Grace and Peace
Two Words That Can Still Change a Room
Paul starts his letter to the Philippians the way he starts almost every letter he ever wrote — with two simple words that sound like a benediction and a blessing all at once:
“Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Grace and peace.
It’s easy to glide right past them. After all, Paul says it so often it can sound like his version of, “Dear friends, hope you’re doing well.” But those words are anything but filler. They’re the opening line of a letter written from prison — a man in chains sending light through a keyhole.
That’s the thing about grace and peace. They don’t wait for better conditions.
When Paul writes, he doesn’t start with complaints about the guards or the food or how cold the nights are. He doesn’t list his injuries or beg for sympathy. Instead, he offers what he himself most needs: grace and peace.
I’ve come to believe that the words we offer the world when we’re hurting reveal what’s deepest in us. For Paul, it was this stubborn conviction that God was still at work, even in confinement — that grace still flowed and peace was still possible.
Grace and Peace
Paul begins with two words that still have the power to stop me in my tracks: grace and peace.
He could’ve opened with something more ordinary — Dear friends, or Hang in there. But instead, from a cell that smelled of iron and damp stone, he chooses a blessing. He leads with joy.
Grace — that wild, unearned love that shows up even when we’ve done nothing to deserve it. Grace is the quiet voice that says, “You’re still mine.” It’s the kind of love that doesn’t wait for you to get your act together. It just walks right into your mess and sits down beside you.
And
peace
— not the fragile kind that depends on calm seas or perfect days, but the kind that holds steady when the waves are high. The kind that whispers, “You’re okay, even here.”
I love that Paul links the two together, because grace without peace feels unfinished, and peace without grace feels forced. Together they form a rhythm — grace that reaches, peace that remains.
And maybe that’s what Paul was really offering: a new way to begin.
Can you imagine if those were the first words we spoke to each other every morning?
Joy to you. Peace to you. Every kind of good to you.
How different a day might feel if it started there — not with headlines or hurry, but with blessing.
Maybe that’s the secret of Paul’s letter: that even in a place built to break him, he still believed goodness could find a way through the cracks.
So what would it look like to practice this?
Maybe it starts small — whispering “grace and peace” toward the people you don’t even like. Or toward yourself when that inner critic starts its sermon again.
So what would it look like to practice this?
Maybe it’s learning to pause, breathe peace, and offer grace instead.
When gossip starts — grace and peace.
When the argument heats — grace and peace.
When you replay the hurt that still stings — grace and peace.
When the argument heats — grace and peace.
When you replay the hurt that still stings — grace and peace.
Interrupt the old patterns with blessing.
The early church actually practiced this. In Acts 14 and 20, believers would commend one another to God’s grace before sending them out. They’d gather, pray, lay on hands, and say, “You are given over to God’s grace and peace.”
What if we did that? What if we treated every conversation, every cup of coffee, every parting at the door as a small commissioning — giving one another over to grace and peace before we go back into the world?
A Roman prison doesn’t sound like much of a sanctuary, but Paul found one there. Maybe that’s the invitation — to find our own
Unlikely Altars, the places where grace still surprises us and peace somehow holds.
If I’m honest, I’m preaching to myself here. I could use a little grace and peace most mornings before the second Mountain Dew.
So wherever you are today — in traffic, in grief, in the middle of a week that feels like too much — hear this old, stubborn greeting again:
Grace and peace to you.
Not someday. Not when you’ve earned it. Right now
.
