The Christian life in all its aspects and experiences is an outflow from
the 'the Fountain of Life,' the giving God. Observe how emphatically the
Apostle, in the context, accumulates words that express universality:
'_all_ grace . . . _all_-sufficiency for _all_ things . . . _every_ good
work.' But even these expressions do not satisfy Paul, and he has to
repeat the word 'abound,' in order to give some faint idea of his
conception of the full tide which gushes from the fountain. It is 'all
grace,' and it is abounding grace.
Now what does he mean by 'grace'? That word is a kind of shorthand for
the whole sum of the unmerited blessings which come to men through Jesus
Christ. Primarily, it describes what we, for want of a better
expression, have to call a 'disposition' in the divine nature; and it
means, then, if so looked at, the unconditioned, undeserved,
spontaneous, eternal, stooping, pardoning love of God. That is grace, in
the primary New Testament use of the phrase.
But there are no idle 'dispositions' in God. They are always energising,
and so the word glides from meaning the disposition, to meaning the
manifestation and activities of it, and the 'grace' of our Lord is that
love in exercise. And then, since the divine energies are never
fruitless, the word passes over, further, to mean all the blessed and
beautiful things in a soul which are the consequences of the Promethean
truth of God's loving hand, the outcome in life of the inward bestowment
which has its cause, its sole cause, in God's ceaseless, unexhausted
love, unmerited and free.
That, very superficially and inadequately set forth, is at least a
glimpse into the fulness and greatness of meaning that lies in that
profound New Testament word, 'grace.' But the Apostle here puts
emphasis on the variety of forms which the one divine gift assumes.
It is '_all_ grace' which God is able to make abound toward you. So
then, you see this one transcendent gift from the divine heart, when
it comes into our human experience, is like a meteor when it passes
into the atmosphere of earth, and catches fire and blazes, showering
out a multitude of radiant points of light. The grace is
many-sided--many-sided to us, but one in its source and in its
character. For at bottom, that which God in His grace gives to us as His
grace is what? Himself; or if you like to put it in another form, which
comes to the same thing--new life through Jesus Christ. That is the
encyclopædiacal gift, which contains within itself all grace. And just
as the physical life in each of us, one in all its manifestations,
produces many results, and shines in the eye, and blushes in the cheek,
and gives strength to the arm, and flexibility and deftness to the
fingers and swiftness to the foot: so also is that one grace which,
being manifold in its manifestations, is one in its essence. There are
many graces, there is one Grace.
But this grace is not only many-sided, but abounding. It is not
congruous with God's wealth, nor with His love, that He should give
scantily, or, as it were, should open but a finger of the hand that is
full of His gifts, and let out a little at a time. There are no sluices
on that great stream so as to regulate its flow, and to give sometimes a
painful trickle and sometimes a full gush, but this fountain is always
pouring itself out, and it 'abounds.'
But then we are pulled up short by another word in this first clause:
'God is _able_ to make.' Paul does not say, 'God will make.' He puts the
whole weight of responsibility for that ability becoming operative upon
us. There are conditions; and although we may have access to that full
fountain, it will not pour on us 'all grace' and 'abundant grace,'
unless we observe these, and so turn God's ability to give into actual
giving. And how do we do that? By desire, by expectance, by petition,
by faithful stewardship. If we have these things, if we have tutored
ourselves, and experience has helped in the tuition, to make large our
expectancy, God will smile down upon us and 'do exceeding abundantly
above all' that we 'think' as well as above all that we 'ask.' Brethren,
if our supplies are scant, when the full fountain is gushing at our
sides, we are 'not straitened in God, we are straitened in ourselves.'
Christian possibilities are Christian obligations, and what we might
have and do not have, is our condemnation.
I turn, in the next place, to what I have, perhaps too fancifully,
called