What's So Amazing About Grace? Revised and Updated

By Philip Yancey

OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD!

It's the most powerful force in the universe, our only hope for love and forgiveness, and a foretaste of eternal life: amazing, radical, life-changing grace.

Millions of lives have been changed by award-winning author Philip Yancey's startling exploration of grace at street level. Grace is the one thing the world can't duplicate, the healing force we need, and the key to transforming a broken world.

In this revised and updated edition of his personal and provocative book, Yancey offers true portraits of grace's life-changing power. These stories, set in the midst of life's stark realities, evoke such questions as:

• If grace is God's love for the undeserving, how do I get it?
• How well are we dispensing grace to a world that knows far more of strife and unforgiveness than it does of mercy?
• Can grace make a difference in the midst of such atrocities as the Nazi holocaust, and how can it withstand the brutality of hate?

 

With powerful stories, rich theology, and practical suggestions, Yancey challenges us to become living answers to a world that desperately needs to know, What's So Amazing About Grace?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zondervan
• Release date: Oct 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9780310367819

Philip Yancey

Philip Yancey previously served as editor-at-large for Christianity Today magazine. He has written thirteen Gold Medallion Award-winning books and won two ECPA Book of the Year awards, for What's So Amazing About Grace? and The Jesus I Never Knew. Four of his books have sold over one million copies. He lives with his wife in Colorado. Learn more at philipyancey.com.

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Preface to the Revised and Updated Edition

I wrote the original edition of this book more than twenty-five years ago. Even then, at the dawn of a new century, I feared that some parts of the church were growing so shrill and divisive that bystanders no longer heard the gospel as good news. In fact, I submitted the book to my publisher with the proposed title What’s So Amazing About Grace and Why Don’t Christians Show More of It? A wise and gentle editor persuaded me to shorten it. That title’s a bit in-your-face for a book buyer, don’t you think? he said. Besides, we can’t fit that many words on a book’s spine.

I remember standing in the kitchen as I stuffed the thick bundle of my manuscript pages into a mailing envelope—in that era when editors still preferred hard copy to digital files. It’s probably the last book I’ll write for Christian readers, especially evangelicals, I said to my wife. After all, I have a chapter on Mel White, now an LGBTQ activist, and another chapter on Bill Clinton, a favorite target of evangelicals. I’ll likely be blackballed. I was wrong. This book has sold more copies, and provoked more responses, than anything else in my writing career.

As I studied the word grace, which appears over one hundred times in the Bible, it struck me that this five-letter word is precisely what the world needs in contentious times. It takes little or no grace to relate to someone who thinks like you, votes like you, and looks and smells like you. Rather, grace is put to the test when we confront someone different, especially someone who is morally offensive to us. As the Canadian theologian Lee Beach¹ has said, If you want to grow in love, the way to do it is not likely going to be by attending more Bible studies or prayer meetings; it will happen by getting close to people who are not like you.

What must it have been like for Jesus, who knew what God imagined for the human experiment, to live amid people whose lives so miserably failed to match that ideal? And yet many of his parables present startling examples of grace. More, he demonstrated grace in person, seeking out people in society who least resembled him: tax collectors, prostitutes, notorious sinners, physical and spiritual outcasts.

As I reflect on the past twenty-five years, it seems clear to me that the world needs grace more than ever. At the time of this book’s first publication, President Bill Clinton was serving his second term in office. Historians were ranking those years as among the most peaceful and prosperous in U.S. history. Unemployment hit historic lows, and astonishingly, the federal budget produced a surplus four years in a row. Congress passed bills with bipartisan support on major issues such as welfare reform and crime prevention. All this happened because Democrats and Republicans worked together—though not without strife—rather than automatically opposing whatever the other side proposed.

At the same time, international tensions had greatly eased from Cold War days. The Soviet Union had broken up into sovereign republics. Russia was reveling in newfound freedom and looking to the West for help in managing a chaotic economy (at least until Vladimir Putin became prime minister the following year). China’s economy was booming, lifting millions out of poverty. The political scholar Francis Fukuyama suggested that human development had reached the end of history, a triumph for liberal democracy.

We now know that Fukuyama spoke too soon. In the years since, wars have erupted in Africa, the Middle East, and Ukraine. Autocrats have risen to power around the world, and a new Cold War is taking shape between the U.S. and its old adversaries, China and Russia. On the domestic front, U.S. elections now show a sharp divide between blue states and red states. Some politicians seriously advocate for their states to secede from the nation; others speak darkly of a potential civil war.

Much has changed culturally as well in twenty-five years, including the country’s religious makeup. Church membership has fallen from 69 percent to below 50 percent, a historic low. According to the Pew Research Center,² currently about three in ten U.S. adults describe themselves as atheists, agnostics, or nothing in particular when asked about their religious identity. These nones vote overwhelmingly Democratic, widening the political divide.