Some of the best letters ever written came from prison. Not cozy writer’s retreats, not beach houses, not corner offices with ocean views. Prisons. Paul’s letters from Rome. Bonhoeffer’s from Tegel. Martin Luther King Jr.’s from Birmingham. Each penned behind locked doors, on borrowed paper, with hope that somehow the words might slip past the guards and make it into the world. And they did. What fascinates me is not just what they wrote, but where they wrote it from. It’s one thing to talk about faith or freedom or joy when you’re standing on a stage. It’s another when your only audience is a damp wall and a single beam of light. Paul starts his letter to the Philippians with the same two words he used so often: grace and peace. Not resentment. Not a plea for bail. Grace and peace. As if he’s saying, “Yes, I’m chained up—but I’m free where it counts.” That’s what hooked me. Because I’ve learned that “prison” doesn’t always have bars. Sometimes it looks like grief. Or waiting rooms. Or a quiet house after someone’s gone. Sometimes it’s a job that’s lost its meaning, or a season when God seems to have stepped out for coffee and hasn’t come back yet. We’ve all got our versions. And maybe—just maybe—the letters we write ( or live ) from those places are the ones that matter most. The ones we didn’t plan on writing. The ones that bleed a little truth and hum with hope in spite of it all. When Bonhoeffer wrote from his cell, he wasn’t trying to be profound—he was trying to stay human. He wrote about missing his fiancée, about books he wished he had, about the longing to see the sky. And in between the lines of the ordinary came the sacred: “ Only the suffering God can help .” When Dr. King wrote from Birmingham Jail, he wasn’t crafting a masterpiece—he was answering a letter from fellow pastors who told him to wait. “ Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, ” he replied, with chains on his wrists and conviction in his voice. And Paul—well, he wrote to say thank you. To encourage. To remind a fledgling community that joy doesn’t depend on circumstances. He wrote about grace, love, partnership, deliverance, and struggle—words that still breathe life into our own small confinements. Maybe the best letters come from prison because that’s where honesty and hope have to share the same cell. And maybe that’s what makes it an Unlikely Altar . A place where faith is stripped to its bones, where prayers sound less like poetry and more like breathing, and where grace shows up in the least graceful places imaginable. Over the next few posts, I want to walk through Philippians chapter one—slowly. Not to decode it, but to dwell in it. To listen for the heartbeat behind the bars. We’ll start where Paul starts: with grace and peace . Then move into gratitude for the good work God’s still doing ( even when it feels like He’s on break ). We’ll talk about what it means to hold people in your heart, to let love abound, to trust in deliverance, and to find solidarity in struggle. You don’t have to be in prison to get it. You just have to know what it’s like to feel stuck—to long for something freer, deeper, truer. This series isn’t about how to escape. It’s about what you can discover when you can’t. Because maybe the sacred still writes letters from the places we’d rather forget. And maybe the God who showed up in Paul’s cell still shows up in ours—reminding us that grace can grow in concrete cracks, and peace can find a way through iron bars. Grace and peace! Let’s open this letter together.
There’s a sound every cyclist knows — the click of clipping in. For me, it’s one of the most satisfying sounds in the world. That tiny, metallic click says, You’re connected. You’re ready. Let’s ride. It’s also the sound I wasn’t sure I’d ever hear again after my crash. A patch of slush, one bad angle, and an ankle full of hardware later, I found myself grounded for months — and eventually years — before I was able to really ride again. Add Sjögren’s Disease into the mix, and the idea of climbing back on the bike sometimes felt more like foolish nostalgia than wisdom. But grace has a way of whispering, Try again. And so, I did. The first time I clipped in again, I smiled. Not because it was easy — it wasn’t. But because I realized the road still had more to teach me. There’s something holy about motion — even slow, hesitant motion. About wind on your face and breath in your lungs. About knowing the ride won’t be perfect but pedaling anyway. Because the truth is, life rarely gives you tailwinds. Most days, it’s a mix of potholes and headwinds and st retches of rough pavement that test more than your legs. But grace doesn’t wait for the perfect road. Grace rides with you — through the wobble, the pain, the wind, and the weariness. What does that really mean? It means grace is the quiet companion drafting just behind you — not pushing harder, but keeping you from quitting. Grace isn’t the coach yelling from the sidelines; it’s the presence that matches your cadence, breath for breath, mile for mile. Grace doesn’t flatten the hills or calm the wind. It rides beside you through them. It steadies your shaking hands when you hit rough pavement. It gives you the courage to unclip when you need to stop — and the strength to clip back in when you’re ready to move again. Grace shows up in the quietest ways — a moment of laughter in the middle of exhaustion, a friend who calls at the right time, a peace that comes out of nowhere when you thought you were done. Sometimes it’s not even words. It’s breath. It’s presence. It’s that deep-down knowing that you’re not riding alone, even when no one else is on the road. And every now and then, grace even lets you coast. The road has become an Unlikely Altar for me — the place where faith and fatigue meet, where sweat becomes prayer, and where I remember that grace doesn’t mean ease. It means presence. When I ride now, I don’t measure distance or speed the way I used to. I measure gratitude — for the ability to move, to breathe, to clip in one more time. Maybe that’s the quiet gift of age, of injury, of illness — you learn that the point was never perfection, but participation. You get back on the bike not because the road is smooth, but because the ride itself is sacred. So if you find yourself staring at a road that looks long, uneven, or uphill, take a breath. Clip in. Start pedaling. Grace doesn’t clear the path. It keeps you company on the ride. You’re never alone on the ride.
