Transcript
Ben Fallon: Paul, you are probably best known because of your daily devotional, New Morning Mercies, but yet the word you use most in that devotional and across all of your books and tweeting and preaching is the word “grace.” So quite simply, a question that we've received a couple times is this, “What's the difference between mercy and grace?”
Paul Tripp: Well, I want to answer this age-old question. I think this is a question that has been asked thousands of times. And I want to do that by reading three passages of Scripture and then I want to comment. This is Ephesians 2:4-9.
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive with Christ–by grace you have been saved–and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of work, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
1 Timothy 1:1 and 2.
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope. To Timothy, my true child in faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Hebrews 4:14-16.
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need.
So, it's important to notice that in each of these passages, the words “mercy” and “grace” are not used as synonyms. The biblical authors, writing under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit, do not understand these words as being different ways of saying the same thing. This means each word depicts God addressing something different and doing something different as a result. So, grace doesn't do what mercy does and mercy doesn't do what grace does.
And if you study all these passages where these words appear, it becomes clear that in his mercy, please pay attention here, God keeps you from getting what you deserve. And in his grace, God provides for you what you don't deserve. In terms of the biblical theology of salvation, this would mean that mercy addresses sin's condemnation, its penalty, its exclusion, its darkness; and grace addresses our inability. That means we cannot, and we will not ever deserve all the rich blessings that are ours because we are in Christ. Because of God's rescuing mercy, we're blessed with eternal grace in Christ.
So, because of God's mercy, the sentence of the condemnation has been removed forever, and we will never be punished again for our sin. And because of God's grace, we are blessed by “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places.” (Eph. 1:3) Hope is found in both the generosity of God's mercy and the lavish outpouring of His grace.
Again, mercy means we don't get what we deserve–the condemnation for our sin. And grace means we get what we don't deserve–all the blessings of being in Christ that are rooted in God's presence, His promises, and His power unleashed for us!
BF: Thank you, Paul. Well, we love both of the words, “mercy” and “grace.” And another word that means a lot to us at Paul Tripp Ministries is “generosity.” Of course, the gospel is the world's best generosity-narrative, and PTM would not exist without the generosity of our community of supporters.
All of the resources that we create, like Ask Paul Tripp and Wednesday's Word, The Connecting Podcast, they're only made possible because of the generosity of our donors. And if you want to support the work that we're doing, you can learn more at paultripp.com/give. Thank you for your generosity, and together, we're connecting the transforming power of Jesus Christ to everyday life.
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