“And there is still much more to say of his unfailing love for us! For through the blood of Jesus we have heard the powerful declaration, “You are now righteous in my sight.” And because of the sacrifice of Jesus, you will never experience the wrath of God.”
Romans 5:9 The Passion Translation
A strong desire to have a sense of accomplishment seems to be entrenched in human nature. We all want to feel like we’ve accomplished or obtained something that will make us feel proud. I’ve chatted to many people who struggle to receive gifts or help in certain areas because they feel that they can’t have everything handed to them – they feel that they need to struggle a little to earn it and deserve it. For people like this, gifts diffuse their sense of accomplishment (a point of pride). I know someone who was experiencing a season where God’s blessing was manifesting in his life in an amazing way and he was experiencing provision in so many areas of his life. At a point he told me that he actually prayed and asked God to slow down on the blessings because he also wanted to contribute something. If this kind of attitude carries over into our relationship with God (which it often does for many people) it only causes frustration.
It’s not wrong to want to accomplish something. God gave Adam and Eve the job of looking after the Garden (Genesis 2:15), and He commissioned them to be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion (Genesis 1:28) – you could call that an instruction to accomplish. Jesus gave us the Great Commission to go into the entire world and preach the gospel and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15-18) – that’s also an instruction to accomplish. It’s not wrong to have goals and try accomplishing something. It’s only wrong if you’re trying to obtain what God has already freely offered you, and if through your efforts and accomplishments you’re seeking validation and acceptance. I believe that it was the fall of mankind that corrupted our inner wiring to make us feel like we needed to prove and validate ourselves through our efforts and accomplishments (think about the Tower of Babel). God doesn’t think you’re awesome because you do awesome things, and He doesn’t love you more because you do more and accomplish more than others do. God loves you and accepts you independent of what you do or don’t do. You’re His child and that’s enough reason for Him to think that you’re awesome!
There is still much more to say of His unfailing love for us! – This is the good news: God’s love for us isn’t based on our performance but on Jesus’ performance on our behalf. God’s love for us is unfailing, which means that it is constant, dependable, trustworthy and reliable. It’s never-ending and without condition. Why? Because through the blood of Jesus we have heard the powerful declaration, “You are now righteous in my sight.” Through what Jesus has done for us, God has declared us to be in perfect right-standing with Him. We are not accepted and right before God in accordance with what we do or according to our sacrifice but according to the blood of Jesus – His sacrifice!
And because of the sacrifice of Jesus, you will never experience the wrath of God – that’s great news! God will never punish you for sin, ever. Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? God doesn’t reward you for good behaviour and He isn’t punishing you when you’re bad. There are natural blessings and consequences for good behaviour, and natural bad fruit or consequences for bad behaviour, but God doesn’t treat us as we deserve because Jesus took our sin and paid for our sin, and now we are declared 100% righteous in His sight! You can be punished for a debt that has already been settled!
Put your strong desire to achieve and accomplish aside. God is freely offering you so much! Focus on His amazing grace – on everything that Jesus has done for you and is freely offering you – and simply receive it. Just say, thank You, Jesus!
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