Sweeter than Cotton Candy

November 12, 2025

I love the movie The War, starring Kevin Costner and Elijah Wood—especially one scene that captures the very heart of grace.

At a country fair, some bullies harass Stu, a young boy, who finally begins to fight back. His father, played by Kevin Costner, steps in and breaks up the fight. But instead of scolding the bullies or demanding they be punished, he walks over and hands them the cotton candy he’d just bought for Stu’s mother and sister.

Stu is furious. “I hope you know those are the kids who beat me up,” he says. “Why’d you give them Ma and Lidia’s cotton candy?”

His father looks over at the two boys and quietly replies, “Because they look like they haven’t been given anything in a long time.”

Grace. Amazing Grace. Getting what we don’t deserve.

According to the world, that’s unfair. But God’s grace always stands in opposition to the logic of society. Grace—the unmerited love and favor of God—is offered freely. It’s not about getting what we deserve; it’s about receiving what we could never earn.

God’s love isn’t measured by our effort or ability. It’s rooted in who God is—in His mercy, His compassion, His decision to reach out to us through His Son, Jesus Christ.

This is what God did for the thief on the cross. A man who had spent his life in crime, now dying beside Jesus, cries out: “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.”

Michael Yaconelli, in Messy Spirituality, writes: “God’s grace is unfair. How unfair! Shouldn’t the thief have been asked to repent, to make amends, to at least declare he was sorry? No lectures, no sermons, no teaching or demands for repentance. Jesus just ushers the man into the kingdom of God.”

And Jesus’ reply? “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

Helmut Thielicke once wrote: “Jesus was able to do this because He saw through the filth and crust of degeneration. His eye caught the divine original hidden in every person… He saw in him a child of God, one whom His Father loved and grieved over. Jesus did not identify the person with his sin, but saw that sin as something foreign, something chaining him—and He came to set him free.”

Paul puts it this way in Ephesians 2:8–9: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.”

We see this grace again in Luke 7. A Pharisee named Simon invites Jesus to dinner. During the meal, a woman—described only as a “sinner”—enters the house. We don’t know her story, but we know her heart. She kneels at Jesus’ feet, weeping. Her tears wash His feet; her hair dries them. She anoints them with expensive perfume.

Simon mutters to himself: “If this man were truly a prophet, He would know who and what sort of woman this is—she’s a sinner.”

For Simon, righteousness means separation from sin. Salvation comes by keeping the law, staying pure, following the rules. For him, holiness means staying away from people like her.

But Jesus sees differently.

The woman with the alabaster jar knows exactly who she is—a sinner in need of grace. Paul came to the same realization on the road to Damascus. “Oh, what a miserable person I am!” he wrote in Romans 7:24. “Who will free me from this life dominated by sin?”

And the Holy Spirit revealed the answer: “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)

The first step toward salvation is realizing we are lost.

I remember teaching this lesson to my boys after watching The Dark Knight. In one scene, Batman faces his nemesis, the Joker. After a brutal fight, the Joker hangs from a ledge, about to fall to his death. Instead of letting him go, Batman saves him—refusing to become like the evil he fights.

As we left the theater, I turned to my boys and said, “That’s why I need a Savior—because I know myself. I would’ve let him fall. Maybe even pushed him. The capacity for hate, for vengeance, for indifference—it’s in me. I need Jesus.”

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me…”

If we truly understood God’s grace, we would respond as the woman with the alabaster jar did—with gratitude and devotion. Dietrich Bonhoeffer stated, “Grace is free, but it is not cheap. It calls us to love as we have been loved.” Philip Yancey reiterated this truth, saying, “Grace received must become grace given.” And Max Lucado explains, “When we understand grace, we stop trying to prove ourselves worthy and start living to show our gratitude.”

If we are not doing these things, perhaps we have not yet fully grasped grace—how much we need a Savior, and how much was sacrificed for us.

Maybe, like Simon the Pharisee, we sit back feeling righteous enough, quick to judge others while missing our own need for mercy.

But grace calls us to something deeper. It calls us to humility, to love, to awe.

May we celebrate the gift—God’s amazing grace.

May we love much in return for the love we have received.

And may we stand in wonder that God comes to us—no matter who we are, no matter what we’ve done—and offers a gift far sweeter than any cotton candy.