I wrote for Christianity Today magazine during the Clinton presidency, and in that role I was twice invited to the White House. The concept of culture wars had recently entered politics, and President Clinton seemed baffled by it. A Southern Baptist himself, he couldn’t understand evangelicals’ outrage when he permitted gays to serve in the military under the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. Back then, no country had yet legalized same-sex marriage, and transgender issues were barely mentioned.

In 1998 Clinton’s sex scandal with a White House intern dominated the news, leading to the president’s impeachment (and later acquittal). For spiritual guidance, notably, the Democratic president turned to two evangelical pastors, scheduling weekly meetings with Tony Campolo and Gordon MacDonald.

Both sides of the political aisle have hardened over the past few decades. A poll by the Public Religion Research Institute reveals that eight in ten Republicans believe the Democratic Party has been taken over by socialists, while eight in ten Democrats believe the Republican Party has been taken over by racists. Almost half of all U.S. adults report that they’ve stopped discussing political news when they disagree with a close friend or family member, and one in six have simply broken off the relationship.³

On university campuses and online, a cancel culture tries to keep opposing views from even being heard. I saw this principle in action as I followed an internet thread about the hymn Amazing Grace, first sung nearly 250 years ago. One side vigorously opposed singing lyrics written by a slave trader—even though John Newton repented of his past and joined William Wilberforce in the long, successful campaign to end slavery in the British Empire. As a friend of mine said, I’ve noticed that no matter which side you’re on, Left or Right, there’s no place for forgiveness or redemption. Once you’ve crossed a line sacred to, say, Black Lives Matter or one of the white supremacist groups, you’re out, banned forever.

Some activists now view Christians as a hostile force of moralists who oppose individual choice in abortion, LGBTQ, and gender issues. Often it seems that two sides are standing on opposite banks, shouting at each other across a canyon. In such a climate we can choose to withdraw, hunkering down with like-minded people. Or we can choose the Jesus way, seeing schism and antagonism as a testing ground for grace.

I come across one of my favorite images of grace whenever I hike the mountains in my home state of Colorado. In the summer my wife and I choose trails that we know will be abundant in wildflowers. The mountains are spectacular, with their upthrusts of stark granite, couloirs of snow, and sparkling alpine lakes. Suddenly, however, we turn a corner and see an entire field full of delicate columbines waving in the breeze. Or we reach the top of a peak and there we find bright purple flowers, the showy sky pilot, seemingly growing out of bare rock. God has lavished this earth with beauty—flowers, coral reefs, tropical birds—whether we notice it or not.

At its most basic level, grace acts as a social lubricant, softening human interaction. I grew up in the South at a time when every kid learned to say Yes, ma’am and No, sir, and to liberally use words such as please and thank you. Like grace notes in music, such embellishments add a subtle flavor of courtesy. Take them away, and interaction will have a harsher edge. Have a nice day may seem like a cliché, but it beats the surly growls from waiters and retailers in some countries I’ve visited.

More importantly, verbal courtesy enables people to express their differences in a noninflammatory way. Even politicians from opposing parties may learn to treat each other respectfully. For example, Great Britain’s House of Commons instructs its members to address opponents as the Right Honourable Gentleman (or Lady) opposite.⁴ In the U.S., that practice sank to a new low during the presidential campaign of 2016, when one candidate called her opponents a basket of deplorables, and the other dismissed his as deranged and human scum.

Politics is an adversarial sport, and in recent years I have watched Christians adopt some of its most unwelcome characteristics. Francis Collins, former director of the National Institutes of Health, reports that during the COVID-19 pandemic his most vociferous hate mail came from fellow evangelicals. They were also the group most likely to embrace conspiracy theories, he adds.

"Perfect love⁵ casts out fear," the apostle John wrote. Looking back over my lifetime, I see a subculture plagued by a variety of fears: Communism, Armageddon, fluoride in drinking water, hippies, secular humanism, homosexuals, AIDS, socialism, immigrants, masks, and vaccines. It occurs to me that the converse of John’s statement is also true: perfect fear casts out love. The more Christians are characterized by fear, the less we can communicate good news.

Martin Luther King Jr. used to say that justice and moral issues are certainly worth fighting for. But he called on Jesus followers to use different weapons, the weapon of love.⁶ Paul urged us to bring comfort to the harsh world around us by representing the God of all comfort and Father of compassion. Peter added, Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.⁷ Jesus followers can lead the way in helping to restore civility to a deeply divided nation.

The mountains also give me a second image of grace, one that expresses its revolutionary nature. I live by a stream that originates thirty miles away, near the summit of a fourteen-thousand-foot mountain. In late spring I have stood on its ice field and heard the hollow gurgling sound of a melting stream just beginning to form. It’s possible to follow the course of that stream down some seven thousand vertical feet to my home, and then down another two thousand feet to Denver, where it ends in a reservoir.

