The Pathway of Grace Personified

If you read Romans 8: 28-30 you will see how the Apostle Paul lays out the pathway God's grace takes when God is up to his good work in us. In the book Moving at the Speed of Grace you can find this pathway outlined as...

Begin in repentance
Believe in the Lord
Build up your faith
Bless
Bring Life
Breakthrough

Well, I'm always looking for scriptural and real life representations of this path and I believe I have found another one.

A young man named Marcus recently started attending our early worship service at South Hill UMC. For about a month he came in with one of the families in our church and sat down near the back of the chapel. A couple of weeks ago he asked to speak with me and through our conversation I recognized the way in which he had already answered God's call to repentance. That day he professed his faith in Jesus as Lord and we have scheduled his baptism for August 15th at 3:00pm at Palmer Point.

Marcus had responded to God's call and begun to worship the Lord. He had believed God's prognosis or foreknowledge and not only turned from his troubles but put his faith in Jesus. I shared how he could be predestined to be conformed into the image of Jesus that day in my office and he has been praying and studying his Bible daily.

That same day in my office he moved in obedience to God's call to serve when I asked him, "Now, that you're a Christian, how can I pray for you"? Marcus replied, "I'm alright now. I really want you to pray for my Mama. She needs the Lord." God has been bringing life to him ever since then in a marvelous way. In multiple ways - in the joy of his face, the confidence of his walk, his enrollment in college, and his gaining of a job; even the opportunity to go on vacation with the church family with whom he's living (Pray he learns how to swim while he is there.) caused Marcus to exclaim, "I have a life! I have a future!"

Indeed he does because God's pathway of grace always leads to breakthrough and beyond. Pray God will continue to show himself mighty to Marcus in ways he can recognize and praise!