What makes us valuable to God—all stubborn, broken, wayward as we are?

It’s not the sometime good we do—
forgiving unrepentant foes; 
feeding hungry kids afar; 
warming pews and saying prayers; 
performing unpaid mission work. 

Not one of these, nor all of them, can make us dearer to the One who chooses from His unforced, unrequired love to cherish every soul He made. “I have loved you with an everlasting love,” He says. “I have drawn you with unfailing kindness” (Jer 31:3). 

This grace confounds the wisdom of the world:
no ledgers; no accounts; 
no keeping track of charities;
no earning credit with a boss; 
no bank of kindnesses to set against our debts and deficits. 

We fall back in amazed relief: “I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love” (Rom 8:38).

Grace leads us, in the end, to praise—the joy we were created for. 

Now stay in it.

—Bill Knott