There's grace here, too.

From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him. You meet him who joyfully works righteousness, those who remember you in your ways.

-Isaiah 64:4-5

My Monday is almost over. I am convinced this is going to be the hardest week of my college experience so far. It will be full of papers, piles of reading, lectures, classes, and late nights. There have already been times that I have felt too tired or just simply unable to do my work. Yet, there has been grace in those times. It looks like praying with a friend before we open our books, like finding myself having accomplished everything on my list, and like walks back down the hill under brilliantly starry skies.

Grace looks like this past Sunday morning, too. Caroline, EA, Travis, Jack and I went north to Lansing to Kevin DeYoung's church to hear C.J. Mahaney speak. I am so thankful that we were able to do that: it was refreshing to be somewhere that reminded me so much of home, and God met us through the message. He spoke on 1 Corinthians 1:1-9, exhorting us to never lose sight of the evidences of grace in the lives and the world around us. He reminded us that for those who have been sovereignly called by God, grace IS working. Grace does exist. As God works a divine perspective in our hearts and minds, we will be able to see that grace more and more every day. Because He has called us, He will also be faithful to us all our days. What a comforting thought that is going into this week. I serve a God who is faithful to sustain, faithful to strengthen, and faithful to save. May I never lose sight of this glorious truth. May I never grow used to the beauty and glory of the cross.

I know when I get to the end of this day, to the end of this week, and someday to the end of this life, I will not have a story of what I have done for God. It will not be about my faithfulness to Him, or about my pursuance of Him. Because of God's grace, my story every single day of my life will be about His faithfulness, about His work in my life, about His transforming mercy and His redeeming work.

...as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

-1 Corinthians 1:8-9