Grace Upon Grace
“For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” - John 1:16 (ESV)
Everything we have and anything we are is because of God’s grace. Past, present, and future. Grace upon grace. This is true for us as individuals and it is true for us as a church. Only if we are dependent on God’s mercy and grace will we find his presence and privilege with us. By Grace. It’s in our name, Grace Chapel. Grace in God’s forgiveness towards us as sinners. God’s grace to us in healing and restoration. God’s grace for future days whatever they may hold.
In 2007, a little band of grace-filled believers and a decommissioned, discouraged pastor met for mutual encouragement, prayer and friendship. Here and there, in homes and restaurants, we met to discuss our lives; frustrations, failures and futures. At some point it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us that we should begin a church fellowship. Grace Chapel. Grace, like amazing grace. Grace, like God’s too-good-to-be-true love. Chapel: not a cathedral, not an overly complicated business machine. Simple, ordinary grace-receivers and celebrators. Chapel is also a nod of appreciation and honor to the Calvary Chapel movement which welcomed and fostered much of the “Jesus Movement” of the late 1960's and 70's. Chapel is the notion of a gathering of believers that is supposed to be warm, homey, close, loving, and faithful to Jesus. I hope you’ve found it to be so. If you haven’t then help us. Pray for us.
Thank God for his faithful love throughout the years. We have experienced his mercy at every turn in our journey. So many people willing to give and sacrifice and volunteer and help. (There’s no such thing as a church of one person. That’s silly.) Our unifying principle? Jesus is Lord. Both personally and corporately. He died for this. He was raised for us. Under that banner, we can worship him together and serve him together. We don’t need to agree on every secondary issue. And so we are a gathering of people who hold diverse views of peripheral issues. For instance, all of us believe in the Lord’s personal return, but exactly how and when that will occur is not agreed upon by all in our church. As our church by-laws state, a peson having strong commitment to secondary issues would probably not be comfortable here. We want to be faithful to the real Jesus and the true Gospel.
The Lord has provided for us in many aned miraculous ways. Financially we are debt free even though we purchased this property, built a childern’s center, remodeled and upgraded the gathering place, entrance and sanctuary. More importantly the Lord has gathered and caled the right people at the right time. All glory, honor and praise to Him. He alone salves, sanctifies, calls and glorifies. He plants and plucks up. He builds up and pulls down. He establishes and he destroys. May he be pleased to continue to build and establish what his hands have done at Grace Chapel.
“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.” - 1 Corinthians 15:10
Tim Russell