What exactly is grace? We know the familiar comparison of grace contrasted with mercy and justice in light of our sinful nature: Justice is getting what you deserve; mercy is not getting what you deserve; grace is getting what you do not deserve. It's a decent definition, but grace is more complicated than the maxim suggests.
THE WORD, GRACE
GRACE: charitos (χάριτος)
Charis (Χάρις) appears more than 150 times in the Bible, mostly in the letters written by Paul. The first usage, however, is not for first century Christians, but for pre-Abrahamic Noah (Genesis 6:8) when the Lord decided to destroy the evil that ruled the hearts of all the people in the world. Only Noah, of all the people living, was considered righteous and blameless. The Lord told Noah that He intended to "make an end of all flesh," and He gave Noah instructions to build a sanctuary of salvation, the Ark. Only the living things on the Ark would survive the catastrophic floods to come.
Charis describes favor and gratitude intertwined bestowed on someone. Objectively, grace describes exceptional beauty or charm. Subjectively, charis describes the feeling of beneficence offered and received. It was used by Sophocles as he wrote about kindness that begets kindness. Grace reflects both the giver's and recipient's feelings of goodwill and delight surrounding an action. Χάριτος is the source for the English word, charisma, used to describe people who are so charming and compelling that others become devoted to them.
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