Grace, like water, always flows to the low places. When I was writing The Jesus I Never Knew, I made a chart of all the people in the Gospels who had a personal encounter with Jesus. With shocking consistency, this pattern became clear: the more upright, responsible, high-functioning, and even devout a person was, the more suspiciously they viewed Jesus. Meanwhile, the socially and morally outcast were the ones most attracted to Jesus.

The same pattern appears in Jesus’ parables, which present as heroes the good Samaritan, not the good rabbi; a beggar named Lazarus, not a nameless rich man; an inarticulate tax collector, not a pious Pharisee; the prodigal son, not his obedient older brother. Again and again, Jesus makes the point that although the world rewards worthy individuals, grace has nothing to do with worthiness. Like water, it flows downward; like a gift, it needs only to be received with open hands.

As though to underscore the point, the entire Bible shines a spotlight on deeply flawed individuals who have been transformed by the radical power of grace. Moses, a great leader to be sure, but one who had an anger problem and committed murder. David, who committed adultery and multiple murders. Peter, who betrayed Jesus with a curse, not once but three times. Paul, the human rights abuser who once tortured Christians. These are the giants of faith, proving that no one can conclude, I’m beyond the reach of God’s grace. God could never love someone like me.

Like a time-release capsule, grace works on several levels: restoring basic civility, transforming individuals, and ultimately affecting all of society.

A mountain stream may begin as a trickle, but in time it can gather enough force to alter the landscape. (If you doubt that, visit the Grand Canyon.) The revolutionary strain of grace changed history, setting loose a stream of liberation that freed slaves, empowered women, lifted the downtrodden, educated the illiterate, and brought healing to the sick. Wherever in the world I have visited, I have found a trail of hospitals, orphanages, schools, and ministries that fight poverty, liberate victims of sex trafficking, and respond to disasters, all in the name of Jesus. Such is the power of grace.

Jesus likened the kingdom of God to a tiny seed in the garden that grows into a great bush in which the birds of the air come to nest. When I travel internationally, I see the long-term results of the gospel that Jesus preached. According to Transparency International’s⁸ index of corruption, nine of the ten least corrupt countries have a strong Christian heritage. The same ratio applies to indices that measure freedom, prosperity, gender equality, earth care, human rights, democracy, freedom of the press, and charity.

Scandinavian countries rank high on these lists, and Sweden illustrates the pattern. On my first trip there, I came away impressed by the Swedes’ charity, honesty, courtesy, and hospitality. Ironically, I had just been reading a history of Europe which recorded that for two centuries many prayers in Europe ended with the line, Lord, save us from the Vikings. Amen.

What happened to change a culture from raping and pillaging barbarians to an admirable society that tourists like to visit? Grace happened. It took several centuries, but gradually the power of the Christian gospel percolated through an entire culture. The seed fell into the ground, and a great bush grew up so that even today birds of the air nest in its branches. In a way, modern Scandinavians, many of whom have left the church, are living off the moral capital of Christian values.

What’s So Amazing About Grace? has been in print for over twenty-five years. In that time I have received several thousand letters of response. Mostly, they tell stories. The man who shot John Lennon, now studying the Bible in a New York prison. Former president Jimmy Carter, spending his postpresidency bringing grace to less fortunate countries. An Emmy-winning actress working to heal wounds from childhood. The rock band U2, who studied the book together.

U2’s lead singer, Bono, had the most concise summary: When you boil it down, the universe runs by either Karma or Grace. I’d be in big trouble if Karma was going to finally be my judge. I’m holding out for Grace.

I have made changes throughout the original text, mainly by updating old examples and references. This edition also includes a reflection guide consisting of questions that make the application more personal. I hope that a new generation of readers, not even alive when I wrote this book, discover for themselves what’s so amazing about grace. A quarter century later, I am more convinced than ever that the United States and the world need a massive infusion of it.

Like Bono, I’m holding out for grace.

Part One

How Sweet the Sound

I know nothing, except what everyone knows—

if there when Grace dances, I should dance.

W. H. Auden

Chapter 1

The Last Best Word

I told a story in my book The Jesus I Never Knew, a true story that long afterward continued to haunt me. I heard it from a friend who works with the down-and-out in Chicago:

A prostitute came to me in wretched straits, homeless, sick, unable to buy food for her two-year-old daughter. Through sobs and tears, she told me she had been renting out her daughter—two years old!—to men interested in kinky sex. She made more renting out her daughter for an hour than she could earn on her own in a night. She had to do it, she said, to support her own drug habit. I could hardly bear hearing her sordid story. For one thing, it made me legally liable—I’m required to report cases of child abuse. I had no idea what to say to this woman.

At last I asked if she had ever thought of going to a church for help. I will never forget the look of pure, naive shock that crossed her face. Church! she cried. Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They’d just make me feel worse.

