“Why does God waste such a gift on someone who doesn’t deserve it?” I was overhearing a conversation. The subject was a particular worship artist generally disliked for their selfishness, laziness, arrogance, deceptive practice and spite. And yet she was endowed with musical talents, a singing voice, leadership traits and other qualities of a creative.
It is a valid question: Why does God give gifts to someone who doesn’t deserve it? But it obviously begs another question, “So who does deserve it?” I know folks who take it upon their selves to act as God’s accountants - penny-pinching bean counters who want to be sure Heaven isn’t being too generous with mercy and gift giving. As if you could take measure of divine goodness - as if there is a limited supply. God’s ration squad, who think that one person getting a gift, without earning it, would leave another without - as if God is finite.
They are the elder brother in the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15), who can’t seem to freely receive the Father’s love and generosity for themselves, and so get offended seeing it in others. The fatted calf was always theirs: ring, robe, feast and farm… everything the Father had. But being so busy “earning” the Fathers love, they failed to receive it. With scales in hand, noting portions, collecting receipts, earning points, keeping score and holding grudges, their arms were not free to embrace.
Words like, plenty, bounty, abundance, superfluous, and surplus seem foreign and never make it into their theological glossary. Theirs is a vocabulary of lack. Self-styled sentries (who have never entered into rest), who live on a self-imposed stipend and shoestring budget. They only use their imagination to imagine scarcity and have not learned how to receive God’s abundant, undeserved mercies for their selves. Always waiting on God to drop the hammer ‘cause he’s been brooding over the books and has found your overage. He’s honked off and he’s gonna getcha!
We must account for our lives, but we are not left to our own devices…unless we so choose. It’s not self-improvement we need, but Spirit empowerment (i.e., baptisms in love). Rule-keeping is not as important as mercy-giving. God isn’t fair…God is good.
The dignity of humanity is re-formed by the Spirit - moral beauty reaffirmed. Forgiveness is premeditated. Grace was forethought, not a problem solving after thought. It was always plan A…never plan B. You were always loved without promise of reciprocity.
Receive generous love. Give love generously. Leave no paper trail.