Resources:

Bible Hub: use this resource site to discover the original Greek and Hebrew for the words in the Bible.

PrayerMate App: this is a fantastic app to keep yourself organized and faithful in prayer, and it also has free downloadable devotionals.

You are listening to Grace and Mercy podcast. This podcast is for people who want to know the Grace of God and how it changes the way we interact with the world. I’m your host author, Darlene Bocek, and in this episode, we are going to find out 27 ways Luke introduces us to Grace.

Quote of the Day

To start off with. I wanted to share with you the quote of the day. I read this in my devotionals.

I do a Charles Spurgeon devotional that’s on my PrayerMate app, which I also recommend (link in the show notes). The quote is just a phrase he said:

“only let us enjoy his smile.”

Only let us enjoy his smile. That made me think I think Grace is that– His favor is his smiling at us. It sounds very coarse to say God smiles at us.

But isn’t that what Aaron’s prayer was? “The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine on you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.” There’s Grace and peace right there him lifting his face and shining his face at you. Which is a smiles, isn’t. Just a smile?

Connection between please and grace

I’ve been thinking over the past day that maybe the connection between what we see in Genesis about pleading with God, pleading with people– please, like Joseph’s pleading or asking, “if I have your favor, please have a meal with me. If I have found favor in your eyes.”

The combination between the pleading and saying grace, the thankfulness is maybe… Grace is the intersection of please and thank you. Like in Turkish, the word please is actually the same word as Grace. Lütfen is how you say please is and lütuf is how you say Grace. It’s the same word. And gracias in Spanish and the other Hispanic Latin languages.

Latin and Proto-Indo-European

I found a word in Latin called gratus, which is where Grace comes from. Gratus is a Proto-Indo-European language, which you may or may not know. Proto-Indo-European is like the heart of all languages. Most languages come out of that branch. Proto-Indo-European and gratus is that old.

I will share in the show notes as well the writing of it because it’s got superscript W’s in it and everything this word, but it comes from that Proto-Indo-European word, which means “to welcome, greet and praise.” So that word in itself means welcome, greet and praise. Having praise as part of welcoming, which matches the idea of “Hail, King of the Jews.”

Sanskrit takes this word and it means “praise.” Old Church Slavonic and Old Prussian takes it to mean to “praise.”

The definition of this word in Latin has three meanings, the first meaning “pleasing, acceptable/agreeable, welcome.”

Welcome, Well-come

So you greet somebody. “Oh, welcome” or, “Oh, I’m glad you’re here!” which is what we say in English. “Oh, I’m glad you’re here.” Well, come. Well, that you came right? Second, “dear or beloved,” and the third “grateful, thankful.”

As you remember in the first show, I said I’m confused about the combination. Why do we “say grace”? Why do we say graceful? Why do we say God’s Grace? What’s the intersection between all these things? And my suggestion, again, is what if it’s the combination or the intersection or the space between please and thank you like that back and forth. Somebody gives you something and you receive it.

You’re gracious when you receive it. Right? Gracious, Grace. But then graceful is, I think, a twist on that meaning something that’s pleasing. Like when you watch ballet, we would never dance like that in regular life, walking down the street, most people in the world would not.

Graceful like a swan

But when we see a play like The Nutcracker and they’re doing this ballet. We’re watching, and it’s pleasing to see the graceful movement. We say a swan is graceful. It’s this pleasing kind of a movement , a together-movement that… It’s not harsh and peace. Peace, peace, peace.

It’s a whole movement like a swan. Gliding as opposed to scraping, scraping has friction and gliding swan we’d say it’s graceful because it’s the smooth movement. It’s pleasing for us to see things that have no friction.

Friction bothers us. Fingers on the chalkboard. But graceful dancer, graceful swan is pleasing to our eye. But I think we may still in this series find some more connections between graceful and this idea of the relationship between inside of please and thank you.

So we had Latin word study today. Gratus. We had quote of the week. Now let’s move to the book of Luke. The first verse I want to bring your attention to is a transition from yesterday’s study, which is Luke 2:36.

Grace Runs to the Temple

You remember we were talking about Grace in Leviticus, and we came all the way up till Luke. And in Luke, we saw Simeon and Anna waiting there at the temple. But what’s interesting is that when Anna showed up, it says that she hurried there at that hour, the very hour that Christ came. She hurried there. She hurried to the temple.

