“Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.” (Ephesians 3:7)
In the New Testament, the words for gift and grace are very closely related. The Greek term charis is most frequently translated “grace,” and charisma is most often rendered “gift.” We who are twice-born are to use our “gift” with one another as “good stewards of the manifold grace of God” (1 Peter 4:10).
When God gifts us with faith so that we are saved by His grace (Ephesians 2:8), we are then “created in righteousness and true holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). This “new man” is granted the potential to understand the “exceeding greatness of his power” (Ephesians 1:19) and to participate in the “divine nature” so that we are able to escape the corruption that pervades the lust of this godless world (2 Peter 1:4).
When we preach the gospel, we are using “the power of God” that will result in the salvation of those who respond (Romans 1:16). Right after the day of Pentecost, the apostles gave testimony of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus in a demonstration of that power so that “great grace was upon them all” (Acts 4:33). The message and the power and the grace of God are inseparable.
When our lives radically changed in response to the “new man” created in us by God, they did so by “the grace of our Lord” that is “exceeding abundant with faith and love” (1 Timothy 1:14). When we access the strength to rise above our infirmities or difficult circumstances, we are experiencing the Lord’s grace that is sufficient to deal with or overcome whatever may be hindering us (2 Corinthians 12:9).
When we “work out” the salvation God has “graced” us with, we can be sure that God is working in us “both to will and to do of his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12-13). HMM III
