Grace is difficult to define. It is the active expression of God's love.
Grace is represented in metaphor by 'water'. Living water.
Or perhaps the image of an infant. An infant does not 'earn' it's parents love. The parent first loves it.
The facts of Grace:
It always exists.
It is always available.
It is always good.
It is always victorious.
Instead of leading to absolute quietude and serenity, true spiritual growth is characterized by increasingly deep risk taking.
Jesus threatened powerful people's addictions to frozen images of faith.
With faith, we influence the encounters with grace. We can't make grace happen, grace is always happening. But faith can open us up to grace.
Faith is the human component of that mysterious interweaving of divine grace and human intention that can vanquish the power of attachment.
The power of grace flows most fully when human will chooses to act in harmony with divine will.
In practical terms this means staying in a situation, being willing to confront it as it is, remaining responsible for the choices one makes in response to it, but at the same time turning to God's grace, protection and guidance as the ground for one's choices and behavior. Responsible human freedom thus becomes authentic spiritual surrender, and authentic spiritual surrender is nothing other than responsible human freedom,