What struck me about my friend’s story is that women much like this prostitute fled toward Jesus, not away from him. The worse a person felt about herself, the more likely she saw Jesus as a refuge. Has the church lost that gift? Evidently the down-and-out, who flocked to Jesus when he lived on earth, no longer feel welcome among his followers. What has happened?

The more I pondered this question, the more I felt drawn to one word as the key. All that follows uncoils from that one word.

As a writer, I play with words all day long. I toy with them, listen for their overtones, crack them open, and try to stuff my thoughts inside. I’ve found that words tend to spoil over the years, like old meat. Their meaning rots away. Consider the word charity, for instance. When King James translators contemplated the highest form of love, they settled on the word charity to convey it. Nowadays we hear the scornful protest, I don’t want your charity!

Perhaps I keep circling back to grace because it is one grand theological word that has not spoiled. I call it the last best word because every English usage I can find retains some of the glory of the original. Like a vast aquifer, the word underlies our proud civilization, reminding us that good things come not from our own efforts, rather by the grace of God. Even now, despite our secular drift, taproots still stretch toward grace. Listen to how we use the word.

Many people say grace before meals, acknowledging daily bread as a gift from God. We are grateful for someone’s kindness, gratified by good news, congratulated when successful, gracious in hosting friends. When a person’s service pleases us, we leave a gratuity. In each of these uses I hear a pang of childlike delight in the undeserved.

A composer of music may add grace notes to the score. Though not essential to the melody—they are gratuitous—these notes add a flourish whose presence would be missed. When I first attempt a piano sonata by Beethoven or Schubert, I play it through a few times without the grace notes. The sonata carries along, but oh what a difference it makes when I add in the grace notes, which season the piece like savory spices.

In England, some uses hint loudly at the word’s theological source. British subjects address royalty as Your Grace. Students at Oxford and Cambridge may receive a grace exempting them from certain academic requirements. Parliament declares an act of grace to pardon a criminal.

New York publishers also suggest the theological meaning with their policy of gracing. If I sign up for twelve issues of a magazine, I may receive a few extra copies even after my subscription has expired. These are grace issues, sent free of charge (or, gratis) to tempt me to resubscribe. Credit cards, rental car agencies, and mortgage companies likewise extend to customers an undeserved grace period.

I also learn about a word from its opposite. The media speak of communism’s fall from grace, a phrase similarly applied to Ravi Zacharias, Bill Cosby, Richard Nixon, and Harvey Weinstein. We insult a person by pointing out the dearth of grace: "You ingrate! we say, or worse, You’re a disgrace! A truly despicable person has no saving grace" about him. My favorite use of the root of the word grace occurs in the mellifluous phrase persona non grata: a person who offends the U.S. government by some act of treachery is officially proclaimed a person without grace.

The many uses of the word in English convince me that grace is indeed amazing—truly our last best word. It contains the essence of the gospel as a drop of water can contain the image of the sun. The world thirsts for grace in ways it does not even recognize; little wonder the hymn Amazing Grace edged its way into the top ten of the charts two centuries after composition. For a society that seems adrift, without moorings, I know of no better place to drop an anchor of faith.

Like grace notes in music, though, the state of grace proves fleeting. The Berlin Wall falls in a night of euphoria; South African Blacks queue up in long, exuberant lines to cast their first votes ever; the Arab Spring brings new hope for democracy and freedom—for a moment, grace descends. And then Eastern Europe sullenly settles into the long task of rebuilding; Russia invades Ukraine; South Africa tries to figure out how to run a country; civil wars break out in Libya, Yemen, and Syria. Like a dying star, grace dissipates in a final burst of pale light, and is then engulfed by the black hole of ungrace.

The great Christian revolutions, said H. Richard Niebuhr,¹ come not by the discovery of something that was not known before. They happen when somebody takes radically something that was always there. Oddly, I sometimes find a shortage of grace within the church, an institution founded to proclaim, in Paul’s phrase, the gospel of the grace of God.²

Author Stephen Brown notes that a veterinarian can learn a lot about a dog owner he has never met just by observing the dog. What does the world learn about God by watching us, God’s followers on earth? Trace the roots of charis in Greek, often translated grace in English Bibles, and you will find a verb that means I rejoice, I am glad. In my experience, rejoicing and gladness are not the first images that come to mind when people think of the church. They think of holier-than-thous. They think of church as a place to go after you have cleaned up your act, not before. They think of morality, not grace. Church! said the prostitute, Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They’d just make me feel worse.

Such an attitude comes partly from a misconception, or bias, by outsiders. I have visited soup kitchens, homeless shelters, hospices, and prison ministries staffed by Christian volunteers generous with grace. And yet the prostitute’s comment stings because she has found a weak spot in the church. Some of us seem so anxious about avoiding hell that we forget to celebrate our journey toward heaven. Others of us, rightly concerned about issues in a modern culture war, neglect the church’s mission as a haven of grace in this world of ungrace.

