Falling From Grace

Falling From Grace

By Apostle Felix

4  If you want to be made holy by fulfilling the obligations of the law, you have cut off more than your flesh—you have cut yourselves off from the Anointed One and have fallen away from the revelation of grace! 

Galatians 5: 4

Falling from grace has been an old adage is used in church, especially when one of the brethren fell in sin. It is usually used to describe a sister, who has fallen pregnant out of wedlock. The sister, who is already condemning herself for the disgrace of falling pregnant is then suspended from church. This was a practice I was never in agreement with since I got saved and affiliated myself with the Pentecostal church. It was a practice that was more Pharisaical than christianity. Christ embraced people like prostitutes and tax collectors when the Pharisees where shunning them. The Pharisees were ready to stone the prostitute, but Jesus was ready to forgive her. He did not excommunicate her but He received her.

7  Angry, they kept insisting that he answer their question, so Jesus stood up and looked at them and said, “Let’s have the man who has never had a sinful desire throw the first stone at her.”

John 8: 7

The Pharisees, who were law keepers brought the woman caught in the very act of adultery before Jesus Christ. They expected her to be stoned to death, but little did they know that they had brought the woman before grace. Grace does not expel sinners away, even believers who have missed the mark. This is not to support wilful sinning and living in sin. The man who had taken his father’s wife in first Corinthians chapter five verses one to five. The man in question was adamant to change and persistent in his sin. So then, the believers were encouraged to excommunicate the impostor.

A believer in Jesus Christ can miss the ark, but that does not mean he or she has fallen from grace. So many believers fall into the trap of perpetual rededicating their lives to the Lord over something they did. The falling from grace in  Galatians chapter five verse four, is talking about an attempt to attain holiness by fulfilling the obligation of the law. The law is not of faith.

12  But keeping the law does not require faith, but self-effort. For the law teaches, “If you practice the principles of law, you must follow all of them.”

Galatians 3: 12

The law only requires self effort through the practice of the principles of the law. On the contrary, grace requires faith. That is having faith in what the Lord Jesus has provided for us through His death and resurrection. The atonement work of Christ is the work of grace. Any attempt to try to attain by self effort what Christ has provided by grace, makes one to fall from grace. What that means is that attempting to earn salvation through legalism, severs a believer from benefiting of what Christ has done. A believer will be restless, instead of been restful. A believer will be judgemental, instead of been gracious. The die by fire believers are usually legalistic in their approach. They see life through the eyes of the law, instead of grace. They are like the Pharisees who dragged a woman to Jesus to be stoned. Thank God for Jesus, who saw the woman through the eyes of grace and pardoned her. Child of God, you have not fallen from grace. You are still in grace  because it is grace that you need to empower you in order to overcome sin.