As a math teacher, when I have a student who gets a good grade on a test even though he didn’t work for it but because he “guessed” well, I get frustrated. I feel like he didn’t deserve the good grade he got. My feeling is not one of gladness for his good grade, although he’s obviously happy.
How pharisaical of me! I want the world to operate on law-basis although I want God to treat me based on grace! I certainly don’t want to get what I deserve from God because I know I deserved death and hell. And yet, when it comes to others around me, I want them to get what they deserve!
How happy I am that God doesn’t deal with me according to what I deserve!
“He does not deal with us according to our sins,nor repay us according to our iniquities.For as high as the heavens are above the earth,so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;as far as the east is from the west,so far does he remove our transgressions from us.”Ps. 103:10-12There is no doctrine like the doctrine of grace in the world. There is no repaying or earning or “purging” in Christian faith. Our God is so great that He doesn’t need our input. He does it all. That’s what grace means – He gives us what we don’t deserve. He does not meet us half way when we have responded. The very fact that we responded means that He had initiated His act of grace with us!
Therefore, we must not resent someone else’s fortune. Even if, and especially if, they did NOT deserve it!
Think about what you deserved (death and hell) and what you got instead (Christ and heaven)!
If you woke up this morning, praise Him for it.If you had breakfast this morning, thank Him for it.If you had legs to walk to the bathroom, rejoice in it.If you can read these words, praise God for your literacy.
PH
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