The passionate desire of the apostle Paul for the church in Thessalonica was, in his words to them, “that you would walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory” (I Thes. 2:12). Of this longing for them he said, “we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children” (I Thes. 2:11).

Christians are a called people. They are called out of one world into God’s “own kingdom and glory.” Can we get our minds around this? In this world of ours Christians are called to live as citizens of God’s kingdom and glory. This is what defines being Christian.

God has spoken His world into our lives and, like the believers in Thessalonica, by a grace we most likely don’t fully understand, we “accepted it…for what it really is, the word of God” (I Thes 2:13). That word lives in us and, as Paul says, “performs its work in you who believe” (I Thes. 2:13).

Our lives, as Christians, are being worked on by the living Word of God. Is this not a marvelous thing? God’s word “performs its work,” in a hundred or more different ways. We call it mercy, hope, love, power, divine intervention, comfort. Call it what we will in the end it is simply and profoundly, “Amazing Grace.”

What was it the poet said? “O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be.”