Cheap Grace, Costly Grace
Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.
Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a person must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs us our life, and it is grace because it gives us the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it costs God the life of God’s Son: “you were bought at a price” and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon God’s Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us.
Costly grace is the Incarnation of God. Costly grace is the sanctuary of God; it has to be protected from the world, and not thrown to the dogs. It is therefore the living Word, the Word of God, which God speaks as it pleases God. Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart.
Grace is costly because it compels a person to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
—an excerpt from the book From a Testament to Freedom:
The Essential Writing of Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Cheap grace is useless grace; it is not effectual. The grace that abounds in Christ was costly; He surrendered His life, a ransom for sin; He purchased our redemption. And He rose from the grace to reign, not with an iron fist but with a tender and loving heart; a yoke that is easy, and a burden that is light. Grace’s cost for you and me is in accepting His love, placing our lives in His hands, and following Him. I think of the disciples James and John, the ‘sons of thunder’ asking Jesus for the privilege of sitting at His right and left hand in glory. Jesus’ response was, the first will be last and the least will be the greatest, in God’s Kingdom economy. His Kingdom is full of such paradoxes, just like this one: In embracing costly grace, our souls are set free! –DH
—David Hoskins, Founder & Care Guide, Sanctuary Clinics