Grace in a new light ...

I have long been a fan of Michael Card. He is a singer/song writer ... from my generation. I have almost all of his albums ... but not enough of his books. The Christmas before last, I received some money as a gift and I went online through Amazon and purchased this book, along with a few CD's ~ a couple of Michael Card albums that I used to have on cassette tape had gone bad, so I upgraded (!) to a CD for those. I put this book on my coffee table, intending to read it right away. I got started on it, but then since I am most always reading several books simultaneously (depending on where I am in the house), I got distracted, laid this one back down and kind of forgot about it ... until a few weeks ago.

The season of Lent was beginning and I had determined to focus my attention on the gospel accounts of those last days in the life of Jesus, along with some of the prophetic passages too. And then I remembered this book, picked it up, and ... wow!

Are you familiar with Michael Card? I have been fortunate enough to actually hear him in concert on two occasions, many years ago. One of those times was at Calvin College, back in the early 90's (I think) and I was struck very much with how quiet-spoken he was ... how UNimpressed he was with himself ... how humbly he spoke of his writings and beautiful music.

"A Violent Grace" was published by Multnomah Press in 2000. I've never looked at grace like this before, nor have I knelt at the cross and actually visualized what Christ's suffering looked like in this detail. Michael Card is an excellent writer. His love of the Lord is so evident in all he writes. He is constantly amazed by grace. He challenges his readers to consider, long and hard, the violence done to Christ to win our forgiveness and salvation.

Our former pastor, Dr. Ed Dobson, is very slowly dying of ALS. He has often said that it's not the dying that bothers him, it's the "getting dead" that's hard for him to handle. I grew up celebrating Easter my whole life ... without spending much time thinking about the "getting dead" that Jesus did for me.

There are 21 short devotional chapters in this beautiful little book. My faith has been deepened through the reading of it. It's still available on-line, through Amazon. Just thought I'd share it with you ...