But I'm Gold!

For a couple of years now, my daughter and I have been “Gold” Status with the airlines that we fly with. I know that may not seem like a huge deal to some, but when we finally “arrived” at Gold, we were so excited! The main benefits that I love are getting one free bag checked for each of us, and you get to board in one of the first groups, in the Priority lane!!!

So imagine my surprise when I took one of my latest trips, and as I was checking in at the kiosk at the airport, they tried to charge me for checking my bag!!!! I thought, “Wow, their system is messed up.” So I called someone from American over to fix it, because I knew it was a mistake. He kindly took my info and looked it up on the computer. “I’m sorry ma’am, you’re Gold status expired 10 days ago.” WHATTTTTT?!?! EXPIRED!!!!??? How in the world can that be? “I’m sorry ma’am, because you didn’t fly last month, your status expired, and that will be $25 to check your luggage.” Then he proceeded to print out my boarding pass…as I looked at it, I thought, “No, no this can’t be right.” It didn’t say “priority” at the top, and I was boarding in GROUP 6!!!! GROUP 6?!? I can’t remember the last time I was boarding in GROUP 6!!!! I know this may sound really trivial, and some of you may be thinking, “Geez, Sharon, just be happy you’re going on a trip….” And I know. I was! Super happy, and thankful! But when I learned that my Gold status had “expired”, I felt disappointed and I wanted to plead with American Airlines saying, “But just 10 days ago I was GOLD! How can you take that from me? I am important! I get my bags checked for free! I get to board in a Group WAY before 6! Don’t you remember me!? Sharon Lewis!? I’m GOLD!!!!!!”

And just like that, I began to say out loud to the Father, “Thank you Lord that you NEVER take away our status with you. You’ve redeemed us, and there is nothing we can do that will change that. We didn’t have to earn it, and we don’t have to work to keep it. We are always “Gold” with Jesus.

Then I thought - “Wow, I was ready to fight for my position and status with American…I just knew it was a mistake, and they needed to fix it immediately and give me what was rightfully mine!” But how often do we allow the enemy to convince us that we are NOT Gold status with Jesus, and we listen to him and we live beneath our rights as children of the King. We don’t fight back, we don’t say who we really are, and so the enemy has us right where he wants us, thinking we are unworthy of such a status with the Father. We can’t possibly be deserving of such favor, such grace, such mercy and love as the Father has bestowed upon us. And so it goes, day after day, we just sit back as the enemy continually tries to get us to believe that we aren’t worthy of that status.

Some time after that trip, I got an email from my airline saying I could purchase Gold status! Well how kind of them to offer me the opportunity to purchase something that once was mine, then was taken from me! Why would I want to pay for something that I was rewarded with only a short time ago? My thoughts once again flipped to our status with Jesus. “How often do we try to ‘pay’ for what Jesus already rewarded us with for free?” He gave us life in place of death, health in place of sickness, forgiveness and mercy in place of judgement and we didn’t have to do anything to earn any of it. Yet, so often, we can find ourselves working to earn what the Father has already freely given. If we just read our Bibles enough, pray enough, serve enough, then we feel as though we are worthy of the gift of salvation and the benefits that come along with it. As if there were anything we could actually do that would be equal to what Jesus did for us. THERE WILL NEVER BE ANYTHING WE CAN DO that will measure up to the selfless act of love that our Father so willingly carried out.

Friends, I leave you with this: You are always Gold in your Father’s eyes. He will never see you as anything else than His beloved child, whom He loves with an everlasting love. You have been made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. You didn’t earn it, and you don’t have to do anything to keep it. Stay in His Word and meditate on who you are in Him, and when the enemy tries to convince you that you’ve lost your status, you can remind him that your status was paid for by the blood of Jesus, and you are always GOLD!