Grace is everywhere, said the dying priest in Georges Bernanos’s novel The Diary of a Country Priest.³ Yes, but how easily we pass by, deaf to the euphony.

I attended a Bible college. Years later, when I was sitting next to the president of that school on an airplane, he asked me to assess my education. Some good, some bad, I replied. I met many godly people there. In fact, I met God there. Who can place a value on that? And yet I later realized that in four years I learned almost nothing about grace. It may be the most important word in the Bible, the heart of the gospel. How could I have missed it?

I related our conversation in a subsequent chapel address at that school and, in doing so, offended the faculty. Some suggested I not be invited back to speak. One gentle soul asked whether I should have phrased things differently. Shouldn’t I have said that as a student I lacked the receptors to receive the grace that was all around me? Because I respect and love this man, I thought long and hard about his question. Ultimately, however, I concluded that I had experienced as much ungrace on the campus of a Bible college as I had anywhere else in life.

A counselor, David Seamands,⁴ summed up his career this way:

Many years ago I was driven to the conclusion that the two major causes of most emotional problems among evangelical Christians are these: the failure to understand, receive, and live out God’s unconditional grace and forgiveness; and the failure to give out that unconditional love, forgiveness, and grace to other people. . . . We read, we hear, we believe a good theology of grace. But that’s not the way we live. The good news of the Gospel of grace has not penetrated the level of our emotions.

The world can do almost anything as well as or better than the church," says Gordon MacDonald.⁵ You need not be a Christian to build houses, feed the hungry, or heal the sick. There is only one thing the world cannot do. It cannot offer grace. MacDonald has put his finger on the church’s single most important contribution. Where else can the world go to find grace?

The Italian novelist Ignazio Silone wrote about a revolutionary hunted by the police. In order to hide him, his comrades dressed him in the garb of a priest and sent him to a remote village in the foothills of the Alps. Word got out, and soon a long line of peasants appeared at his door, full of stories of their sins and broken lives. The priest protested and tried to turn them away, to no avail. He had no recourse but to sit and listen to the stories of people starving for grace.

I sense, in fact, that is why any person goes to church: out of hunger for grace. The book Growing Up Fundamentalist⁶ tells of a reunion of students from a missionary academy in Japan. With one or two exceptions, all had left the faith and come back, one of the students reported. And those of us who had come back had one thing in common: we had all discovered grace.

As I look back on my own pilgrimage, marked by wanderings, detours, and dead ends, I see now that what pulled me along was my search for grace. I rejected the church for a time because I found so little grace there. I returned because I found grace nowhere else.

I have barely tasted of grace myself, have rendered less than I have received, and am in no way an expert on grace. These are, in fact, the very reasons that impel me to write. I want to know more, to understand more, to experience more grace. I dare not—and the danger is very real—write an ungracious book about grace. Accept then, here at the beginning, that I write as a pilgrim qualified only by my craving for grace.

Grace does not offer an easy subject for a writer. To borrow E. B. White’s comment about humor, [Grace] can be dissected, as a frog, but the thing dies in the process, and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind. I have just read a thirteen-page treatise on grace in the New Catholic Encyclopedia, which has cured me of any desire to dissect grace and display its innards. I do not want the thing to die. For this reason, I will rely more on stories than on syllogisms.

In sum, I would far rather convey grace than explain it.

Chapter 2

Babette’s Feast: A Story

¹

Karen Blixen, Danish by birth, married a baron and spent the years 1914–31 managing a coffee plantation in British East Africa (her Out of Africa tells of these years). After a divorce she returned to Denmark and began writing in English under the pseudonym Isak Dinesen. One of her stories, Babette’s Feast, became a cult classic after being made into a movie in the 1980s.

Dinesen set her story in Norway, but the Danish filmmakers changed the location to an impoverished fishing village on the coast of Denmark, a town of muddy streets and thatched-roof hovels. In this grim setting, a white-bearded Dean led a group of worshipers in an austere Lutheran sect.

What few worldly pleasures could tempt a peasant in Norre Vosborg, this sect renounced. All wore black. Their diet consisted of boiled cod and a gruel made from boiling bread in water fortified with a splash of ale. On the Sabbath, the group met together and sang songs about Jerusalem, my happy home, name ever dear to me. They had fixed their compasses on the New Jerusalem, with life on earth tolerated as a way to get there.

