Giving Out of Grace
There is a tremendous amount of giving going on in the Bible. Obviously, the greatest gifts are given by God: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). The Greek word that is most often behind give, including in John 3:16, is didomi. This Greek word occurs 415 times in the New Testament. But there is another Greek word that is translated as give that is the subject of our attention right now. This is the word charizomai, which is used only 23 times in the entire New Testament.
In last month’s Greek Geek Speak (see Gospeling the Gospel if you missed that entry), I showed you some of the tools I use on www.blueletterbible.com to explore the Greek that is behind our English translations of the Bible. It was in using those tools in my study of Galatians 3:18 that I stumbled across charizomai. “For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave (charizomai) it to Abraham by a promise” (Galatians 3:18).
The beauty of the word charizomai is that embedded within it is the word charis—grace. The weight of charizomai, whether it is translated as give, grant, or forgive, is that the thing given is free and undeserved. In the Galatians 3:18 example, God gave Abraham the promise of blessing and inheritance even when Abraham had done absolutely nothing to deserve it. The word is used of Jesus giving sight to the blind in Luke 7:21. Shortly after that, when Luke records the parable Jesus told of two debts being canceled or forgiven, charizomai is the word used. Neither of these men had the resources to pay the debt, so the forgiveness was certainly undeserved.
Paul uses this word more than any other New Testament author. In Romans 8:32 Paul asks, “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” In this case, the ESV translators chose to include the idea of grace in the translation. Paul also calls us to the same grace-giving in Ephesians 4:32: “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” In both cases—God’s forgiveness of us in Christ and our forgiveness of others—charizomai is the word used. Just as with give, there is another Greek word used more often for forgive, aphiemi. It seems that whether the grace results in forgiving or giving, charizomai is used to emphasize the grace.
Considering the undeserved favor of this giving from God, it may come as a surprise to readers when Paul writes, “For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake” (Philippians 1:29). What is granted or given in this verse is not only the grace to believe in Him, but also the grace to suffer for His sake. Paul sees suffering as a gift and privilege for believers. Paul is also the one who shares his lesson from God that “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). We can know that when God graces us with suffering that He will also grace us with power to walk through it.
The grace behind charizomai is not always translated to the English versions of our Bible. But the grace of God runs under the surface of the entire storyline of Scripture. Don’t be afraid to use all the tools at hand to discover God’s grace.