Hello, Cherished Friends and Imagine Church Family,
One of the most poignant stories in all of Scripture is found in the first verses of the gospel of John, chapter 8. It says, “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ He straightened up and said to them, ‘If any of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.’ At this, those who heard began to go away, one at a time, until only Jesus was left with the woman standing there. And Jesus asked her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ And she said, ‘No one.’ ‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus said. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.'”
If you’ve never known how grace operates, take it straight from Jesus, and let it seep deep down into your life. There are three key dynamics as to how grace operates. First, Jesus teaches us that grace sees us exactly for who we are.
Everybody that day just saw a woman caught in adultery. A moral failure. Some deserving condemnation and death. But through the extension of grace, Jesus saw a precious child of God. Somebody who was struggling with life, who had made a lot of mistakes (just like everybody else), but he also saw someone who could get past the struggles and grow toward the person that God intended.
Jesus also tells us that grace forgives us for what we’ve done. Isn’t that what we all long for? To be forgiven? I once read a survey of psychiatrists which said that 70% of their patients could be healed instantly if they could just get rid of their guilt. They said that seven-out-of-ten people they see could walk out of their office and never come back if they could just get rid of their guilt — if someone could just wipe away the feelings of condemnation.
However, maybe the most important thing that grace gives us is this: Jesus shows us that grace restores us, so that life can go on. It is grace, and only grace, that can restore you. Jesus took this woman at the lowest point in her life, and stripped away the stigma and the shame, the labels and the condemnation, and he forgave her, he planted her on her feet as the child of God that she was and pointed her toward the direction her life could now take.
It is grace that marks the identity of Imagine Church. We don’t pretend to always have the answers. We want to understand what you’ve gone through and what you’ve suffered, and we strive to be genuine about it. We want to be your friend, with no other motive, and no hidden agenda. Because we believe there are scores of people who could do church that way, who could begin exploring God for their lives, if church could be that way.
Because here’s what Jesus did, and it’s what we try to do as well: instead of it being all about the things that someone may have done wrong, we’re going to make it more about seeing the potential of all that someone can get right, of what our lives can be. Here you can catch a glimpse of what Jesus Christ can mean for your life.
In the incredible combination of grace and truth,
Bruce Jones, Pastor Imagine Church
