entitlement

I fully intended to write a blog whining about my past week. In a sense, I could justifiably do so, but more important topics are at hand.

Entitlement - we were fortunate enough to hear a wonderful sermon on the topic last week at Bethel Evangelical Free church here in Fargo. For an audio link to the sermon, click here and click on the link for "The Entitlement Myth."

There are three specific ways this sermon has impacted me this week, and I would like to share (read:confess) them here.

1. The Cell Phone - I was laid-off from my job this week. This was through no fault of my own, yet the company needed to reduce cash flow, so two positions were eliminated. Mine happened to be one of them. One of the other eight was the man who handled network infrastructure/cell-phones/desktop support (if this sounds like a role that shouldn't be eliminated, you're correct...and in fact they have been scrambling to replace his work with others in the meantime)...I digress. Anyways, he let me borrow a company phone for my wife to use on her line. It would have been easy to let it "fall in the cracks" (confess: I thought about it for a minute...ok, two.) Nevertheless I made the right choice and told my boss about it.
2. The Health Insurance - I recently turned in my health insurance information to Mayo Clinic. As my visits have been a mix of pre-existing condition and non pre-existing, I thought BCBS would "catch" the difference. It appears they haven't, and covered several items that total over $1,000. I thought for a few minutes about this one, and have decided to call Mayo and BCBS on Monday to see what happened.
3. The Other Employee - There were three people on my team: manager, worker 1 and worker 2 (me). Worker 1 is a slacker, shows up at 10, (we consider 9:30 early, 9 unheard of, 11 at times), takes long lunches, and leaves early. Worker one is going through some things in their life at the moment, and doesn't seem to care much about his job. I won't go into details, but it isn't looking good for him. For a long time, I rejoiced in this, thinking: "Finally, I'll get my job back!!!" or "Well they don't deserve the job, I do because of (insert all manner of reasons here)." or "I hope they fail and lose their job so I can get mine back". I was quite happy thinking of all these things, imaging returning, etc...then that darn sermon reminded me of...entitlement.

It's so easy to feel entitled to things, like we "earned" or "deserve" them. I fall into this trap all the time, and it's those little moments that strip our integrity for the other big moments. I don't write this so people can see how spiritual I am, I really hope that's not what people get from reading this.

What I sincerely hope and pray you see is my brokenness, and the sin in my life that God has been working on correcting. The fact that I even thought for a few seconds about the above three is reprehensible. I am deeply sorry for them and wish to confess it to all who happen to read this.

I owe my co-worker an apology. I'm challenged to pray that they use this time to change, grow, and thrive in whatever they do. I need to stop worrying about money and what position/pay I will get. I need to seek first His kingdom and righteousness...

continue to lift me and my family up in prayer this week.