Grace Finds Us

     Sometime this year I plan to take my 14-year-old son Ben to New York City for a little man-cation. I am trying to build a coming-of-age experience with each of my children during their eighth-grade year, before they start high school.
     Two years ago, I took my oldest son to the Baltimore Orioles' spring training in St. Petersburg, FL, and in two years I will hopefully get to take our third child on a fun trip.
     When Ben and I go to New York, he will see for the first time the Ground Zero memorial, Times Square, and maybe even a Broadway play. Who knows what other firsts we will experience?
     In this country, we value the freedom and the ability to go and see places we have never seen before, to experience things we have never before experienced. We treasure the gift of self-determination, the ability to control our future and shape our destiny.
     When we talk about grace, it does not work this way. Grace is a gift from God that we can neither plan for or control. And all Elvis jokes aside, there is no place on a map called Grace-land that you can just hop in your car, drive to, and find.
     Now, we can certainly put ourselves in situations that are conducive to experiencing the grace of God: Renewal weekends, Bible studies, mission trips, and times of prayer. We can surround ourselves with people of faith, perform acts of service, and study our Bible. But when it comes down to it, grace is revealed to us and given to us by God. Grace finds us; we do not find grace.
     Why is this important? Today it seems we want to control everything in our lives, including God. We want God to bend to our schedules. We want God to show up when we need him and where we need him, and when he does not show up as we had hoped for or planned, we grow discouraged and disillusioned.
     A life of faith is so much more than an on-demand service contract. A living faith means trusting that God's grace will find us when we need it most, even when we veer far off course to a different destination.