Grace Upon Grace

A few years back my siblings and I discovered my grandmother’s recipe box. It has been a real treat using her old recipes to recreate some of the cookies we enjoyed when we were kids. This year my brother had a special request. Would I be willing to try and make her “church window” cookies? I gave them a shot, and the results are pictured above. Basically they are chocolate, nuts, marshmallows, butter, and coconut.

Sweetness on top of sweetness on top of sweetness! Now that is a Christmas cookie!

Most people would tell you that John’s gospel does not contain the Christmas story. And it certainly does not have the details of Matthew or Luke. But the first chapter of John’s gospel has these words: “And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” (John 1:14) It’s hard to read those words at this time of year and not picture a baby in a Bethlehem manger! In that manger we find a profound mystery. The Word through whom the universe was created, the fullness of God himself, now contained in a helpless infant. The Word became flesh indeed!

And then a couple verses later John makes this stunning claim: “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” (v. 16) Jesus comes bringing a gift for all to receive. Grace upon grace. Sweetness on top of sweetness.

Different translators and theologians over the years have struggled to express the depth of this concept. One translation has, “one blessing after another.” Another says, “blessing upon blessing heaped upon us.” Yet another says, “grace after grace,” and then notes that “grace under Christ replaces grace under the law.” Maybe my favorite is, “every one of us has shared in his riches-there is grace in our lives because of his grace.”

When I was making those church window cookies this year I kept thinking of that verse, and this concept of a God who comes to us to bring us grace on top of grace. I was also thinking about the sad truth that “church windows” (or the people inside them) don’t often communicate that grace to people from the LGBTQ+ community.

How can we be people full of grace for all? People who reflect the fullness of God’s grace found in Jesus?