Gatekeeping God's Grace

God’s grace isn’t getting out of hand. It’s been out of hand for 2000 years.

Public Theology is based on the work of Zach W. Lambert, Pastor of Restore, an inclusive church in Austin, Texas. Zach’s first book, Better Ways to Read the Bible, will release on August 12, 2025 and is available to preorder today. All of the content available at Public Theology is for those who identify as Christian, as well as those who might be interested in learning about a more inclusive, kind, thoughtful Christianity. We’re glad you’re here.

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Someone once told me that grace was “getting out of hand” at our church.

He had asked to meet with me to discuss all of the reasons he was leaving Restore: women praying in front of men, a divorced man serving communion, a gay couple holding hands within the service. Our church was clearly not a good fit for him, so I helped him find one more to his taste, but I’ve never forgotten that conversation.

Do you know anyone who feels like God’s grace is out of hand? That it’s too radical, too inclusive, and too all-encompassing?

Do you know anyone who feels like some people are undeserving of God’s grace? Have you ever felt undeserving?

For the last 2000 years of church history, many people have become obsessed with policing God’s grace. They are preoccupied with deciding who is in and who is out, who is worthy and who is not.

You can probably name people like this. You may even be thinking about how much of American Christianity is defined by this litmus test oriented faith. Sadly, none of this is new.

There were some early church leaders who felt like God’s grace was “getting out of hand” too. People who tried to build walls to keep other people out of God’s family. They argued that folks needed to follow the Old Testament Law, or conform to the dominant cultural expressions of the community, or even change their physical appearance in order to be a “true Christian.”

But thankfully, other early church leaders stood up and said “No.” One of these leaders was the persecutor of Christians turned pastor named Paul. He helped start churches centered on the grace of God all over the Near East during the first century.

Some of those churches were in the Roman province of Galatia, a part of modern day Turkey. Not long after these churches got started, they were infiltrated by some “God’s grace is getting out of hand” kind of people and they started circling the wagons, policing who was worthy of God’s love and who wasn’t.

Paul was not happy about this and he wrote them a letter to let them know (the book of Galatians in the New Testament).

Paul, an apostle—sent not from men nor by a man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead— and all the brothers and sisters with me. To the churches in Galatia: Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—which is really no gospel at all.

Galatians 1:1-7

If you’ve read any of Paul’s other letters found in the New Testament, you know this is not normally how he begins his correspondence. Paul usually spends most of chapter one telling the people how much he loves them, how he’s praying for them, and catching them up on what’s been happening in his life— but not this time. This problem in the Galatian church is too urgent to be delayed by pleasantries.

These folks are turning to a different Gospel which, he states, "is really no gospel at all.”

Gospel literally means “Good News.” Paul is referencing the community Jesus has inaugurated in which all people have a place to belong and everyone experiences flourishing.

This is the Good News we celebrate on Easter, the gospel that Jesus spent his life pursuing healing and wholeness for all people, that he died on the cross, and that he rose from the grave, overcoming death and offering forgiveness and fullness of life to everyone. It’s the Good News Paul told the Galatians about. It’s the foundation of the church they started.

But they have abandoned it for something that isn’t good news at all.

Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ… We know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified.

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

Galatians 1:7, 2:15-21

Paul is imploring these Christians not to “set aside the grace of God!” Do not pervert it, do not add to it, and do not neglect it. Everything rises and falls on the grace of God made manifest through Jesus. He was the embodiment of divine grace, so much so that John describes the incarnation of Jesus Christ coming into the world in these terms:

So the Word (Jesus) became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son… From his abundance we have all received grace upon grace.

John 1:14-16

Jesus, God in the flesh, spent his entire life lavishly dispersing God’s grace to humanity. You might be wondering, “But didn’t Jesus get mad?” Yes, he certainly did. But do you know what made Jesus the most mad? People who claimed God’s grace for themselves while attempting to withhold it from others. Let’s call them “the grace gatekeepers.”

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? Again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?

Galatians 3:1-5

Paul reminds the Galatians, in no uncertain terms, that the Gospel of Jesus Christ has always been centered on the gift or grace not the works of law. In his letter to the Ephesian church, Paul puts it like this:

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

Ephesians 2:8-9

We are welcomed into the open arms of God by grace through faith in Christ. This grace is available to all people. Not some people. Not special people. Not chosen people. All people.

Like Paul said, this grace empowers us to do good works, but God’s love for us and grace toward us is not dependent on those good works.

God already loves us. God’s grace has already been poured out upon us.

This is the Gospel. Anything else is counterfeit.

Paul calls this Gospel “offensive” in another letter to the early church in Rome.

Unfortunately, that verse has often been used as a license for Christians to be jerks. Someone acts in a purposefully offensive way and then says, “Well I can’t help it, the Bible says that the Gospel is offensive!” That’s not what Paul meant.

The Gospel is offensive because the God of the universe became a human in the form of Jesus Christ. The creator put on flesh and became a part of the creation.

It’s offensive because he was born to a low-class family from a backwoods town.

It’s offensive because he grew up working a blue collar job, surrounded himself with notorious sinners, broke a bunch of religious laws, and was eventually executed by the Roman government on a cross.

It’s offensive because execution on a Roman cross was usually reserved for major criminals and political dissidents.

And this is what makes the next part so beautiful. Death couldn’t hold Jesus. As we celebrate every Easter Sunday, Jesus conquered death and the grave and rose again on our behalf.

Through the cross and resurrection, Jesus transformed hate into love and death into life. And the most offensive part of all? Jesus offers that life and love to absolutely everyone who wants it.

In her book Searching for Sunday, Rachel Held Evans says it like this:

"What makes the gospel offensive isn't who it keeps out, but who it lets in.”

Rachel Held Evans

God’s grace isn’t getting out of hand. It’s been out of hand for 2000 years.

We have two choices: get out of the way so we can experience the life changing grace of God in our own lives and give it away to everyone we meet— OR— get in the way of what Jesus is doing by claiming that only certain people deserve God’s grace.

We religious types are really good at building walls and retreating to temples. We’re good at making mountains out of our ideologies, obstructions out of our theologies, and hills out of our screwed-up notions of who’s in and who’s out, who’s worthy and who’s unworthy. We’re good at getting in the way.

Perhaps we’re afraid that if we move, God might use people and methods we don’t approve of, that rules will be broken and theologies questioned. Perhaps we’re afraid that if we get out of the way, this grace thing might get out of hand. Well, guess what? It already has.

Grace got out of hand the moment the God of the universe hung on a Roman cross and with outstretched hands looked out upon those who had hung him there and declared, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Grace has been out of hand for more than two thousand years now. We best get used to it.

Rachel Held Evans

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