You are about to get on a plane, when suddenly, something keeps you from it. A thought, a premonition maybe. Or more practically, there is a problem with your ticket or you just plain (heh, punny) miss the flight. You are angry, you scream and yell at the attendants and you head home angry.
Then your plane- the one you didn't get on- crashes.
OK, so that is kinda a plot from a Final Destination movie- but it is an example, extreme though it may be, of negative grace.
More likely, you've been late getting out the door and happened upon an accident you'd have been in if you were on time. Or you've lost a job that forced you to look into a different career that you now love. Or the love of your high school life broke your heart, and even though you swore no one would be better, you met the ACTUAL love of your life because of your heartbreak.
Negative grace, as I like to call it, is really just grace. But we often take the definition of grace that says "you get what you don't deserve" to mean you deserve bad but get good.
I've come to learn that you can deserve good, but get bad- and it makes you better.
When I lost my job- which I hated, by the way- I found myself free. I'd asked God to get me out of the job, and He did. In what I saw as a negative way. Because I lost the job and had to go through a tough time, I found a career I love but would have been reluctant to try in another circumstance- given that little kids scare me. Now, I work in an elementary school and love it- may even try to take a teacher position at that level if I can get certified and find a job. All because of negative grace.
An addict hits rock bottom to find God- negative grace. An artist endures poverty, but finds the eyes to paint the world in a new way because of it- negative grace. A terrible illness or injury puts your life on hold, and you suddenly see the people and things you were taking for granted and get a chance to truly enjoy them- negative grace.
This past weekend, I was speaking about grace at a Disciple Now in Cleburne, Texas. I'd never given this idea of negative grace much thought, but as I am talking about grace being that we get what we don't deserve- it hit me:
Jesus deserved life, but he got death.
He got what He didn't deserve.
And it is called grace.
Because He got what He didn't deserve, we get what we don't deserve- which just so happens to be the very same thing Jesus actually DID deserve- eternal life. We know now that Jesus endured that death and still attained the thing He earned- but from Friday evening until Sunday morning- it was not so.
The thing about negative grace is that the negative part is never permanent. It may be longer for some, but it will end so the good may come. We also never know in the midst of the negative that the grace is coming- I sure didn't in my unemployment, and the disciples ABSOLUTELY did not know it on that long Saturday.
Chances are, if you are in that negative, you can't see it right now either. And I can't promise you that the negative will ever turn to grace.
But you can hope.
Because negative grace is good. It cleanses us, it disciplines us, it reminds us that in our darkness God is there. We might not see it now, but when we look back, we see the hole we have been pulled out of with great clarity.
So, the next time you are upset about a missed opportunity or setback, take a second to think that that negative thing may just have saved you- physically and spiritually.
Because when grace arrives, we don't always think the package looks good- but it is so much better than good if we trust God enough to be who He says He is.
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