Grace: The Promise of God and the Power of the New Covenant

by Paul Pavao

God's Riches At Christ's Expense We know a lot about and emphasize "Christ's expense," but we have barely tapped into what God's riches are or how to put them into practice in our lives. Most Christians know that grace literally means favor. True I had a friend once whose uncle was the dictator of a small country. She could have had all the riches of that country. She chose not to, fearing what would happen to her if his government was overthrown, but you get the idea. The favor of a ruler can lead to all sorts of luxurious benefits. God is the greatest ruler of all, and he has abundant (spiritual) riches for his children, which the apostles sum up under the word "grace." Too few Christians have any idea of the riches inherent in God's favor, so they do not benefit any more than my friend benefitted from her uncle's favor. Grace explores the Bible's passages on grace and explains, in easy to understand terms, how to apply it to our lives. This little booklet could easily become the most important book you have ever read.

38 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 27, 2015

About the author

My goal is to make Christian history and theology interesting and easy to understand for the average Christian and the curious seeker. History is the most interesting, important, and exciting stories of all time. Only a trained academic could make it boring!

I became a Christian in 1982 as part of a major evangelical denomination. I was appalled by the doctrinal disputes, infighting, and sheer disregard of the plain meaning of Scripture. Surely the churches that the apostles themselves started didn't fight like this!

It took me 8 years to find out that books. letters, and essays by early Christians are readily available to anyone and translated into English! Most of them are bundled up in sets like the Ante-Nicene Fathers, published by Eerdman's over a century ago. Nowadays they can be read online for free at earlychristianwritings.com and CCEL.org. I have devoted much of my life to making them known to the general public.

My books cover both church history and radical discipleship because wholehearted, sold-out, self-denying Christianity was the only kind known in the first centuries of the Church.

Along with writing books, I am the webmaster of Christian-history.org where my goal is to get the "early church fathers" out of the halls of academia and before the eyes of average Christians that want to see for themselves what the apostles really taught and really meant. The "fathers," who were really just ordinary Christians like you and me, were members of the apostles' churches. What an important peek into history!

I am an elder in a Christian community. I write about, teach and, as best I can, live the radical life of the primitive Christians.

I am married, and I have raised six wonderful children. I was rewarded with two beautiful grandchildren early in 2017.

Reviews

[Clayton Wagler · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great read for gaining a much better understanding of what should be thought of when one hears the word “grace” in the Bible. The word is majorly misused in today’s world and this book does a really good job at correcting that. It’s also very short and concise so it only takes about a couple hours to read through the book.