Title: The Weight of Grace
Contents
Text: Dan 10:1-12
Title: The heaviness of grace
Date: Jan. 24th 2010
However, brothers and sisters, even a person like me who you think has no insufficiency, still has something lacking. One of the desperate things is that I want to receive stronger grace. I always have a wish to experience more spiritual grace.
However, as I mentioned before, I want to experience God’ presence more strongly. I want to experience Paul’s, so called, the third heaven”. Paul confessed that the spiritual experience was so wonderful that he wasn’t sure if he was in his body or out of it. Ezekiel the prophet saw the glorious throne of God’s in the edge of the Kebar River, I also want to have that kind of vision. I, as a simple believer, before a pastor, also desire to have abundant experience of amazing world of God.
From that point of view, Daniel was somebody I envy, because he was so blessed with God’s grace. Daniel, in many ways, was a very successful man. He was abundantly blessed in spiritual and in physical.
Daniel's country was lost when he was young. He was dragged to Babylonia as a captive before Judah completely fell against Babylonia. However, this shabby young man took a noble status due to the favor from Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylonia. He was wise and was outstanding in interpreting kings’ dreams. It was the wisdom from God. Meanwhile, Babylonia perished and the Persian emperor took the land. The country changed, but Daniel still remained undiminished. Far from being pushed out, he became the prime minister and ruled the whole country under King Dario.
Besides, He was so great in spiritual. He was a prophet to receive revelation from God. He was a man who knew the secret of God, had a deep relationship with God. He was a man with opened heaven above him.
I really hope we’d all be like Daniel. Be successful in this world, be successful in your business, get promotions in your work, have a happy family. I hope you’d grow prosperous in many ways of your life.
Also, I hope you’d be abundant spiritually as well. I hope you’d be filled with the Holy Spirit, have a deep relationship with God, be a man of prayers, man of scripture in a deeper level. I hope you have plenty of blessings every day.
Then, what would happen to us when we experience that kind of grace? Perhaps, we would jump with joy and praise the Lord, overflowing with thanksgiving with our face so bright. This is the thought of ordinary people.
However, today’s text brings us confusion. Who is Daniel? As I mentioned before, he was in great blessings from God. Verse 11 says, <Daniel, you who are highly esteemed>. He received God’s revelation. God revealed His secret work to him. Look at verse 1. <In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia, a revelation was given to Daniel (who was called Belteshazzar. Its message was true and it concerned a great war. The understanding of the message came to him in a vision .> <it concerned a great war>, the future which is going to happen, God's management for the universe, the secret of history management was revealed to Daniel. things that others didn't hear.
However, he didn’t look to be blessed. How did he look? The text shows us Daniel who was exhausted. Look at verses 2-3. <At that time I, Daniel mourned for three weeks. I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips; and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over.> He was sad. He didn’t eat any good food, he didn’t take care of his appearance. He looked insane. Verse 8 says about his situation like this; <So I was left alone, gazing at this great vision; I had no strength left, m face turned deathly pale and I was helpless.> He became so exhausted that he looked as if he was falling down.
Brothers and sisters, what do you think? This is the shape after Daniel got the revelation from God. Our expectation to be joyful and thankful with full enegy when we have God’s grace is now falling apart. Daniel became exhausted although he had amazing spiritual experience. Then why do these things happen?
First of all, that’s because we, the limited beings ,have experienced the presence of God, the unlimited.
Ladies and gentlemen, we meet many people in our lives, and not everyone gives the same impression when we meet them. Some encourage us, and some make us exhausted.
The situation is very much the same. We are happy whenever we go on a date, or hang out with our friends. However, we feel exhausted when we are interviewed with senior interviewers to get a job, when we have to go to see somebody to ask a big favor. Under those undesirable situations, only 10 minutes seem to go slower than 10 hours with increasing physical, mental tiredness. .
This is the same when we come to God. Essentially, we are not qualified to stand before God. We are humble creatures compared to noble God. God is the holy creator, and we are unrighteous sinners. Only by seeing God Human being can’t live. Israelites thought they would die if they see God.
Now Daniel got exhausted after the deep communion with God. God is never easy being. We should give Him all our hearts and all our souls. Likewise, we should worship Him with all our hearts in this worship service, too.
There can be one or the other reason we are okay after experiencing God. It’s either we meet God with absent-minded or God cares us with His unfailing love. Daniel was burnt out at the moment he saw the top secret of God. God is beyond our approach with His almighty power to control the future of every creature in the universe.
However, there was a fundamental reason Daniel was burnt out. It was because he couldn’t manage the grace that heavily fallen onto him. Do you know how heavy grace is?
