I love the phrase: Life isn’t fair. It is usually in response to a child complaining saying something isn’t fair. The parent then responds with their retort about life being unfair, meaning that its not going to get any better. But I have to tell you, I think the parent there has it all wrong. Not the life isn’t fair— it definitely isn’t. But we always say that as if it is unfair to our disadvantage. As if life being unfair were such a bad thing. Why?

Well, a short answer is because we are selfish. We have a selfish view that can only see so far. We think that the value of life is based on our own happiness or how life is “treating us” or our fortune. We think life is about us! But when we think that life is about us, and we live our life a way that embodies that mindset, then of course life will be dull and meaningless. It may be fun and full of adventures and highs, but it also at some level will be hollow. If your life doesn’t go beyond just you, then what purpose do you have. If a mother’s life doesn’t extend beyond herself to her children, then what purpose and value as a mother does she have? If a hand does not serve the body, the what value does it have? None. It is no longer even a hand. She is no longer even a mother beyond the biological meaning of the word.

Life cannot be about us. Or it will always be unfair because life doesn’t revolve around us. We are all from time to time geographically and astronomically challenged by thinking that the world revolves around us. It is nothing more than silliness. Life cannot be about us. I cannot be about me. Or I will only see the “unfairness” in life and assume it is a bad thing.

However, if I can broaden my scope and look just a little beyond then maybe I will see something else. Heck, if I simply just admit I can’t see but still be okay, then maybe I will know something else. Our personal realities tell us that life is unfair to our disadvantage. But if we take on a heavenly perspective, see that life is not about us, and remember some key truths we will see that life is certainly unfair. However, we may breathe a sigh of relief at this thought.

Our personal realities get in the way of the grand reality: truth. The truth is: Life is unfair, and thank Jesus Christ that it is. From the bottom of your souls thank Him. Because that unfairness of life, the unfairness you see from that heavenly perspective, is to your advantage. In fact without that unfairness of life, we are damned to the fairness of the world. To the fairness of society. We need that unfairness of life. We need to remember our desire for that unfairness. We need to remember what we once called that unfairness: grace.

If life were fair, I would be long gone. Lost to sin or death. If life were fair, I suppose there would be no point to me having been born at all. It is the unfairness of life that gives me a chance to have purpose and value. For myself? No, but for the Lord above and the people around.

To live is Christ, and to die is gain. There is nothing fair about that. Luckily, that’s not the point.

Perhaps it is our broken definition of fair and unfair. We have selfish definitions which really could be translated to convenient and inconvenient. But even still, that mindset stops with just myself. It stops being about convenient for me or inconvenient for me when it stops being about me in the first place. When I take on a purpose I extend beyond myself. Then I can lose myself in the joy of this unfair life.