This is a message from leading the way with Dr. Michael Youssef.

We pray that it will encourage you in your walk of faith.

If you would like to learn more about Dr. Yousef or leading the way,

please visit ltw.org.

You've heard the saying, but for the grace of God, there go I. I want to tell you, that can be truly the motto of my life.

This is not preaching speaking, this is not just nice thing to say, that is truly the absolute truth about my life.

And that is why you always find me overwhelmed when I preach on the grace of God.

Because I am deeply thankful for the grace of God. I am deeply grateful for the abundance of his

grace that is poured upon me, the abundance of grace that he has poured upon me in times when I feel

least deserving of it. And that is why I guess it's called grace.

But the closer I walk with the Lord, the more conscious I am of my weaknesses, the more conscious

I am of my shortcomings, the more conscious I am, of my failings.

And I had to reflect, particularly this week, as I prepared this message,

the first in the series of messages on portrait of grace.

I had to reflect upon the grace of God that overwhelmed even what I consider to be my failure in the area of parenting,

in the area of being a father.

The more I'm aware of His grace, the more grateful I am to the Lord for overruling my failings, particularly in that area.

You see, like most parents, I've met a bunch of mistakes.

I learned, for example, that shouting in order to make your kids obey is like using your

horn to steer the car, and you get about the same results. Now, it took me a long while to learn

that. But God's grace overruled. The truth is, before I had

children, I'm glad you did not know me back then, because I was an expert on bringing up children.

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