What I Deserve

My old stove was a marvel of dysfunction.

Only three of the four burners worked right, the broiler drawer got stuck, and the oven door’s left hinge was broken. Not to mention the thermostat never functioned properly—forget making anything needing 325 degrees.

I really wanted a new stove. {insert whiny voice}

You’d think dinner never got made the way I talk.

But no, every day I managed to coax a fine meal out of that relic despite its flaws.

In the past, my thinking went like this: I work hard. I’ve been patient.

And this is a necessary tool in the fulfillment of my duties as a wife, mother, and aspiring chef.

I deserve a new stove!

 

 

 

We’ve all been there, haven’t we?

It might not be stoves we think we deserve, but those cute shoes, precious time for ourselves, or that mini-van that would solve everything.

 

What is the meaning of deserve?

The New World Dictionary of American English defines deserve:

1. to have a right to because of acts or qualities;
2. merit;
3. to be worthy of . . .

 

What makes us think we are worthy?

Is it our attractiveness, intelligence, work ethic, or our notion of being a “good person”?

 

The truth is:

I know that any beauty I possess is a gift from God.

My ability to think clearly a by-product of God’s Spirit dwelling in me.

My belief in hard work a prodding from the Almighty.

And though I may do good things, I am merely acknowledging the righteousness of God as I perform them.

 

There is nothing good or worthy in me that He didn’t put there.

 

For God has spoken in Psalm 14:3, “They are all gone aside, they are altogether become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.”

Of the three biblical references to deserve or deserving, two out of the three refer to what our iniquities deserve. Ouch!

 

Know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth. (Job 11:6)

 

 

 

 

In my twenties and thirties, I was infected with what about me?. It was not until my forties I began to live out dying to self that I promised at my baptism at seventeen.

I thank God He caused me to see my true lack, which is not physical at all.

It is that without Christ, I have nothing. And the only thing anyone deserves is death.

 

 Abiding in the Vine,

~ Gleniece

 

Update: Recently I was blessed with a new stove. Guess what? About three months after we got it, the thermostat started acting up. You just have to laugh sometimes, don’t you?

The post “What I Deserve” first appeared on Desert Rain.

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