Faces on Faith: Unjust desserts
Most people approach life from the standpoint of merit. That is to say that they want what they think they deserve. Indeed, a lot of the anger many feel today is because of how they feel cheated from their due. Others have gotten to the trough before them, or even some have received what should have been theirs. Either way, they feel left out and aren’t happy about it.
But the longer I live, the more I see the value of seeking what I do not deserve. In other words, do I really want to go through life on merit alone? Granted, there will be times when something comes to me due to my hard effort. But most of the time, I prefer to be on the receiving end of good for which I am in no way responsible.
The theological term for this reality is grace; and when we think about it, the world is suffused with it. God has structured creation in such a way that favor abounds for those who did not earn it. How did Jesus put it in his Sermon on the Mount? “God sends His rain on the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). We may think Jesus was speaking about calamity in that saying, but to an agrarian people, the rain was necessary for a good harvest.
Of course, that’s not to say that calamitous times don’t come to us all. The Bible is clear about that fact as well. But the promise that faith brings to us is that even amid calamity, God’s provisions abound and his grace is sufficient. We don’t have to face the calamity in our own power so that even when life seems to be more than we can handle, it never is for God.
This month marks two signal holidays for both Jews and Christians. Both Passover and Holy Week remind us of the time God showed up to do for his people what they could never have done for themselves. Deliverance abounds for those who trust their circumstances to Him. “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you” (Isaiah 43:2). Our assurance for tomorrow always lies in God’s faithfulness to make a way where one doesn’t seem possible, a way that emerges not through our efforts but through God’s alone.
So, when you think you are constantly drawing the short end of the stick in life, think again. Life itself is a gift (which, as the old saying goes, is why they call it “the present”). And God’s grace is inexhaustible. Consider how much more peaceful your life might be if you didn’t worry so much about getting what you deserve but receiving more. Grace really never ceases to amaze us, and it is that grace that enables us to look forward to the future convinced that with God, the best is always yet to come.
The Rev. Dr. Doug Dortch is the pastor at the Captiva Chapel by the Sea.