The old Dean, a widower, had two teenage daughters: Martine, named for Martin Luther, and Philippa, named for Luther’s disciple Philip Melanchthon. Villagers used to attend the church just to feast their eyes

Reviews for What's So Amazing About Grace? Revised and Updated

[pgchuis · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this in conjunction with the video series and study at church. I found the concept of the book excellent, challenging and helpful, but as a non-American a generation younger than Philip Yancey, parts of it seemed a bit time and culture-specific. I thought he was best on the personal and inter-personal level; the sections about nations discovering grace felt superficial and unconvincing and the parts about the church and politics (and the slight blurring of the falling of the Iron Curtain with salvation) again probably speak more to Americans than to me.My favourite idea is a quotation from CS Lewis about the concept of loving the sinner while hating the sin: we have felt this way about ourselves all our life: "There had never been the slightest difficulty about it. ... Just because I loved myself, I was sorry to find that I was the sort of man who did those things."

[olegalca · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Grace is phenomenal. I don't think we'll ever get a handle on it until we get to heaven.

[popejephei · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Yancey's just slightly ahead of his time. In 1997 he realizes there's a sickness at the heart of American Fundamentalism's soul, even if he misdiagnoses a vicious pneumonia as a cold. Unlike Gabe Lyons (unChristian) writing several years later, Yancey's honest enough to know that what the cult needs is more than a better PR job. He is even honest enough to allow that Fundamentalism's approach to belief may not be perfect, a difficult assertion for a member of a movement that values obedience to authority above all else to make. He sees so clearly... up to a point, and then, Yancey goes completely blind again. He's happy to question how religious leaders have used and abused God language, happy to note some of the missteps of Fundamentalism, but utterly unable to even begin to question the rotted core of Fundamentalist belief. Yancey, for example, can understand that a gay friend is hurt by self righteous Fundamentalists telling him he's going to hell and his sins are unforgivable. Still Yancey will not even for a nanosecond allow himself to wonder if maybe Fundamentalism is known by its fruits, and if its fruits are hatred and bigotry it might be time to pause and reflect. Yancey is quick to tell us that ultimately, he too, has to consign his friend to hell. Realizing that the word "love" has become diminished and exhausted through misuse and overuse, Yancey cleverly suggests that faith be reviewed using the relatively unadulterated word "grace." If only he, or some other Fundamentalist, would go one step further and examine their own beliefs in a new light instead of simply crafting a convenient, non-threatening, definition of grace that reinforces a misguided and unhaopoy set of religious ideas.

[lisamunro · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This isn't the kind of book that I'd normally read, but I was struggling with forgiveness and thought I'd give it a try. I'm glad I did. Yancey not only helps to explain what exactly grace means in a Biblical sense, but also why so many Christians seem to be living in a state of what he terms ungrace. Through numerous examples from his own life as well as anecdotes drawn from the lives of ordinary people and nations, Yancey gives us a better idea about what it might look like to practice grace in an every day way. Yancey also doesn't neglect to mention his own struggles with the concept of grace and the idea of extending forgiveness to those people who hurt us as well as those who we hurt. Overall, I thought that the concepts contained in this book were clearly illustrated and a call to people to live with ever greater grace in their daily lives.

[gdill-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I once read Brennan Manning's "Ragamuffin Gospel" several years ago and thought it was the best book ever written that best captures and defines the very essence of grace. While it still remains one of my all-time favorite books, "What's So Amazing About Grace?" stands right next to it. Yancey never disappoints with his raw grit stories and life-changing quotes. He tells like it is, and in many cases may make many Christians uncomfortable. Yancey tells of many true-life stories of what grace looks like in the real world. On the other hand, he also tells of many stories of what the other side of grace looks like, he calls "ungrace". Sadly, this "ungrace" comes from many who call themselves evangelical Christian. Fortunately, ungrace doesn't have to be the way it remains. Many Christians have shown grace and continue to live it and act it out in ways that have changed the world and continue to do so today. At the conclusion of this book, Yancey summarizes what grace should look like. I highly recommend this book to those who have bad taste of Christians in their mouth, and to those of us who need a reminder of what Jesus exemplified and how we ought to be living like... through the eyes of grace.Some of my favorite quotes from this book:Grace does not depend on what we have done for God but rather what God has done for us.Only Christianity dares to make God's love unconditional.Grace comes free of charge to people who do not deserve it and I am one of those people.There is perhaps no one of natural passions so hard to subdue as pride... Even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility. (Benjamin Franklin)Grace, my friends, demands nothing from us but that we shall await it with confidence and acknowledge it in gratitude.Some of us seem so anxious about avoiding hell that we forget to celebrate our journey toward heaven.Grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us more. And, grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us less.To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you. (C.S. Lewis)If everyone followed the "eye for an eye" principle of justice, eventually the whole world would go blind. (Mohandas Gandhi)Christianity has always insisted that the cross we bear precedes the crown we wear. (MLK Jr.)Law merely indicated the sickness; grace brought about the cure.Our real challenge should not be to Christianize the United States but rather to strive to be Christ's church in an increasingly hostile world.Moralism apart from grace solves little.Of one hundred men, one will read the Bible; the ninety-nine will read the Christian. (D.L. Moody)A grace-full Christian is one who looks at the world through "grace-tinted lenses".

