It seems like one of the things God has been showing me is my need for grace. Such a simple concept, but one of those things I'm convinced that I will be relearning until I die. There are times where I know that grace has been bestowed upon me, but I refuse to accept it. Like with all my stress lately, I refuse to let the grace of God work these things out. I refuse to let Him be Jehovah Jireh - the Lord provides. I try to make myself good, to make myself righteous and holy, and perfect. Heh. There's no grace in that. There's no God in that even...So, I need to just acknowledge how much I suck..and let God work the rest out...

I was thinking about this one line from "Joy of the Lord": "I am surrounded by mercy and grace." I think about how I forget that I am totally hemmed in, fenced in, protected by mercy and grace. There are times when I try to jump the fence in my own need to try to fix all my problems. And then God brings me to my knees. Where even in prayer, I don't come to Him with a list of requests and petitions. But, I end up with "God, help me please. Have mercy on me. I need you." I can sit for hours on end and just utter those few words....

I like how God weaves things together to teach me things. I've just started reading The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning. And in the opening chapter, he quotes Paul Tillich:

Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life... It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying: 'You are accepted. You are accepted, accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now; perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything now; perhaps later you will do much. Do not seek for anything, do not perform anything, do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted.' If that happens to us, we experience grace.

- Paul Tillich in Shaking the Foundations

Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:10, "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me."