Ephesians I
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8 ESV)
Grace
How different this verse would read if something else replaced Grace. It would change the nature, possibility, and fact of salvation and the gospel.
For instance:
For by works you have been saved, through faith… our salvation would be up to US… probably the act of faith would be the work that saves us, then. We would have to do the work of checking the box of ‘faith’ to be saved.
For by niceness you have been saved… our salvation would depend on our demeanor and attitude. Pleasant people would be saved, the rest of us, not. The road to heaven would be paved by smiles and acts of kindness. Too many bad days, and we would be doomed.
For by ‘being in the right group’ you have been saved… our membership, whether by birth, social status, or choice of friends would determine our eternal state. Hopefully, in that universe, changing groups would be easy!
But those words are not the right words.
Grace saves. Grace means we are saved by God’s character, God’s intentions, God’s equation, God’s relationship, God’s determination.
I am absolutely sure that is the only way we could find salvation.