FRINGE BENEFITS

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all His benefits — who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Psalm 103:1-5

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Most people who have had a job are familiar with the term “fringe benefits.” They amount to some form of compensation above and beyond a person’s regular salary or wage.

Employers are really required to provide fringe benefits. Just hiring a person to a position is a win-win for both. The employer gets an employee to get a job done while the worker gets a wage or salary to pay their cost of living expenses.

So why do we need fringe benefits at all then?

Well, sometimes it’s hard to find laborers, especially when experience and/or a particular skill are needed. And once you get a person hired, you want to make sure they stay with you and don’t jump ship to work for someone else. With this, employers use fringe benefits to not only entice people to come to work for them but to keep them employed with the company long after the initial hire.

So as believers, should we expect fringe benefits from God?

The answer is easy.

Absolutely not.

No, God is God, our Master. We are completely subordinate to Him, created as His laborers and required to follow His commands in complete obedience. It’s as simple as that.

Just being able to live and serve God is a blessing and a privilege, all the reward we should ever wish for. We are to serve and obey God not expecting or demanding anything in return. It’s not our place to put any stipulations on God; only Him on us.

But when it comes to the matter of spiritual blessings, God in His amazing goodness does provide us, His laborers, with some amazing fringe benefits, ones that are far greater than anything the world offers for His benefits are eternal and not temporal.

Looking at the opening verses of the 103 rd Psalm, David lays our six specific benefits that God grants to His faithful followers:

Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all His benefits — who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Were you able to pick them out? They are as follows:

1. Forgives all our sins.

No one forgives like God. We were born into sin and God gets that yet He still nonetheless expects that we do all we can to turn from sin toward His righteousness. When we do, we are living in His favor. When we don’t, we will experience His correction but also His pardon when we repent of our sins and commit ourselves to getting our lives back right with God.

2. Heals all our diseases (look at death as a quasi-form of healing as we will be freed from pain and sickness and suffering and affliction).

Each and every day, believers are in the almighty Hands of the Great Physician. No one possesses the power to heal like He does. What a comfort that is when we face a worldly existence that can bring any number of illnesses on us, some so serious they are terminal. Even then, we have good news because through the salvation gift God has given us through His Son Jesus Christ, we are never terminal but rather eternal. That’s a huge part of the good news of the Gospel.

3. Redeems our lives from the pit.

We’ve already established we are sinners. Short of salvation through Jesus, we have no hope and instead of life after death, we face destruction and wrath, annihilation at the hands of God’s judgment. Thanks be to God that He so loved us that He sacrificed His only Son Jesus to atone for our sinfulness. Through Christ, God gave all who place their faith and trust in Him redemption and a rescue from the pit of damnation and condemnation.

4. Crowns us with love and compassion.

We’ll never know a greater love and compassion than what the Father gives us all. And through His Holy Spirit, He teaches us how to do the same in our lives. We can only love properly when we allow God to love through us. For at His very essence, God is love.

5. Satisfies our desires with good things.

When we serve God faithfully and commune with Him daily, we experience more riches than anyone or anything else could ever provide. We find all the desires of our heart met because we yearn for things of the kingdom, not things of this world – and God fills us to overflow with His goodness, mercy, grace, and love.

6. Keeps us renewed and empowered as when we were young.

The Christian walk is one that is VERY labor-intensive. We were not given commands that called for us to be passive. No, we were give commands to go into action and carry out the Lord’s will so that it might be done on earth as it is in heaven. As we have already discussed, we are God’s laborers and the workload is extensive – or as I have always said, when you sign on to work for the Lord, you will always be full time employed with lots of overtime.

With this, thank goodness that God grants us a special strength and empowerment through the Holy Spirit that leads those faithful to Him to be able to say as Paul did, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).

So there you have it. Clearly defined benefits for those who choose to sacrifice themselves for the service of God, the One who hired us on at birth, training and developing us through our formative years for His service. Now it’s time to get to work. To give the Lord an honest day work for an honest day’s blessings, all the while enjoying the benefits He so graciously grants us. .

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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