Blessings of Grace

Not too long ago around here, church and community groups were praying for rain.  When the prayers were being prayed, there had been only a thimble full of rain in over five months.  The land was suffering.  Crops needed to be planted.  Wildfires were raging due to the extremely dry conditions.  Things have changed in the last few weeks.  I am beginning to wonder if there was too much praying.  Buckets of rain are falling day and night.  The land is saturated.  The rivers are full.  Churches now are showing some renewed interested in providing instructions for building arks.   

Who among us remembers that old gospel song, "There shall be showers of blessing?"  All this rain makes me wonder if we can ever get flooded with blessings.  It is likely that most of us have felt that we were blessed more than we deserved.  I have a friend who often responds to ""How are you?" with "Better than I deserve."  The truth of the matter is that the blessings of God have nothing to do with what we deserve.  If it did, some of us, would have a cup empty of blessings instead of one filled to overflowing.  Blessings are expressions of grace.  If there is a price tag for the abundant grace of God it would be found on the hill called Calvary.   The Apostle Paul made it clear in his letter the Ephesians that the blessings of grace are not about what we deserve, but about what God chooses to give. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God..." (Ephesians 2:8).  

When the prodigal son came to his senses and turned for home, he was greeted not by a father who would give him what other people had said his son deserved, but love that was forgiving and forgetting and most of all, unconditional.  He did not count the blessings in the boys pockets when he left home, the blessings that had been taken for granted and squandered.  Instead, he poured out overflowing blessings upon the son who folks said deserved nothing.  Is it not a good thing that God gives blessings to us not according to what we deserve, but according to His unconditional love?