Love. ―requires Grace.

"Graciousness has been defined to be the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul. Grace must find expression in life. Grace glides on blistered feet. Grace is the refinement of your soul through time."

Love requires Grace―what an understatement.  I absolutely love this quote and hate that I can’t find the author to give credit where it is due (if anyone knows please pass my way).  

I am acutely aware of one very hard fact to swallow right now.  When you love people (be it family, friends, or significant others), you inevitably hurt them and get hurt by them.  That will always be true.

I am clinging to the quote above as what to do when that “hurt” occurs.  The extension of grace is what allows us to get back to a place of peace.  We are supposed to ask for grace and be willing to extend it to others.  I am learning that this appears to be a process I have to do daily―like going to the gym―it must be maintained in order to get the desired results.  Hence the line about gliding “on blistered feet” and the mention of it being the “refinement of your soul” over time.  It is a process.

Grace is the connection factor of life.  It connects us to other important elements like forgiveness, love, loyalty, service, and selflessness.  The ability to extend or receive grace rolls in like a gentle fog when we get perspective on what is important in life. Both when we see our need for it AND when we see how extending it to others can heal us.  Grace must come for forgiveness to come―and both must come for healing to take place.

Grace (by definition) is the free and unmerited favor or beneficence of God.

Grace was manifested this week in moments of having “perspective on life” after having my finger crushed but my flexor tendon spared.  Moments that were followed by even more humbling demonstrations of real perspective when I walked into a patient’s house who had just received a diagnosis of bone cancer.  I saw the expression of her thankfulness for God’s grace when I noticed she had faithfully placed her tithing check on her dresser―like she always does.

I know these things to be true:  I am in need of grace.  I must continue to work on my ability to extend it to others.  And any ability to do so is not of me―but of God through me.  I know this last part to be true because I do not want to be gracious.  I would rather sit and rot in my bitterness than extend grace and forgiveness to someone that hurt me.  I didn’t used to be this way.  This is new for me―this festering.  

My patients cancer diagnosis hit my face like a bucket of cold water.

How can I be bitter?  I am still “in the game.”  I am healthy and I have a choice in this matter.

Maya Angelou once said, “Bitterness is like cancer.  It eats upon the host.  But anger is like fire.  It burns it all clean.”

And so there it is...the pathway laid out before me clear as day.  First of all, I am lucky enough to have love ones. I will hurt them and they will hurt me. When I am hurt, it’s okay to be angry―but I have to move on to grace and forgiveness.  If I don’t, the bitterness (or bone cancer) of life will eat away my peace.

And heaven knows―most of us need all the peace we can get.