Faith, failings, and grace. In my life, each one is a blessing in abundance, a part of life that is new every morning. My goal for this blog is simply to share—share my faith, share my failings, share grace. I’m sharing in the hope that God can use what I write to encourage others—maybe even you.

Blessings in abundance: Faith, failings, and grace. But do failings belong in a list of blessings? Faith, yes. Grace, yes. But failings? Yes. Because without failings, there would be no need for grace.

By definition, grace is unmerited. It’s a state of being that is freely granted to people who don’t deserve it: the big word here is sanctified, but that’s beyond the scope of this blog for the moment. I’ll simplify it by using what my uncle, who was a Baptist minister, taught me long ago: grace is God’s riches at Christ’s expense. Undeserved blessings. My failings—which occur daily and are often spectacular—help me to recognize God’s grace and my need for it. Without a need for grace, there would be no need for faith.

Wow. Not exactly where I planned to go when I began this blog post, but I felt compelled to explain why I was writing before I started writing. I am a person whose private motto has always been, I can do it myself. But the reality is, I can’t. I try and I try, but I fail and I fail. And that is why I need God. Because he can. God says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9, NIV). The simple truth is that I am a sinner in need of a Savior, and Jesus paid the price to make my salvation possible. That’s what I’ll be writing about in this blog: my faith, my failings, God’s grace, and how it all plays out and intersects in my life. I’m praying that God will use what I write as a blessing in others’ lives—maybe even yours.