ONLY GOD IS DESERVING!

Time and again, like many other people, I have found myself thinking and feeling that am deserving of the Lord’s good because of my occasional righteous living. Its as though God owes me for doing good in his eyes. I find myself behaving like that little puppy who expects to be rewarded by the trainer for every acrobat achieved. Not so with God!

Deuteronomy 9:4-6 is so pivotal. 

“Do not think in your heart, after the Lord your God has cast them out before you, saying, ‘Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land’; but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out from before you. It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you go in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord your God drives them out from before you, and that He may fulfill the word which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Therefore, understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.”

This is so amazing to many of us out there who think we are deserving. Friends, God looks, plans and purposes beyond us. Can you imagine, while Israel thought God was giving them the promised land because they were a chosen people, God on the other hand was doing so because the foreign nations were so wicked that He had to deal with them. Besides, Israel was equally undeserving as she was also a stiff-necked people.

What about individuals in the Bible who we may have thought that they are more deserving? Righteous people whom we expected all good from the Lord should have follow them all the days of their lives but it turned out that while in a place of righteousness they faced a lot of pain, suffering and afflictions. People like Joseph, Job, Moses, Ruth, Naomi, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea just to mention a few are great examples of men and women who loved the Lord and lead righteous lives and yet their lives were never all roses. Yes, the Lord’s favor was on them and they saw His glories in many ways and yet God let them experience pain, suffering and affliction one way or the other because God had a plan and purpose to achieve for His own glory even through them.

Consequently, whenever we experience good, welbeing or evils of life let us learn to attribute it to God working out all things for his own glory and purpose. It is not about our ability to do good and be righteous that the Lord does a lot of well with us or for us, rather it is so much about His plans and purposes that He has set out to accomplish that we providentially find ourselves busking in the Lord’s good will. At the same time, even when evil like death, decease or economic struggles befall us, again, let us learn to ever pray seeking to see what the will of the Lord is.

Though my personal effort of occasional righteousness matters, it is still undeserving of any reward. For it is all about the Lord, His will, plans and purposes that matter the most. Surely, though goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, it is no longer I who lives but Christ lives in.