank gives us a grace period. The seedy politician falls from grace. Musicians speak of a grace note. We use the word for hospitals, baby girls, kings and pre-meal prayers. We talk as though we know what grace means.

You turn the page of your Bible and look at the words. You might as well be gazing at a cemetery. Lifeless, stony, nothing moves you. But you don’t dare close the book, no sirree. You dare not miss a deed for fear that God will erase your name.

If that’s your feeling, grace can speak to you. God’s grace has a drenching about it. It comes after you. It re-wires you. From insecure to God-secure. From regret riddled to better-because-of-it. From afraid to die to ready to fly. As Paul said in Galatians 2:20 (NKJV), “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.”  You might call it a heart transplant.

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You stare into the darkness. The ceiling fan whirls above you. Your husband slumbers next to you. In minutes the alarm will sound, and the demands of the day will shoot you like a clown out of a cannon into the three-ring circus of meetings, bosses, and baseball practices. For the millionth time you’ll make breakfast, schedules, and payroll…but for the life of you, you can’t make sense of this thing called life. It’s beginnings and endings. Cradles and cancers and cemeteries and questions. The meaning of life, the poor choices of life.

Did you know God answers the mess of life with one word? Grace. Do we really understand it? God in the Bible says, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you” (Ezekiel 36:26 NKJV). That’s grace! Grace calls us to change and then gives us the power to pull it off.

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God’s grace. It has a wildness about it. A white-water, rip-tide, turn-you-upside-downess about it. Grace comes after you.

Some years ago I underwent a heart procedure. I asked the surgeon, “You’re burning the interior of my heart, right?” “Correct.” “You intend to kill the misbehaving cells, yes?” “That’s my plan.” “Could you take your little blowtorch to some of my greed, selfishness, superiority, and guilt?” He smiled, “Sorry, that’s out of my pay grade.” But it’s not out of God’s, my friend.

We’d be wrong to think this change happens overnight. But we’d be equally wrong to assume change never happens at all. It may come in fits and spurts—but it comes! Titus 2:11 (NKJV) says, “The grace of God that brings salvation has appeared.” The floodgates are opened, the water is out. You just never know when grace will seep in.

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Some people feel so saved that they never serve. Some serve at the hope of being saved. Does one of those sentences describe you? Do you feel so saved that you never serve? So content in what God has done, that you do nothing? The fact is, we are here to glorify God in our service.

Or is your tendency the opposite? Perhaps you always serve for fear of not being saved. You’re worried there’s some secret card that exists with your score written on it and your score is not enough. Is that you?  The blood of Jesus is enough to save you. John 1:29 (NIV) announces that Jesus is “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”

The blood of Christ doesn’t cover your sins, conceal your sins, postpone your sins, or diminish your sins. It takes away your sins, once and for all. So you are saved! And since you are saved, you can serve with joy.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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Are a bride and groom ever more married than they are the first day? The vows are made, the certificate signed—could they be any more married than that?

Imagine fifty years later. They finish each other’s sentences, order each other’s food. They even start looking alike—a thought which troubles my wife, Denalyn, deeply. Wouldn’t they be more married on their 50^th anniversary than on their wedding day? Marriage is both a done deal and a daily development.

The same is true of our walk with God. Can you be more saved than you were the first day of your salvation? No. But can a person grow in salvation? Absolutely. Like marriage, it’s a done deal and a daily development. Be secure in your salvation. And at the same time, grow in your salvation.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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Why did Jesus live on the earth as long as He did?  To take on our sins is one thing, to experience death yes, but to put up with long roads and long days?  Why did He do it? Because He wants you to trust Him. Even His final act on earth was intended to win your trust.

Mark 15:22-24 says, “they brought Jesus to the place called Golgotha where they offered Him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it.  And they crucified Him” (NIV).  Why?  Why did He endure all this suffering—all  these feelings?

Well, because He knew you’d be weary, disturbed, and angry.  He knew you would be grief-stricken, and hungry, that you would face pain. A pauper knows better than to beg from another pauper. He needs someone who is stronger than he is. Jesus’ message from the Cross is this: I am that Person. Trust Me.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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If you were told you were free to enter the Oval Office at the White House, you’d shake your head and chuckle, “You’re one brick short of a load, buddy.” Multiply your disbelief by a thousand, and you’ll have an idea how a Jew would feel if someone told him he could enter the Holy of Holies— a part of the Temple no one could enter except the high priest and then only one day a year.

Why? Because the glory of God was present there. God is holy, and we are sinners, and there is a distance between us. Like Job, we say, “If only there were a mediator who could bring us together” (Job 9:33). 1 Timothy 2:5 says, “There is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man, Jesus Christ.”

God welcomes you. He is not avoiding you. The door is open. God invites you in.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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Scripture often describes our behavior as the clothes we wear. In 1 Peter 5:5, Peter urges us to be “clothed with humility.” David speaks of evil people who clothe themselves “with cursing.”

Garments can symbolize character. The character of Jesus was a seamless fabric woven from heaven to earth, from God’s thoughts to Jesus’ actions. From God’s tears to Jesus’ compassion. From God’s word to Jesus’ response. All one piece. A picture of the character of Jesus.

But when Christ was nailed to the cross, He took off His robe of seamless perfection and assumed a different wardrobe—the wardrobe of indignity. He wore our sin so we could wear His righteousness.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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Pride and shame. You’d never know they’re sisters. They appear so different. Pride puffs out her chest. Shame hangs her head. Pride boasts. Shame hides. Pride seeks to be seen. Shame seeks to be avoided.

But don’t be fooled, the emotions have the same parentage. And the emotions have the same impact. They keep you from your Father. Pride says, “You’re too good for him.” Shame says, “You’re too bad for him. Pride drives you away, shame keeps you away.

If pride is what goes before a fall, then shame is what keeps you from getting up after one. God, the sinless and selfless Father, loves us in our pride and shame. 2 Corinthians 5:19 (NKJV) says, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.”

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

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It would have been nice if God had let us order life like we order a meal. I’ll take good health and a high IQ. I’ll pass on the music skills, but give me a fast metabolism. Would’ve been nice, but it didn’t happen.

When it came to your life on earth, you weren’t given a voice or a vote. But when it comes to life after death, you were. In my book that seems like a good deal, wouldn’t you agree? Have we been given any greater privilege than that of choice?

You’ve made some bad choices in life, haven’t you? You’ve chosen the wrong friends, maybe the wrong career, even the wrong spouse. You look back and say, “If only. If only I could make up for those bad choices.” Well… you can. One good choice for eternity offsets a thousand bad ones on earth. The choice is yours.

Read more He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart

For more inspirational messages please visit Max Lucado.