We Don't Deserve Anything

What did I do to deserve this? Cancerous relapse, a clean bill of health. The promotion at work versus working the cardboard intersections. A renewal of vows. Taking inventory of the newer, misplaced bruises. Beautiful children. A too-small casket. Enduring the words of a bully, or a faithful friend enduring you.

To deserve any of these assumes that we’re either blameless enough for reward or vile enough for punishment, and are attached with strings to a marionette who plays by those rules. Growing up, church people would announce one of two things, each iteration still warring with the other. We, as sinners, are dust. Doomed. Grateful to even be alive under His eye. And we, as image-bearers, are also washed anew. Cut from His cloth. Passing from glory to glory, He chose us. Pure.

So which is it? As disorienting as this may sound, I still think it’s both and the duality of his death and resurrection — his finite humanness and infinite Godliness — is what lets it make sense to me. But to pit them against their opposite and hold them in two hands unbalanced is how we’ve regretfully spun the story. We, as sinners, are no less deserving and we, as image-bearers, are no more. They are held level, one and the same. Wholly undeserving without penalty and wholly justified without prize, save his presence, of course.

You and I don’t deserve each other’s kindness, goodness, or gentleness like we often think we do. Likewise, it’s not in our best interest to admire when someone “gets what was coming for them.” This stokes the narrative that somehow, by good deeds, we are worthy. And of the opposite, when we fail, which is mostly, that badness should find us.

I’ve just been thinking about this lately. I guess what I’m saying is to tread lightly when you start telling yourself this story. That you need a drink at the end of a long day because you deserve it. Work hard for hard work’s sake and let it be to His glory. Self care is fine, but care for yourself, your body and soul, as if it’s the only one you have here on this earth. Not because you rallied a hundred kids and your merit of motherhood depends on it (though maybe I’ll someday say it does).

It’s a slippery slope when we start claiming our own favor and fortune the way we want to. Suddenly, we’re tired, sick, things hurt, everything’s an inconvenience to us, so we deserve the world. Culture tells us to treat ourselves, and so we do until our entitlement surpasses His sufficiency. I’m guilty of it. And I’ve had people ask that if I had nothing else, would Christ be enough and sometimes my true answer has been no. I want it to be yes. And I want it to be without caveat. I want the good things to be just gifts in light of God’s inherent goodness. Not mine. And I want the burdens to make me grateful even to be alive under His eye. And instead of carrying the weight of my own sin, self-deprecating, I want to trust his easy yoke.

We can rest quietly knowing that we don’t deserve anything — grace, mercy, the kindness of a stranger, even the estrangement of our kin. For “if when we were at our worst, we were put on friendly terms with God by the sacrificial death of his son, now that we’re at our best, just think of how our lives will expand and deepen by means of his resurrection life.” Romans 5:10. Undeserving and still justified so that we can drop the act and just be faithful.