Unmerited Favor: Introduction

Dear friends,



After completing the series on "Destined To Reign" and a short break, I would like to go deeper on the gospel of grace. I believe you were blessed from reading and understanding the past articles, and I believe you will be blessed even more with this new series, "Unmerited Favor".



This series of articles/devotionals is all about Jesus. It is about His passionate love for you and His desire for you to experience success in your life. Before we go further, let me ask you this question: Do you believe that Jesus is interested in your success? Take a moment to reflect this.



I want you to know that Jesus delights in blessing you. It is His good pleasure to see you blessed in every area of your life (Luke 12: 32, Psalm 35: 27). Now, don’t put a limit on His blessings in your life. The blessings of the Lord are not just seen in material things. Jesus is infinitely interested in your total well-being. He is interested in your family, career, fulfillment in life, marriage, ministry, and the list goes on.



When it comes to your desires, hopes and dreams, there is no detail that is too miniscule, minute or insignificant for Him. If it matters to you, it matters to Him too. Jesus will never ridicule or deride your concerns as petty. He is never dismissive or condescending. He is not like some of your so-called “friends”, who may delight in poking fun at your shortcoming. If it bothers you, it bothers Him too.



Jesus is someone whom you can be real with. You can hang out with Him and be yourself, with no pretense and no play-acting. Jesus is ever-loving toward you and you can talk to Him about anything. He enjoys conversing with you about your dreams, aspirations and hopes. He wants to heal you of things in your past that you may be struggling with. He is interested in your present challenges. He wants to weep with you when you are down and rejoice with you in all your victories.



Do you know that you are important to Jesus? Know with full assurance in your heart that Jesus knows you perfectly, and yet accepts and loves you perfectly. When you begin to understand that, you will realize that it is truly that unmerited favor, that favor from Jesus that you know you do not deserve, did not merit and cannot earn for yourself, that will perfect every imperfection and weakness in your life. If you are facing challenges, such as lack in any area, addictions, fears, sicknesses or broken relationships, Jesus’ unmerited favor (grace) will protect, deliver, prosper, bring restoration to and provide for you. His unmerited favor (grace) will transform you into wholeness, and it is the goodness of God, not your striving and self-efforts, that will lead you to live victoriously for His glory.

There are essentially two ways you can go about your life. The first is to depend entirely on your self-effort, and the other is to depend completely on the unmerited favor and blessings of God. As for me and my house, the choice is absolutely clear. I am leaning strong on His unmerited favor in every area of my life – my marriage, family, church and anything else that I may be involved in.

The world’s way to success is based on meritocracy. All religions are also based on the same principle of merit. God’s way to success in the new covenant is in direct contradiction to that, and is based on His unmerited favor. You can’t earn it. You can’t deserve it. And you certainly can’t merit it. It comes by way of God’s grace and by the power of what was accomplished at Calvary. It goes against the grain of every world system you have ever learned or depended upon. God’s ways are higher and they always lead to good and abiding success.

My friend, there is no middle road. You cannot mix your own effort with God’s grace. Choose His unmerited favor and all the glory redounds to Jesus. Every success, opportunity, blessing or breakthrough, be it in your health, family or career – success in every aspect of your life – comes by His unmerited favor. It is never you.

You may ask, “Shouldn’t there be a part for man to perform and another part for God to fulfill? Shouldn’t man do his best and let God to the rest?” I am glad you asked this question! You see, when people say that man has a part to play, what they end up doing is to come up with a list of requirements that man needs to do to qualify for God’s blessings. They say things like, “In order for God to answer your prayers, you have to do this and do that, and not do this and not do that.” And all the while, this list of do’s and don’ts to qualify for God’s blessings keeps growing.

Now, let’s stop right here. Doesn’t this list of requirements that you have to fulfill so that God will bless you sound awfully familiar to you? I believe that many of those who insist on these requirements are well-meaning, sincere people. But what they are doing is pointing others to the old covenant of the law, whether knowingly or unknowingly! That’s how the law of Moses works. Under the old covenant, God’s blessings were contingent on man’s fulfillment of a list of requirements. But we are no longer under the old covenant of the law.

This is not Christianity. The new covenant that we are under today is based completely on the removal of our sins by the blood of Jesus! “For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes on a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ , who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 9: 13-14)” Depending on your own efforts to deserve favor from God is considered “dead work”. It is God’s desire for us to depend wholly on the unmerited favor of Jesus.

God Himself says, “For if that first covenant (the covenant of law) had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second (the covenant of grace) (Hebrews 8: 7).” The Christian life today is not a religion based on what you are doing or not doing. The reality is that the Christian life is not a religion at all. It is all about having a relationship based completely on receiving what God Himself has done on the cross! When you receive completely what Jesus has done for you, your “doing” will flow effortlessly.

Hear what the apostle of grace, Paul, had to say about this, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace (unmerited favor) of God which was with me. (1 Corinthians 15: 10)” So my friend, in answering your question, I would say don’t worry about what “man’s part” is. As Paul said, focus entirely on Jesus’ part – His grace and unmerited favor upon your life – and you will end up being energized by the Lord to pray more, read the Bible more and serve both God and your community more, simply because the grace of God is not in vain in your life. You will also realize that the outworking of all that you do is not of yourself, but it is by His grace overflowing in you.

Some people think that grace will compromise God’s holiness. Absolutely not! The standards that grace sets are much higher than the standards of the law of Moses. When you are under grace, you will effortlessly fulfill and even super-exceed the expectation of the law of Moses.

When we are speaking about grace or unmerited favor of God, we are speaking of Jesus and His finished works at the cross. It is important to see this in the Word of God yourself: “May grace (God’s unmerited favor) and peace (which is perfect well-being, all necessary good, all spiritual prosperity, and freedom from fears and agitating passions and moral conflicts) be multiplied to you in (the full, personal, precise, and correct) knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord” (2 Peter 1: 2. AMP)

It is really that simple. The unmerited favor of God (grace) will flow like a mighty torrential river into every parched area of your life, be it your physical body, marriage, career or finances, when you see Jesus! The more you increase in the knowledge of our loving Savior Jesus Christ and His finished works on the cross, the more God’s unmerited favor (grace) will be multiplied in your life. And it is His unmerited favor (grace) that will cause you to enjoy success beyond your natural intelligence, qualifications and ability!

God’s unmerited favor (grace) is not a topic. It is not a teaching. God’s unmerited favor is the gospel! God’s unmerited favor (grace) is not a subject. It is a person, and His name is Jesus! When you have Jesus, you have God’s unmerited favor or grace. Unmerited favor or grace is embodied in His entire being and His finished works at Calvary. It is unfortunate that the word “grace” in the modern church has been made into a theological subject or classified as a doctrine. In the modern vernacular, the word “grace” has also been abused and devalued. For example, you are given “five minutes’ grace” before parking charges are levied when you drive into the parking lot in downtown. How that “cheapens the word “grace”.

It is in my prayer that as you dive into the pages that you will read in the next while, you will start seeing more of Jesus and start experiencing His grace (unmerited favor) in unprecedented way. Get ready to experience God’s supernatural success through His unmerited favor (grace) today! Amen!

Dedo Suwanda

From the book "Unmerited Favor" by Joseph Prince