Here are some quotes by Lewis Smedes (author of the book Shame and Grace). He talks about the good news being the message that God accepts us as we are. He also speaks of the lightness of grace. I like that idea. The true gospel of grace makes us feel lighter, not heavier; it removes burdens and brings rest to our souls rather than weighing us down and tiring us out. Grace gives us the lightest feeling in the world! Here are the quotes:
The mystery is that God was in Jesus Christ reconciling the world to Himself....He [Jesus, in His death and resurrection] was about the business of making it right for us at the core of life. He let it be known to all, once and for all, that when we are confronted by the God who made us and holds us in His hands, we are facing a God who loves us and wants our good.
The flagship word of the gospel is grace. No wonder, for grace is shorthand for God wishing us well.
....shame depresses; grace lifts. shame is like gravity, a psychic force that pulls us down. grace is like levitation, a spiritual force that defies gravity [and lifts us up].
The lightness of grace ...sets loose the lightest feeling of life: being accepted: totally, unreservedly accepted.
Grace is the gift of being accepted before we become acceptable.
Grace heals our shame...by removing the one thing all our shame makes us fear the most: rejection. Nothing will keep God from accepting us.
God accepts us with our shadows and all the ogres who live inside of them.
The message we get from God is the message we are aching to hear: you are accepted.
Grace overcomes shame by simply accepting us, the whole of us, with no regard to our beauty or our ugliness, our virtue or our vices. We are accepted wholesale. Accepted with no possibility of being rejected. Accepted once and accepted forever. Accepted at the ultimate depth of our being.
There is a weightlessness about grace. It has the feel of a fairy tale; what makes it a very special fairy tale is that it is true.
Lewis Smedes
