Fiona Veitch Smith

Although born in Britain, I lived for many years in South Africa, with all its massive social problems. So when I finally ‘came home’ a few years ago I had little patience with people who moaned and complained about poor housing, transport, policing, education and healthcare. When I pointed out that compared to many other parts of the world we have it good, I was told, bluntly, that in Britain ‘we deserve more.’

The American constitution defines certain ‘inalienable rights’, while the British social welfare system sets out to deliver them. We live in an age of entitlement. We demand and expect a certain standard of living: a good house, a decent education, an above-inflation salary, streets free of crime and grime, must-have appliances, designer décor, fashionable clothes, continental holidays… And why not? We’re British. We deserve it.

Uncontrollable rage

Psychologists and sociologists are linking this sense of entitlement to the rise in violent crime and inappropriate social behaviour. If we don’t get what we think we deserve - materially and emotionally - we are easily overcome by a sense of injustice. And this can bubble over into rage: date rage; road rage; sports rage; shopping rage; parking rage … spiritual rage?

Is it possible that this spirit of entitlement, and I use the word ‘spirit’ intentionally, has spilled over into the church? Of course it has. And why not? We’re Christians. We deserve it.

It’s not just the prosperity gospel we’re talking about here, nor the upwardly mobile believers who measure spiritual growth by material success. Fortunately the deception of this kind of Christianity has been unmasked, and most of us, in theory at least, don’t subscribe to it.

The spirit of entitlement

But the spirit of entitlement is subtler than that - and more resilient. We try our best to sweep it out of our homes and churches, but fail to remove it from our hearts. And it’s in our hearts that it’s most dangerous.

St Paul asks ‘who has ever given to God that God should repay him?.’ It’s a rhetorical question. None of us have a right to expect anything from God. And yet, by His grace, He chooses to lavish blessings upon us.

But surely we must have some rights? Something God tells us we’re entitled to? Yes, we do - the Bible tells us that ‘to him who overcomes I will give the right to eat from the tree of life‘ and we are reminded that ‘to those who believe in his name he gives the right to become children of God’.

What are our rights?

These are the only two ‘rights’ the Bible alludes to, but it is much more forthcoming in telling us what we ‘deserve’! For example: ‘What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins have deserved’.

So if we’ve already been granted our rights, and, by His grace, not got what we deserve, surely we should be satisfied. After all, ‘godliness with contentment is great gain‘. And yet, how many of us are truly content?

Through our saving relationship with Jesus Christ we will gain the status of a beloved child. What it means to be that child is open to interpretation, skewed as it is through our earthly experience of parenting, but one thing we can be sure of: however the Father chooses to raise us will be in our own best interest. Unlike the recent anti-smacking legislation that protects the rights of British children, God’s expression of discipline and love is not reduced to a set of rules.

Insecurity

This leaves us feeling a little insecure. How do we know how God will treat us? What can we expect of him? God promises to act consistently with his character: ‘I am the Lord who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight, declares the Lord.’. God is kind. God is just. God is righteous. But what form will His righteousness take? Will He forgive us lavishly like He so often did with David, or will He choose to treat us more like Ananias and Sapphira who were struck down for a ‘mere’ lie?

Who can know the mind of God? Who can know how it applies to us? That’s why we want to know our rights, what we’re entitled to, so we can ‘hold God to it’. We would like to believe that God only has good things in store for us, but we may not like the way He wants to deliver them.

Fear Factor

The root of all this is fear. Not Godly fear, but fear born out of separation from the Father. No matter what assurances the Holy Spirit whispers to us, when things aren’t going to plan, our plan, we fear that we may be separated again. We need God to prove Himself to us and we secretly begin to doubt Him, His love for us and our merit in being loved.

We set check-lists in our heart. If God heals me from this illness, answers my prayer, gives me the breakthrough I’ve desired for so long, then I’ll know He loves me. We rejoice, only in part, when our brothers and sisters testify to answered prayer. We’re encouraged, yes, but secretly jealous that God hasn’t done the same thing for us. Why did God answer her prayer and not mine? What makes her more entitled than me?

Giving up on God

When I was at university a young man called Graeme was very active in our Christian Union. Like Jacob, he struggled with God, and I was drawn by his passion and refusal to let go until God blessed him. But one day he just gave up and pinned his reasons for doing so to the Christian Union notice board. I wish I’d kept a copy of his declaration of the death of God. But I remember the opening sentence: ‘This is why I no longer believe in God.’

Graeme went on to list a series of promises that God had made in His word, promises that Graeme held on to, believed in and prayed for, and how they failed to materialise in his life. ‘There are only two possible conclusions I can make,’ said Graeme (and I paraphrase), ‘either there’s something wrong with me or there’s something wrong with God. I know that I’ve done everything I can, so I’ve kept up my side of the bargain, but God has not come through on His. I can only conclude that God has lied, and seeing God can’t lie, this leads me to the inevitable conclusion that He cannot really exist.’

Graeme left soon after that, and I have no idea what happened to him. I can only pray that he realises there was a third conclusion he didn’t consider: that his understanding of God’s promises might have been wrong. He believed he was entitled to certain things that should have been delivered in a pre-determined way - a way he could understand.

Is there ‘glory’ in suffering?

But God does not work to spec. He is not tied to our agenda. He is not constrained by our limited understanding. God’s way of salvation was so unexpected that many Jews refused to accept it. That was not who the Messiah was supposed to be: a suffering servant, beaten and hung on a cross. Where is the glory in that?

And where is the glory in our sufferings? When the prayers we have poured out are not answered in the way we expect. When the blessings we believed are our ‘rights’ as children of God do not arrive, are we going to doubt the existence of the Father? Possibly not, but like British citizens who expect a certain standard of living, we are going to grow ever more resentful.

If I look into my heart, I’m shocked to see anger at God. It has taken me a long time to recognise it, but it’s there. I’m angry that God has not answered certain prayers. It might have started out as disappointment, but now it’s turned into anger. Ah, but what freedom this brings! Like Job I can tell God exactly how I feel, and He understands.

Learning from Job

Like Job, we need to be freed from the spirit of entitlement. Job expected, quite understandably, that it was his right to be protected from too much suffering. If you can stomach it, read through the Book of Job, and the disasters God deliberately, yes, deliberately, allowed to take place. Firstly his business was devastated: his livestock was stolen and his employees were killed. Then his 10 children died in a freak storm. His health took a turn for the worse after this, and he broke out in sores from head to toe. His friends stuck around for a while, but eventually they, and his wife, got sick of waiting for things to get better and left.

Surely a child of God should not have to go through what he went through. Surely he was entitled to more. After all, God Himself declared Job to be the most blameless and upright man on earth. But no, God had other plans -plans to purify him then to bless him abundantly.

Now I’m not saying we should resign ourselves to the sufferings of Job. Thank God, by His mercy, most of us will not have to go through that. But we only have to look at the plight of persecuted Christians around the world to know that our comfort is a blessing and not a right. And until we realise that we will never truly be free. Godliness with contentment is indeed great gain.

First published in Plain Truth, February 2005

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