GET DRUNK ON GRACE
The Reformation was a time when men went blind, staggering drunk because they had discovered, in the dusty basement of late medievalism, a whole cellarful of fifteen-hundred-year-old, two-hundred-proof grace—of bottle after bottle of pure distillate of Scripture, one sip of which would convince anyone that God saves us single-handedly. The word of the gospel—after all those centuries of trying to lift yourself into heaven by worrying about perfection—suddenly turned out to be a flat announcement that the saved were home before they started…Grace has to be drunk straight: no water, no ice, and certainly no ginger ale; neither goodness, nor badness, nor flowers that bloom in the spring of super spirituality could be allowed to enter in.
-Robert Farrar Capon, Between Noon and Three: Romance, Law, and the Outrage of Grace
Image and post from The Buzzard Blog
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Hi Jen,
Yes he does write so well. I would like to buy the book, but it would just loiter unread on my shelves at present. I have such a long list of books I would like to read!
“Two hundred proof grace”–I love how he writes, this was an awesome excerpt!!
Anita,
it makes perfect sense to me too. But as always, it's not what is being said that counts but how it is being heard and lived.
“God saves us single-handedly, the saved are home before they started.”
These ideas make perfect sense to me when we consider the Fatherhood of God, and our sort of “genetic” connection to him.
I find the love of God something to get drunk on, indeed.
Thanks for your comments, BanksyBoy and Erika!
Yes, and the idea that there are “the saved” who are “home before they started” has sadly also resulted in a hugely arrogant and smugly superior group of Christians who, claiming to have all the truths and all the grace, have done Christianity as a whole a great disservice.
“God saves us single-handedly”… Oh yes! Ginger ale will just have to be taken neat as well, as an optional supplement, obviously?!
Best, PB