Every cyclist knows the feeling. You set out expecting a nice, steady ride—the kind where the tires hum, the sun cooperates, and the wind minds its own business. And then it happens: the headwind. It’s invisible but relentless, a force of nature with a personal grudge. It hits your chest, fills your helmet with noise, and makes every pedal stroke feel like a test of faith. You shift to the lowest gear, tuck down, and mutter a prayer—or, if you’re honest, a few other words not found in Scripture. And the worst part? You tell yourself that once you turn around, it’ll become a tailwind. But no—somehow it’s still in your face. I’ve had rides where I was convinced Texas had suspended the laws of physics. Life has those headwinds too . They don’t knock you over like a crash or startle you like a pothole. They just wear you down, mile after mile. They show up as the quiet resistance that makes everything harder than it should be: The health issue that lingers longer than expected. The work that takes more out of you than it gives back. The grief that refuses to stay in the past. The waiting—on healing, direction, clarity—that seems to stretch on forever. Headwinds don’t announce themselves. They just press in. You keep pedaling, but progress feels slow. Some days, grace feels as far away as the next mile marker. Here’s the strange thing about headwinds: they build strength even when you can’t feel it happening. You may not see your speed on the bike computer, but endurance is quietly forming underneath the strain. The same is true in life. You can’t always measure spiritual muscle when you’re pushing against resistance, but that’s where it grows. Strength isn’t built on smooth roads—it’s forged in the unseen miles where you just keep showing up. Grace doesn’t always calm the wind. Sometimes, grace is what leans into it with you. I’ve had more than a few rides where the wind seemed determined to prove a point. You know the kind—your heart rate’s high, your speed’s low, and your pride’s somewhere in the ditch. You start calculating whether it’s worth just turning around and calling it “training for character.” But here’s what I’ve noticed: the harder the wind blows, the quieter I get. There’s no small talk in a headwind. You just breathe, push, and listen—to your body, to your thoughts, to whatever’s left when everything else gets stripped away. That silence has a way of teaching you something you’d never hear otherwise. Headwinds teach humility. They remind you that no matter how strong or experienced you are, you don’t control everything. You can have the best gear, the perfect route, the right attitude—and still face resistance. And yet, here’s what I’ve learned: the presence of resistance doesn’t mean the absence of grace. Sometimes the two show up together. Grace isn’t the tailwind that makes everything easy; it’s the quiet presence that keeps you moving when you want to stop. I’ve come to believe that headwinds are their own kind of Unlikely Altar . They test you, humble you, and eventually teach you what’s inside you. They remind you that speed isn’t the point—faithfulness is. When the ride’s over, you realize that even into the wind, you made progress. You might not have gone fast, but you didn’t quit. That’s grace, too. B ecause sometimes the holiest moments aren’t when everything lines up perfectly—they’re when the wind is howling, your legs are tired, and something deep inside whispers, “Keep pedaling.” And maybe, just maybe, that’s enough.