What do you think of when you hear the word “grace”? Some of you might think of a dancing ballerina or a beautiful sunset. Some of you might think of the prayer you say when giving thanks for a meal. While a ballerina is graceful and we do often say grace before eating, God’s grace is something more wonderful and more complicated than those things.

In the past few months, we’ve talked about how a person can be saved. First, we learned that it is through Christ alone that we can be saved. Then we learned that it is our faith alone in Christ that saves us. Now, you will learn that it is because of God’s grace alone that we can be saved.

Question 46 in the First Catechism (Great Commission Publications, 2003) asks, “How, then, can you be saved?” The answer: “By the Lord Jesus Christ through the covenant of grace.” Here is that word “grace” again.

When Adam and Eve were placed in the garden of Eden, God meant them to live forever. After they committed the first sin, God sentenced them to death. Every human who lives after them is also sentenced to death through their sin.

But God is gracious. God gave His Son, Jesus, to die on the cross so that we could live.

So, what is grace? Grace is the loving kindness of God. God loved us so much that even though we did not deserve it, He provided the way for us to be saved. It is by the grace of God alone that we are saved.