Merciful Sanctification: God’s Infinite Grace
Published Feb 6, 2024
By Krystal Bremer
“God, why do I do what I do not want to do?! Please, Lord, save me from myself.” I’ve cried this out to God so many times on my path to redemption through sanctification (Romans 7:15). Satan and the natural man enter my mind and try to convince me that I am not forgiven if I commit the same sin over and over again.
I was allowing myself to give into feelings of self-doubt and inadequacy. I would try to convince myself, am I surrendering enough of myself to the Lord? I remember seeking guidance on if that were true or not because of how I was feeling.
While God does not always grant relief from our iniquities, sometimes he allows us to sit in them because he wants us to continuously seek and rely on him. Either way – God’s mercies are new each morning. As stated in Lamentations 3:22-23, “Because of the LORD’s great love, we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” The key to this miraculous, supernatural grace, is through our heart posture. Is the Holy Spirit convicting me through Godly sorrow (2 Corinthians 7:10-11)? Or are my words empty with no true sorrowful repentance for my behavior?
God is in the business of changing hearts, and he wants all of us! Like Paul, the response is to hate the sin, repent of it, and ask for divine grace to overcome it (Romans 7:24–25). When God forgives me through my repentant heart, all I can think to do is fall to my knees and praise God even more.
On top of being in the business of changing hearts, God is PATIENT. God provides grace and mercy that is not on an economy of “you’ve sinned this many times, and I will only forgive you a certain number of times” (Matthew 18:21–22). God knows how long it takes for us to come to repentance, yet he patiently waits for us.
“The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead, he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” 2 Peter 3:9
God isn’t hurt or disappointed by my mistakes because he knows the timeline that he created for my redemption. God is not disappointed in me when I’ve failed an attempt because he knows that he has promised redemption on the 76th attempt (hyperbole). God makes it very clear to me to not give up on pursuing him. This gives me so much peace and comfort knowing that my mistakes are already a part of God’s plan!
Such forgiveness is only possible because of the infinite grace of God shown in the shed blood of Christ on the cross. It’s so easy for us to worry and wonder about forgiveness instead of just accepting it. The key lies in giving up our doubts and our feelings of guilt and resting in God’s promises of forgiveness.
Because of Christ’s forgiving power, we are His children, and we can always be made clean—even after a repeated sin—if we humbly seek God’s forgiveness.
As stated in Got Questions, “Satan would have us think that there is no hope, that there is no possibility that we can be forgiven, healed, and restored. He will try to get us to feel trapped by guilt so that we do not feel worthy of God’s forgiveness any longer. But since when were we ever worthy of God’s grace? Grace is, by definition, extended to the unworthy. God loved us and chose us to be in Christ before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4–6), not because of anything we did, but “in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:12).
God’s grace reaches anywhere, and there is no bottom we can sink that God is no longer able to pull us out. His grace is greater than all our sin. Whether we are just starting to wander off course or we are already sinking and drowning in our sin, grace can be received. Grace is how we live, how we are saved, how we are sanctified, and how we will be kept and glorified. Let us receive grace when we sin by repenting and confessing our sin to God.”
