An excerpt from “Easter: Celebrating What We Don’t Deserve” by Lori Borgman:

“We are a people concerned with getting what we deserve. We deserve child care, health care, good schools, good jobs, easy commutes and a comfortable retirement. We deserve smoke-free air, a strong stock market and happiness in our marriages.”

“When you listen closely, you hear the many things we deserve sprinkled throughout conversations: We deserve our money’s worth. We deserve to be treated respectfully. We deserve good customer service.”

“It is no small irony that though we often live life pursuing what we may falsely or rightly believe we deserve, the holiest holiday on the Christian calendar celebrates not getting what we deserved.

We deserved something all right. Wrath. We richly deserved the penalty for sin, self-centeredness, arrogance, pride, greed, gluttony, hard hearts, mean spiritedness and all the rest. But, the thing is, we didn’t get it.

Christ did.

He took what I deserved, every lash, every hit, every piercing. He took what I had coming. He paid the price I deserved to pay, was crucified, dead and buried, and on the third day rose again.

They say a good way to distinguish between grace and mercy is to remember that grace is getting what you DIDN’T have coming, and mercy is NOT getting what you DID have coming.
Easter is the celebration of mercy.

The next time I open my mouth about something I deserve, may God freeze my speech mid-air and bring to mind the joy and thanksgiving of not getting that which I deserved most of all.”