What God Wouldn’t Let Me Ignore
“But God demonstrates his own love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” — Romans 5:8
Some people just bring out the worst in me. Like, the blood-pressure-spiking, passive-aggressive-prayer-level worst.
You’ve encountered them, I’m sure. They interrupt when you’re talking. They roll their eyes when you’re vulnerable – or when you dare to be joyful about something important to you. They keep score. They twist your words. They act like compassion is weakness and empathy is a performance.
If you just thought to yourself, “I know exactly who you’re talking about” – bless you, because you’re in the right place.
Here’s the difficult truth I have wrestled with this past year or so. God calls us to love those people anyway.
Not tolerate.
Not avoid.
Not quietly seethe behind passive-aggressive smiles.
Love. Them. Anyway.
Grace is one of those words that sounds pithy on a coffee mug—but in real life? It’ll jack up your entire sense of justice. It’s mercy where you wanted paybacks. It’s softness where you wanted someone to experience the same Category 5 storm they caused for you.
“Grace isn’t about fairness. It’s about freedom – yours and theirs.”
Grace doesn’t wait for an apology. Grace doesn’t require acknowledgment of wrongdoing. Grace doesn’t hinge on the other person “getting it.” If it did, it wouldn’t be grace. It would be transaction, and that is what I continue to struggle with personally.
I want your apology to me to be as deep as the hurt you caused me – but that is not what grace is. And when it’s not? When the apology is shallow, hollow, unbelievable, or never comes at all? That’s where grace either lives or dies.
We love the idea of grace when it’s to our own benefit. Of course we do! But we cringe at it when it’s being given to someone who hasn’t earned it.
And yet, Romans 5:8 hits me right in the chest – “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
He didn’t wait for us to change first. He didn’t require an attitude adjustment or a behavior makeover. He moved toward us in the middle of our personal chaos. He went ahead and gave us grace before we ever deserved it.
To clarify my position, though, grace doesn’t mean becoming a punching bag and allowing people to treat you poorly. The whole “turn the other cheek” thing has been misinterpreted and used to instill guilt for actual, natural emotional responses to pain inflicted by others’ actions or words.
To me, grace doesn’t mean you continually turn the other cheek. We only have two cheeks! You can love someone from a healthy distance. You can extend mercy without enabling dysfunction. You can forgive without reopening the door to chaos.
Grace isn’t weakness – it’s restraint (which I admittedly struggle with….do you?) It’s the spiritual discipline of saying, “I choose mercy. I choose kindness. I choose to rise above this, even if you don’t.”
It’s not about ignoring the hurt, although it feels like it sometimes because I want offenders to acknowledge the pain they caused me. It feels fair and right that they take accountability and feel terrible for what they’ve done. But I have to remember it’s not about revenge or reciprocity; it’s about refusing to let the hurt turn you into someone you’re not.
I won’t pretend that I ride on a moral high horse. Sometimes the ungraceful person is staring back at me in the mirror. We’ve all been short-tempered. Selfish. Ungrateful. Petty. We’ve wounded others with our silence, our sarcasm, our pride. I’ve done ALL of those things in a single week!
But God didn’t pull away from me. He has given me grace instead.
Every time I’m called to extend grace to someone who makes it hard, I try to remember:
I make it hard for other people and for GOD, too.
And God hasn’t given up on me. Some people may have. I’m definitely not everybody’s cup of tea, but I’m God’s. We’re not here for the approval of people anyway, right?
Grace isn’t about fairness. It’s about freedom—yours and theirs.
So next time I want to withhold grace, I’m going to try to remind myself of this again:
“While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
That’s the kind of love I’m called to reflect. Not just when it’s easy—but more especially when it’s not.
Prayer for When I’d Rather Throw Hands:
Lord, help me extend the kind of grace I’ve been given. Not because they’ve earned it—but because You gave it freely to me.
If this was your cup of tea, you might also like The Deep End.