Revolution

There is a revolution brewing in my mind and heart.The Lord has used Give them Grace to blow my mind and reveal errors in my thinking that I thought I had corrected long ago. I didn't even know what I didn't even know.
 About a year and a half ago, I realized that though I had asked Christ to be my personal savior many years before, August 9th, 1994 to be exact, I had not truly understood what it meant. I really still thought that this salvation was conditional. Conditioned upon my repentance, I thought that my sin would still send me to hell, regardless of Christ's blood, if somehow I died, or Christ came back, before I had asked for forgiveness for recently committed sin. I did not really understand that while our hearts should be grieved because of sin, Christ's blood not only covered the sins that occurred before our prayer of salvation, but after as well. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved and thy house" Acts 16:31. Maybe it is my Catholic blood. I wasn't raised in the church, though that was my family's heritage, but the mindset seems to be pervasive. Despite Christ's blood, I was still stuck on trying to be good enough. Such an impossibility. So, a year and a half ago, I had an awakening centered around acts 16:31, and I thought I was leaving my legalism, my perfectionism, behind me.
 Then I picked up this book. it does not use the KJV, but using it alongside the KJV, I have not yet found a place where it contradicts it. I am only a quarter of the way through the book. Normally, i gobble books up, but the material here requires me to move slowly, read sections over and over again, reference my Bible, and sit back while the Holy spirit transforms my mind.
Of the many passages that I have already bookmarked, here is one that is dear to me

      " Respect, courtesy, and civil obedience are blessings from the Lord, who bestows his blessings on the just and the unjust ( Matt. 5:45). But if our human obedience or morality isn't motivated by gratitude for God's grace, it is very dangerous. If not rooted in gratitude for God's love for us in Christ, morality is deadlier to the soul than immorality." Elyse M. Thompson and Jessica Fitzpatrick

The book goes on to note how it was the priests, not the gentiles, that crucified Christ; that were blind to his deity. The authors dissect the Parable of the Prodigal Son in a way I had never heard done before- a way that convicted me personally, for my own actions and my attitudes as a parent.
 My dear Auntie blessed me with the book To Train up a Child when the Big Boy was born. Though I had accepted Christ I had not been raised in a Christian home, and the idea that it was important to mold our children's attitudes, not just actions, was foreign and striking.I knew that training attitudes was at the heart of real obedience. BUT boy hadn't I actually missed the point !!! Attitudes are at the heart of our ability to recognize and accept grace....and in the realm of parenting, attitudes, not outward obedience, are the signal that our children are being drawn to God, understanding his grace.
 So I was patting myself on the pack, unconsciously, grateful for how much I had grown spiritually and the work that God had done in me, not even realizing that that work was no where near complete.

   " Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ' Philippians 1:6

He is so good, and I look forward to the continued renewing of my mind- the revolution of my heart and soul, and the freedom of knowing that my children's salvation is not bound to my own good works, good attitudes, or good parenting.  

Thank you, Grateful for Grace, for recommending this book !