A few weeks ago, there was heavy snowfall across the country except Busan. Do you know the weight of snow? Snow is light. It’s lighter than a feather. However, if it keeps accumulating up to 10cm, 20cm or 30cm, a roof would fall down and a branch would be broken off. This is the weight of snow. This explains the power of accumulated snow. Snow is the lightest, at the same time it can be the heaviest thing.
This is the same with Grace. God’s grace falls like light powdery snow at first. Once it piles up, you would end up being buried under it. You might even fear of receiving God’s grace.
Some may question about what I've just said. However, look! If we receive true grace, then deep agony will follow it. We almost can’t handle it. Why is that? It’s because the grace brings challengeable missions with it.
Let’s take Mary as an example. One day, the angel Gabriel came to Mary in Nazareth and said <Greetings, you who are highly favored!>. This was an amazing greeting. How many of people in the world have ever received this kind of greeting?
However, Mary turned deadly after she received this greeting. She couldn’t sleep since that night. She began to struggle with holy anguish. Why? It was because the angel Gabriel told her that she would give birth to Jesus, the Son of God. She would conceive by the Holy Spirit and would give birth to a son. As a virgin, she had to give birth to a baby. That was the result of receiving God’s grace. Ladies and gentlemen, is the weight of grace light?
Abraham had Isaac when he was 100 years old. He was so happy. Watching Isaac grow well was his greatest pleasure. One day, however, God called him. It was for sure God’s grace to be called by God. However, what was the result? Abram couldn’t sleep since that night. Why was it? It was because God asked him to sacrifice Isaac as a burnt offering. This was the heaviness of Grace.
People who were overwhelmed by Grace would want to shout <God, please don't call me. Don't come to me. I do not need revelation. Just leave me alone, please. I don't need more grace. I am satisfied with what I have now>, so that a virgin wouldn’t have to do a scary thing like bearing a child, a father not to sacrifice his son as a burnt offering. This is how we have people who ‘refuse to receive grace’.
Ladies and gentlemen, now we need to ask ourselves a question. What do you think? Do you want to experience more grace, or do you want to stop receiving grace, willing to return grace you’ve already received? This is where our spiritual homework lies. We need to make a decision <whether we experience more grace and follow Jesus, or stop receiving grace and live my life on my own. Ladies and gentlemen, what do you think of this? Probably majority of you may say <I’d like to receive more grace>. However, do you know what’s going to happen once we receive more grace and follow Jesus? We should all die. Our desires, pride, stubbornness would all die and finally we should have the mindset of dying on the cross.
This is why many people want to have easy life of faith. They just come to church on Sundays and pretend to be a faithful believer. Even today, many people feel burdened with overflowing grace. They just want manageable level of grace.
However, the problem is that people don’t taste the real joy although they go to church their entire lives. A German theologian Bonhoeffer said the reason why churches become weak and lose influence to society is because they only stick to <cheap grace>. What would the ‘cheap grace’ be? According to his explanation, it’s forgiveness without repentance which means teaching only forgiveness without changing their lives. It’s baptism without confession which means only participating in the ceremony of baptism without true confession of faith. It’s communion without true relationship, only focusing on the form of communion without meaningful relationship between God and oneself. It’s grace without the cross, discipleship without sacrifice which means Christians who want to follow Jesus and receive blessings but deny sacrifice, Christians who don’t have practical applications to their lives. He commented on those things as ‘cheap grace’.
I want to tell you now; although you may be pressed down with the heaviness of grace, I want you to receive the grace. I want you to be like Jesus. We should never get comfortable at where we are.
We also need solemn determination as Mary decided to have a son. We need the solemn heart when Abraham took the knife to slay his son. Until we know the deepest heart of this kind, we won’t dare to talk about true grace.
Ladies and gentlemen, are you afraid of receiving grace? What do you think? Would you still like to receive grace? Yes, that's right. We have a reason to receive grace although it’s not always easy. Look at verse 10. <A hand touched me and set me trembling on my hands and knees. He said, “Daniel, you who are highly esteemed, consider carefully the words I am about to speak to you, and stand up, for I have now been sent to you.” And when he said this to me, I stood up trembling. Then he continued, “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard and I have come in response to them.>
God didn’t let Daniel die of heavily pressed down grace. He touched him, had him stand up, He comforted him not to be afraid, He told him he’d been answered.
Grace pressed us down and makes us weary, at the same time, grace comes as its own wonderful way. Thus grace brings tears and joy altogether, it brings burden and comfort together.
People with full of grace willingly enter through the narrow gate. Others would look how they live and say ‘it must be difficult’, but they say something different: <I thought the life of grace would be difficult at first, but my way is not through the narrow gate anymore. Your way gets narrower as you walk along, but my way gets wider as I walk and it is the way with my Lord.>
I hope we all walk in the way of grace although it’s hard. Let’s pray like this; ‘Give us more grace’.