{"id":832,"date":"2011-01-02T00:20:36","date_gmt":"2011-01-02T05:20:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.verastic.com\/?p=832"},"modified":"2011-01-02T00:20:36","modified_gmt":"2011-01-02T05:20:36","slug":"its-only-by-his-grace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html","title":{"rendered":"It’s Only By His Grace"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>At the stroke of midnight, I did not get kissed [<strong>insert long sigh<\/strong>]. I was hoping that a miracle would happen, that a knight in shining armor would appear, scoop me up from the red cushion church seat I was on, and rescue my lips – which, by the way, I had glossed very well about two minutes before midnight – with his lips. But instead, at midnight, I was making sure that my text messages were being sent out to my friends – virtual and physical. I was saying thank God it’s New Year. I was saying Happy New Year to Funmie by my right and a gentleman by my left. That was how I ushered the New Year in.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p\/>\n<p>I got back home from church at about 2:30AM or so. I woke up at about 12:30PM. I prayed, did some light heavy housekeeping, watched television, and worked on Verastic. \u00a0But watching the news later in the day, I thought about just how blessed I have been. A church was bombed somewhere – Egypt, I believe. \u00a0People’s homes were flooded in Florida. A plane crashed in Russia. Countless vehicular accidents\u00a0occurred\u00a0on the roads in different parts of the world. I, on the other hand, I drove to church at 10PM, worshipped God without being bombed, drove back at 2:00AM without suffering any injuries, and then, woke up feeling great.<\/p>\n<p\/>\n<p>Last night in church, some people prayed till sweat beads poured down their heads. I didn’t say that kind of prayer. I just prayed peacefully, calmly. I thanked God for what He had done, thanked Him for what He was\/is doing and what He would do, and I asked for forgiveness for my iniquities – most of which I did intentionally. I did not make Him any promises to be good because all my prior attempts have failed. I did not bargain with Him because there’s nothing I can give Him or do for Him that he cannot give to or do for Himself. I only asked for His grace to be the best that I can be, His grace to be wise, His grace to not make the same mistake over and over and over, and His grace to be humble and remember whose daughter I am, especially in this New Year — because this New Year will be great.<\/p>\n<p\/>\n<p>I met a man a while ago. He lost the left side of his brain because he was shot in the head while being robbed for twenty dollars. <strong><em>Twenty dollars.<\/em><\/strong> And I know of a young, bubbling man who suddenly had a stroke. He’s currently lying in the hospital, and his arm is about to be cut off from lack of blood circulation.<\/p>\n<p\/>\n<p>It is only by His grace that I am here today. There is nothing I have done – or not done – to make me deserve what I have today. I am not a prayer warrior. I am not a saint. I have only read the bible up to the First book of Samuel Chapter 3. \u00a0Most days, I tell one little lie or another, but there’s no such thing as a <em>little<\/em> lie. So I’m thankful. I’m not sick. I’m not mourning. I’m not homeless. I’m not broke (this one is relative, of course :-)). I’m alive.<\/p>\n<p\/>\n<p><p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Happy New Year.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p\/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the stroke of midnight, I did not get kissed [insert long sigh]. I was hoping that a miracle would happen, that a knight in shining armor would appear, scoop me up from the red cushion church seat I was on, and rescue my lips – which, by the way, I had glossed very well<a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[54,147,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-832","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-vl","7":"tag-god","8":"tag-new-year","9":"tag-thanksgiving","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>It's Only By His Grace - Verastic<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Vera Ezimora\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html\",\"name\":\"It's Only By His Grace - Verastic\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2011-01-02T05:20:36+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-01-02T05:20:36+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/#\/schema\/person\/2c1b7969fbea03a45b97d54a5228cc1a\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/vl\/its-only-by-his-grace.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"It’s Only By His Grace\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/\",\"name\":\"Verastic\",\"description\":\"Authentic conversations about culture, motherhood, divorce, black excellence, humor, and style!\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/#\/schema\/person\/2c1b7969fbea03a45b97d54a5228cc1a\",\"name\":\"Vera Ezimora\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8fe635ca5be88cfb99752ccedc14549?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8fe635ca5be88cfb99752ccedc14549?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Vera Ezimora\"},\"description\":\"I mean, I'm a lot of things - a Writer, Blogger, Speaker, Vlogger, Content Creator, Storyteller, Truth-Sayer, Milk-Lover, Yogurt-Addict, Entrepreneur, Daughter, Wife, Mom, & Nwa Jesu. 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