[dannywahlquist · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed this fresh look at grace. Some of my favorite quotes include:
In my experience, rejoicing and gladness are not the first images that come to mind when people think of the church. They think of holier-than-thous. They think of church as a place to go after you have cleaned up your act, not before. They think of morality, not grace. "Church!" said the prostitute, "Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They'd just make me feel worse."
I rejected the church for a time because I found so little grace there. I returned because I found grace nowhere else.
Now I am trying in my own small way to pipe the tune of grace. I do so because I know, more surely than I know anything, that any pang of healing or forgiveness or goodness I have ever felt comes solely from the grace of God. I yearn for the church to become a nourishing culture of that grace.
I believe Jesus gave us these stories to call us to step completely outside our tit-for-tat world of ungrace and enter into God’s realm of infinite grace.
"If John were to be asked, 'What is your primary identity in life?' he would not reply, 'I am a disciple, an apostle, an evangelist, an author of one of the four Gospels,' but rather, 'I am the one Jesus loves.'" Brennan Manning
At last I understood: in the final analysis, forgiveness is an act of faith. By forgiving another, I am trusting that God is a better justice-maker than I am. By forgiving, I release my own right to get even and leave all issues of fairness for God to work out. I leave in God’s hands the scales that must balance justice and mercy.
I share a deep concern for our society. I am struck, though, by the alternative power of mercy as demonstrated by Jesus, who came for the sick and not the well, for the sinners and not the righteous. Jesus never countenanced evil, but he did stand ready to forgive it. Somehow, he gained the reputation as a lover of sinners, a reputation that his followers are in danger of losing today. As Dorothy Day put it, "I really only love God as much as I love the person I love the least."
“Don't the Bible say we must love everybody?" "O, the Bible! To be sure, it says a great many things; but, then, nobody ever thinks of doing them." Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom’s Cabin
We may be abominations, but we are still God’s pride and joy. All of us in church need “grace-healed eyes” to see the potential in others for the same grace that God has lavishly bestowed on us.
The scene from John 8 rattles me because by nature I identify more with the accusers than the accused. I deny far more than I confess. Cloaking my sin under a robe of respectability, I seldom if ever let myself get caught in a blatant, public indiscretion. Yet if I understand this story correctly, the sinful woman is the nearest the kingdom of God. Indeed, I can only advance in the kingdom if I become like that woman: trembling, humbled, without excuse, my palms open to receive God's grace.
If we truly grasped the wonder of God’s love for us, the devious question that prompted Romans 6 and 7 — What can I get away with? — would never even occur to us. We would spend our days trying to fathom, not exploit, God’s grace.
Legalism may "work" in an institution such as a Bible college or the Marine Corps. In a world of ungrace, structured shame has considerable power. But there is a cost, an incalculable cost: ungrace does not work in a relationship with God. I have come to see legalism in its pursuit of false purity as an elaborate scheme of grace avoidance. You can know the law by heart without knowing the heart of it.
Jesus' fierce denunciations of the Pharisees show how seriously He viewed the toxic threat of legalism. Its dangers are elusive
the proof of spiritual maturity is not how 'pure' you are but awareness of your impurity. That very awareness opens the door to grace.
The spiritual games we play, many of which begin with the best of motives, can perversely lead us away from God, because they lead us away from grace. Repentance, not proper behavior or even holiness, is the doorway to grace. And the opposite of sin is grace, not virtue.
In short, the President had not experienced much grace from Christians. “I've been in politics long enough to expect criticism and hostility. But I was unprepared for the hatred I get from Christians. Why do Christians hate so much?” Bill Clinton
as I read through stacks of vituperative letters I got a strong sense for why the world at large does not automatically associate the word ‘grace’ with evangelical Christians.
For this reason, I wonder about the enormous energy being devoted these days to restoring morality to the United States. Are we concentrating more on the kingdom of this world than on the kingdom that is not of this world? The public image of the evangelical church today is practically defined by an emphasis on two issues that Jesus did not even mention. How will we feel if historians of the future look back on the evangelical Church of the 1990's and declare, ‘They fought bravely on the moral fronts of abortion and homosexuality rights,' while at the same time reporting that we did little to fulfill the great commission, and we did little to spread the aroma of grace in the world?
“the church must be reminded that it is not the master or servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool.” Rev. Dr. Martin King, Jr.
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” John Quincy Adams
One China expert estimates that the revival in China represents the greatest numerical increase in the history of the Church. In an odd way the government hostility ultimately worked to the church’s advantage. Chinese Christians devoted themselves to worship and evangelism - the original mission of the Church - and did not much concern themselves with politics. They concentrated on changing lives not changing laws.
How does a grace-full Christian look? The Christian life, I believe, does not primarily center on ethics or rules but rather involves a new way of seeing. I escape the force of spiritual “gravity” when I begin to see myself as a sinner who cannot please God by any method of self-improvement or self-enlargement. Only then can I turn to God for outside help – for grace – and to my amazement I learn that a holy God already loves me despite my defects. I escape the force of gravity again when I recognize my neighbors also as sinners, loved by God. A grace- full Christian is one who looks at the world through “grace-tinted lenses.”

