Saved by Grace

Over the course of one’s life there are many failures, regrets, missed opportunities, wrongs, and sin. If you are like me, there are many moments you wish you could do over again. At the same time, when thinking about all that has gone wrong in life it is easy to wonder, “Am I good enough for heaven? Have I done too much wrong to get in?” That is a question I hear often as a hospice chaplain. Fortunately there is a simple answer. Yes! We are saved by grace! While it can be hard to define, grace is getting what we don’t deserve. Perhaps we deserve to be denied entrance into heaven because of our sins, but God says otherwise. God says, “I forgive you and I welcome you into heaven despite your wrongs.” That’s grace! We have a God who is able to look past our wrongs and offer us grace even if we do not deserve it. God is able to forgive all sin; there is no sin too great for God to forgive. So when it comes to the end of our lives and we count up everything we did wrong, God does not. God forgives those sins. Then God opens the doors of heaven and takes us to the place that has been prepared ahead of time just for us. Our salvation is not dependent upon the good (or bad) works we did in life. We are saved by grace!