When my boys were young, I loved to buy them Garanimals! These shirts and pants could be coordinated by matching the animal on one piece of clothing to the same animal on another. I could always count on the colors being compatible and the boys looking as if their mother were very successful at dressing her little gentlemen. With three boys close in age, that can be a feat! Whenever my sons wore their Garanimals outfits, I loved the fact that they were coordinated and even seemed to act as if they thought they looked good!

I guess I was probably sensitive to that kind of thing on a deeper level because when I was about five, I remember an outfit I wore that just didn’t go together. I can see it in my mind to this day: the blouse was light blue with hand-smocking across the front. The skirt was wool, pleated, and red-and-green plaid with straps that came across the shoulders. The blouse and the skirt were pretty, but they didn’t match and I was highly aware of that fact. I was so aware that I remember crying and telling my mother how I disliked it. What I didn’t realize was that was all I had to wear for dress-up. Money wasn’t abundant, and that was my dressy outfit.

As I have grown older, I have discovered that there are other “matching” issues that are far more significant than a blue blouse and red-and-green-plaid skirt. When I began to dive into a deeper understanding of the grace of God, I realized it was all about matching: God matches his grace to our needs. I discovered a Scripture that describes this concept so well. In his first letter, the apostle Peter encourages us, “As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God” (1 Peter 4:10 NASB).

As I began to study this verse, I was fascinated by the word “manifold.” While this verse is about how we each have received spiritual gifts from God and how we are to exercise them in serving one another, it makes reference to a broader description of grace. It speaks of “manifold”—or many-colored—grace, indicating that God’s grace is custom-designed for whatever your need might be. If you have a blue need, his grace will be blue. If your need is a green need, guess what color his grace will be? You’ve got it. It will be the perfect hue of matching green. God’s grace is all about supplying the very thing that you need—not something like you need or something that will do for now, but the exact answer you need for the moment. I love that about God. He knows us perfectly, loves us eternally, and is incredibly involved in giving us strength and supply in our moments of weakness and want.

The book of James tells us: “Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors.” (1:2–4 MSG; emphasis added). Many-colored trials are met with many-colored grace, so in the end as you endure, you will be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. That’s what God offers to us when we are at our weakest point.

That’s why the apostle Paul could boldly say that the Lord told him, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9 NASB). God demonstrates his unconditional love for us in various ways in order to meet us where we are, in order to show us he is interested not only in one part of our lives but in whatever our concerns might be. That is his amazing and wonderful grace.

One of the memorable experiences of walking with the Lord is the way he comes alongside and personally meets us where we are. I’ve asked him to show me where a lost contact lens was hiding and had him direct my gaze to a dusty spider web in the crevice between the porch and a step. I’ve called out to him for intervention when a real estate transaction was going bad, and I’ve seen him intervene. I’ve asked for peace in situations where peace wasn’t humanly possible, and he has wrapped me in his incredible, calming peace.

Both of my parents went through serious, extensive surgeries during the years before they died. As their only child, I had huge emotional investment in being supportive not only to the one having surgery but also to the one who was waiting for news. I found that very hard and often longed for a brother or sister to call or to at least share the burden of “being there.” Since that wasn’t my reality, I learned that God had an “only child with elderly parents” grace that just fit my situation. Looking back, I can remember the lonely vigils, but even more, I can remember the all-encompassing peace that God gave. It was a peace his grace provided in days and especially nights when fear and sadness wanted to move in. What I needed he quietly provided, and when I walked out of those trials, I recognized the tint of his grace touch. He had been there and had left his color-matched fingerprints all over my struggles.

I personally experienced the touch of God’s grace in a way I won’t forget. I found out I had to have a heart catheterization one day and entered the hospital the next—which happened to be my birthday. It was two days before Christmas as well. The situation seemed surreal, but the presence of that many-colored grace was unmistakable. It was if God knew I needed to know he was there. I needed the grace of his presence. I can look back and remember all the peace that surrounded me as the nurses in the catheterization lab sang “Happy Birthday” and as I was rolled back to my room with Christmas carols playing in the halls. God let me know in so many gentle ways that he knew where I was and that he was there with me.

In every kind of life event, from inconsequential to potentially life-altering, God has eagerly given to me from his abundant supply of unconditional, uniquely designed, always available, many-colored grace.

This immeasurable, many-colored, custom-designed grace is yours when you invite the Lord of the universe to take up residence in your life. He loves to give grace to those who receive him, no matter what color grace you need!