[porch_reader · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

C. S. Lewis said that grace is Christianity's unique contribution among other world religions, but grace is a concept that many Christians struggle with. In this book, Yancey begins with a simple definition of grace, saving "Grace means there is nothing that we can do to make God love us more. . . And grace means there is nothing that we can do to make God love us less." But he then explores the challenges that many people have in accepting God's grace. Although I often disagree with Yancey's stance on political issues (which are discussed in some of the book's later chapters), I appreciated his thorough consideration of the concept of grace.

[l_millsaps · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Serving God joyfully and wholeheartedly is only possible when we understand the depth of His love for us, the depth of His grace. In the book, "What's So Amazing aboutGrace?", Phillip Yancey points out its shocking nature - grace cost Jesus everything....and costs us nothing. We don't deserve it, we cannot earn it, and we are completely unable to repay Him for it, yet it is ours for the taking, a gift from God. Once you have truly grasped this, you will be overcome with a willingness to love Christ and serve Him in any way you can....not because you have to, but because you want to. A grace-filled life is a Christ-filled life - when as Christians we show little grace to others, we are also showing very little of Christ. Yancey tells the story of C. S. Lewis - when asked what makes Christianity different from all other religions, he responded with one word...grace. It is what we need, what the world needs. Yancey's book makes me want to be a full-of-grace person, loving Christ and loving others - not because I feel guilty or fearful, seeking to earn God's love....but as a response to the love God has already given.

[libraryclerk · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Was so good I read it again this year, 2010

[librisissimo · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Substance: excellent discussion of grace, forgiveness, charity, etc. Yancey laments the "gracelessness" of too many evangelical Christians (and others) still fixated on the "letter of the law" than on the spirit of the gospel. I think he unfairly targets evangelicals, but he was brought up in one of the more virulent, racist, bigoted congregations so he has some right to talk. He mentions the demonizing of Christianity by the media simultaneously with the paucity of "graceful" Christians but does not seem to connect the dots: how can we "call to mind" acts of real Christian charity when the main-stream-media relentlessly avoids printing the ones that actually do occur? Politics aside, his gospel points are well-taken.Style: Yancey is a clear, articulate, informed and very readable author.

[coffeebookperfect · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A real wake-up call for the "modern" church about their place in society and calling as Christians. Yancey's writing is always intelligent and thoughtful whilst still being practical, compassionate and confronting.

[mrslee_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Philip Yancey has written a wonderful work on what grace is, how it differs from justice or ungrace and why we all need more of it. He dissects the word itself and its uses, how it has been misused and how it has been forgotten or buried in our lives.Though the message he brings isn't exactly new, it is one which is easy to forget in the everyday bustle and hustle. This is a call to all people to remember to live in grace, but especially to Christians who have been so distracted by morality and busy work, we have forgotten our origins as bastards saved by grace. I plan to buy this book and reread it, the message is so important.

[jaygheiser · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Brilliant book. Perhaps the best Christian book I've ever read. It helps me feel more comfortable with some of the 'radical' ideas I have about the state of today's Christianity--ideas that I've struggled with for years.

[dslongwhite · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Last summer at Camp Meeting, Lonnie Melashanko said, "If you read only one book this year, I recommend 'What's so Amazing About Grace' by Philip Yancey." So Karen chose it for bok discussion group. She specifically chose it for this date because Yancey was speaking at Congress in Boston and several of us were going to hear him. He was excellent and after his talk, I was able to get the book signed. I expected the book to be mostly about God's grace to us - and it was. But the majority of the book also dealt with our grace towards other people. It was a message Adventists certainly need to hear After reading the book, however, I realize this is a lesson people in all conservative religions need to hear.Yancey starts the book with the story of a prostitute who sells her young daughter as a prostitute to get money to live. Someone asks her why she doesn't attend church and she responds, "Church! Why would I want to go there? i already feel bad enough about myself - they would only make me feel worse."Yancey asked the question - what has happened to the church - in Jesus day, prostitutes flocked to Jesus but no longer feel welcomed by his followers. He says he himself left the church because he did not find grace there, but he returned because he did not find it elsewhere. He discusses the strict rules of his Bible College and how they defended cultural decisions with unrelated Bible texts as if they were moral issues. He says he wrote an article about sympathy for those in pain and many people wrote to him saying pain was a punishment from God. He says he "yearns for the church to become a nourishing culture of grace."

[rybeewoods · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In the Grip of Grace is where I started, but it was through this book that I came to a more healthy understanding of true godly grace.