Receiving grace

As a child, you may have learned the custom of giving thanks before meals. In my family, this was called “saying grace”. It was a recited expression of spiritual appreciation for the food set before us at table. I must admit to not thinking much about the words I murmured before grabbing the knife and fork. It was just part of the meal process in our house, the ritual that we followed most evenings prior to eating.

Over the years, I’ve watched, listened, and learned about a variety of customs that people follow before eating. Some of these are tied to religion; my father liked to utter a brief prayer for the peaceful repose of the “souls of the dearly departed”. Others are part of more earthbound traditions; many family members and friends prefer to acknowledge, even briefly, that life, in some form, was sacrificed so that we might be nourished. Regardless of perspective, all pre-meal routines that I’ve witnessed have involved the simple yet profound practice of pausing before action, of reflection, of awareness.

Pushing pause in our lives is a challenge. The globe rotates at the same speed and yet our days seem to move more quickly than ever. There seems no shortage of event, information, and activity for us to monitor, absorb, or keep pace with. Devices enable us to “connect”, to stay up-to-date. And yet the so-called cycle of news spins faster and faster. We can feel more and more disconnected.

It is easy to get caught up in the do of the world, not the be. For me, when I let myself become imbalanced in the do, I find it important to return to ritualistic inaction. I try to sit. I try to empty. I try to say more grace.

But what does that mean? And what is “grace” anyway?

It turns out that I have not understood grace at all. When I researched it, I found many perspectives, most more alike than different. One of them, however, stood out for me. It was a definition from Webster’s dictionary: the “unmerited divine assistance given to humans for their regeneration or sanctification”. I had expected to find definitions of grace as the shower of something soft and soothing. Grace as comfort. Grace as a shaw of protection, not a potential revealing or raw exposure. But within the Webster’s definition, the definition that most spoke to me, lay the dualistic nature of grace’s reality. Qualities of tenderness and tribulation are both inherently part of what it means to experience grace in our lives.

Because grace is received, not said. Grace is freely offered to us, not earned by us. Grace is aid from the outside for our individual internal betterment, not positive fortune that we experience as reward for external good behavior.

The reminder stops me: I don’t necessarily deserve the grace I receive. In fact, the grace I receive is sometimes unexpected or unwarranted assistance focused on my shortcomings rather than my strengths or my longings. The help I need is sometimes not the help I think I need or I want. And so I may miss much grace in my life because the most meaningful moments of grace sometimes hurt.

This can be really hard to accept. “The universe is moving me again.” I say that, externally, when the grace I am given is challenging yet bearable. “I can’t handle this.” I say this, internally, when I simply feel overwhelmed. Both may be moments of grace.

This is not to posit that all bad is good; the ugly things that happen in human lives are not necessarily grace. I cannot accept that the divine would deliberately distribute anguish and misery, abuse and violence, as a means toward personal regeneration. Whatever is the essence of divinity, that essence, be it named God, Allah, Buddha, or the Creator, is life-affirming, holy. It must be. Despite this, I must accept that sometimes change is only possible through challenge, that some troubles are not random trials, that my very human ego and perspective inherently require routine lessons in humility. “Unmerited divine assistance” can take many forms.

So I must listen. Continuously. I must stop, regularly, to ask, probe, and wonder whether some, or even most, of my daily woes are not opportunities for – dare I say – sanctification, in whatever small way is possible. I am blessed to have a life in which the good far outweighs the difficult. I must embrace my fortune but not become complacent, too comfortable.

As we enter the calendar season in which we celebrate renewal, regeneration, and rebirth, I must do more than periodically pause in brief reflection before lifting my fork and knife, do more than simply closing my eyes at table and thankfully “saying grace”. I must remain open to humbly “receiving grace”.

Let us bow our heads together.