My daughter and I were in the airport early one morning. As we had not had breakfast, I asked her if she wanted to stop and eat at a fancy restaurant – or go to McDonald’s. As I knew she would, she chose the Golden Arches. After thinking about it quickly, I realized that wasn’t a wise option. She had McDonald’s the previous night and I had a credit to this fancy restaurant.
After I told her we were going to the restaurant instead of McDonald’s, especially because I knew I had a credit AND she’d still be able to order the pancakes if she wanted, she started to fuss. She was not happy with my decision.
As we were sitting there waiting for our food after ordering, we started talking. She had ordered French toast with fresh fruit on the side. I had ordered a smoked salmon platter. I started talking to her and explaining why I chose the restaurant we did. For this choice, we would sit and enjoy as opposed to grabbing and going and the whole price would be covered. I asked her which would she prefer – sure enough – the one that is fully covered.
This got me thinking – why do we fight so hard sometimes for things that are freely given? Jesus’ love is freely given – yet sometimes we feel that we do not deserve it and we choose the option that is ‘less than’.
As you can imagine, the sit down restaurant was a much higher quality and what would have been four times the cost of McDonald’s, turned out to be free because of our credit.
Dear Heavenly Father, help us to realize that your love is freely given and to be able to accept that your love is much better than anything else we can ever even think to compare.