Scandalous Grace

[Jared]

We hear about sovereign grace, irresistible grace, glorious grace, and amazing grace. But should the word "scandalous" be used to describe grace? Can we wrest this word from the clutches of antinomianism and use it in a way that helps us continue to be amazed by grace?

I believe that we can. After all, God is still in the saving business and sinners are the only kind of people qualified to be saved. Jesus came for the sick, not those who are well because it is the sick who need a doctor.

Is the word "scandalous" a helpful adjective for grace?

---------- Post added at 05:23 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:13 PM ----------

I wanted to clear something up. I said that sinners are the only kind of people that are qualified to be saved. Let me clarify that. We have to recognize that we are sinners before we can be saved but God is the one that reveals that to us through the first use of the law which is known as the pedagogical use of the law. Of course, faith and repentance are also requirements for salvation and these are met by God. They cannot be met by us. God is the one who grants us repentance.

 

[NB3K]

[C16: from Late Latin scandalum stumbling block, from Greek skandalon a trap]

I guess. I know when I talked to my ex-boss last, I invited him to hear me preach about the unconditional grace of God from the Prophet Jonah, he looked at me with a dumb-founded look on his face and then he asked me, "you believe that God's grace is unconditional?", and I answered, "Yes I do!". He walked away without questioning why I believed that God's grace was unconditional. I guess he thought that if God's grace is indeed unconditional, then it must in his mind be scandalous! But it's a stumbling block to the unregenerate, like it was to the Jews in the time of Christ. The Jews then could not understand why Jesus loved the sinners, and the unregenerate gentiles are confounded in the same manner today. THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN JEW & GENTILE!

Let the unregenerate scoff and call it scandalous. By God's common grace He allows them to heap more wrath upon themselves by casting out judgements against Him.



This passage of Romans 9 to the unregenerate makes God a tyrant in their minds, but to those that the Lord loves, it is the POWER OF GOD UNTO SALVATION! This passage of Scripture frees the human mind in any type of works based righteousness and it places our minds to the Awesome, Amazing, Unsearchable, Scandalous, Grace of God!

Rom 9:6-23
But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named." This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring. For this is what the promise said: "About this time next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son." And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad--in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls-- she was told, "The older will serve the younger." As it is written, "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means! For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. You will say to me then, "Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?" But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, "Why have you made me like this?" Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory--

 

[MarieP]

But should the word "scandalous" be used to describe grace?

I would say, absolutely! The free grace of God toward Jew and Gentile alike through a crucified Messiah was a "stumbling block" (skandalon).

"As it is written: 'Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame'" Romans 9:33

"But we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness" 1 Corinthians 1:23

"And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased" Galatians 5:11