I, like many of you, now have aging parents, and it has brought Nonnie to mind more than once. I began thinking about the meaning of the phrase, “growing old gracefully.” That was, in a very real sense, what was special about Nonnie: she was full of grace.
Not all aging people become grace-ful. Many become more judgmental, grouchier, and less patient. In their final years, their family members sit with them out of duty, not love.
Maybe it was her life experience that taught her first-hand about human sin. She certainly was no stranger to hardship or ill-treatment with an abusive and alcoholic husband. Maybe she had lived long enough to know herself so well that she had no illusions about her own predilection for wrongdoing. Maybe the vast picture she could see after a century on this earth showed that all these sins don’t stand a chance in the light of Love.
I would like to believe that I could be like Nonnie, becoming more and more full of grace as I age. But that would require me to better understand how deeply I am in need of God’s forgiveness. I am truly wretched, but this doesn’t make me worthless. Rather, I am of such infinite worth that God was willing to let his Son die to save me. I am arguably halfway through my life, and I still struggle to understand this.
How can we help our children understand this? How can they grow gracefully? First, they must become aware of their sin. That means telling them an unvarnished truth, something difficult to do in our whitewashed culture. Then they must know that as bad as our sin may be, God loves us despite it, with an infinitely huge, infinitely powerful love. Like Nonnie, who gave grace to those around her, God’s paradoxical love pulls us to him, to hang on His every Word, to look into His eyes. Then, this abundance of grace we have been given will show us that there is plenty to share with those around us.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. Ephesians 2:8-9