We said that Mary and Joseph brought Grace into the temple when they brought Christ there. Right? But did you know that Anna’s name comes from Hannah, which is our Hebrew word for Grace? Grace really did come into the temple. When Christ came to the temple, Grace was pulled in.

Now what I find fascinating here is that Luke is loaded with Grace words, not just with the rejoicing aspect that we saw in Matthew and Mark. Luke has the real word for Grace, which is Charis.

Purpose of the Gospel Writers

The reason why Matthew and Mark and Luke all have different types of approaching the word. Grace has to do with the theme and the purpose behind their theme. Mark and Matthew–their purpose was to show different aspects of Christ’s prophetic fulfillment.

Matthew is very clear that he is going to show how all of these prophecies were fulfilled. Other gospel writers as well talked about the prophecies, but Matthew’s focus is for the Jewish audience to show them that this is what Grace is Eusebius tells us, mark was the translator or the interpreter (is the word he uses) for Peter. So according to early Church history, Peter and Mark were going from place to place, sharing the gospel, sharing Christ. And as they shared Christ, they told the story.

Peter told the story, and Mark interpreted or translated –whatever the word interpreted means. Mark for sure was saying the same words. So when he wrote the gospel, he already had most likely had it memorized.

Luke-the Investigative Journalist

But Luke is a Gentile. You remember the very beginning of Luke, he says, “Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us. It seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught.

Also, early Church history says that Luke interviewed Mary. He interviewed the family of Jesus in Nazareth. There’s a lot of interviews that Luke did.

We see Luke also, who wrote the Book of Acts. We see him in the Story of Acts when he’s following Paul. Possibly he asked Paul if he could join him as he was writing the histories, the Book of Acts. He’s an investigative journalist.

Now Luke is a Gentile, is writing to a Gentile audience who is unfamiliar with Jewish things. So he explains things, and he’s also very in touch with Paul and Paul’s gospel. Right?

They say that Luke was written sometime in the AD 60s. So a good 30 years after Christ. And while Paul was in his missionary journeys, Luke was very familiar with the gospel message to the nations, to the Gentiles.

Luke’s Thematic Focus: Grace

So his thematic focus of his book is this same gospel message of God’s Grace, not law. So Luke introduces us to Grace in the Bible.

We’ve been looking for it. We’ve seen it in greetings. We did get a hint of it with Joseph talking to his brother. We get a good understanding of God’s relationship with Israel, his favoring of Israel in the Book of Exodus, chapter 33.

But Luke is introducing us to Christ, who has come. He’s introducing it for the nations, and he’s bringing Grace. So now let’s look from the beginning at Luke one. How does Luke introduce us to the word Grace?

The very first time we get the root word is when Zechariah is told about his son that will be born, he says to him, and you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. So two times we see the joy of Grace coming that will be started with John. And isn’t that what we see in the Gospels? The Kingdom of God is introduced through John.

Then we have the angel who comes to Mary, and it says the very first thing the angel says… “He came to her and said, ‘Greetings, oh favored one. The Lord is with you.'” And do you know what’s so interesting about that verse? In that verse, there are two of the root words for Grace: Greetings. You remember we had seen that in Matthew and Mark. Greetings you favored with Grace. And in the Greek, those words are right next to each other. Chaire kecharitōmenē is real grace.

Conclusion

Grace is introduced right here. The word Grace. First time it shows up is when Mary is told. Luke has introduced us to Grace. And there are 27 times that this word in one of its forms is found in the book of Luke. We’re going to be looking at that next time. Let’s pray.

Thank you, Heavenly Father, for the message we hear in Luke that you have brought Grace into this world and it enters with the incarnation of Christ. We thank you for that. And we ask that you continue to teach us from your word what Grace means and how it impacts the way we interact with the world. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

Okay. Question of the Week: “How does the rest of the world understand Grace?”

Thank you for listening to Grace and Mercy podcast with author Darlene Bocek. This has been episode six of season One. Finding Grace You can find the show notes for the episode, including links to everything we talked about at GraceandMercyPodcast.com. Make sure to answer the question of the Week on the Show Notes pages. See you next time.