Expectations Kill

“Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit.  For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” 2 Corinthians 3:5-6 (ESV)

Expectations kill, yet they are inescapable. Behind every human interaction there are expectations, even if they are subconscious. If I smile at a stranger I have an expectation that they will smile back at me. If they do, they have met my expectation; if they do not, they have failed to live up to my expectation and it will bother me to one degree or another. I have expectations of drivers on the road; I expect them to pay attention to their driving and to be courteous, particularly to me.  As with most expectations, this becomes more evident when my expectations are not being met; for example, if they cut me off, or don’t let me in when I need to get over, my ire over my unmet expectations is particularly evident.  I expect people who are serving me in any capacity to behave in certain ways, whether it’s in stores, restaurants, car repair shops; you name it, I have an expectation for it!

We all have expectations of what a friendship should look like, what family should be, how our spouses should treat us, how our children should behave; and, when our children are grown and have children of their own, we have expectations of how they should raise our grandchildren, and how they should treat us.  None of these expectations are general, they are quite specific and are with us in every moment of every single interaction we have.

We have expectations of government leaders and law-makers, groups of people, classes of people, people of one race or another, one belief system or another, one gender or another.  We have expectations of religions, denominations, churches, pastors, our own church family and friends; and, of course, we also have expectations of ourselves which, truth be told, we rarely meet.

In other words, at any given moment, everyone has expectations regarding someone or something and, in most instances, those expectations are not being met.  Unmet expectations lead people to frustration, anger, blaming, bitterness, sadness, guilt and despair. 

The issue is, Expectations= Law.  All of our expectations are a result of the Law being written on every human heart; whether one accepts the biblical Law or not.  In the book of Romans, chapter 2 verse 15, Paul says that even those who do not believe “show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.”  We expect because we all have a built-in internal standard by which we measure everyone and everything.

The problem is, Law can only be that standard, that measuring stick; it never was able to or meant to provide the means for change; therefore, we have the entire human race running around with measuring sticks and finding that no one and nothing measures up. Frustration, anger, blaming, bitterness, sadness, guilt and despair abound, and no amount of explaining, reasoning and knowledge can make us stop our endless expecting and measuring.

That is because the only answer to the Law written on every human heart, is not to tell ourselves or others to, ‘do more’ and ‘try harder’ to measure up, but the Good News that Jesus Christ came and, on our behalf, met every possible expectation and carried to the cross all of our failures to measure up, where they died along with him.  And when he rose up from the tomb we, who believe, were raised with him and now stand before the God of heaven and earth measured by the Law and found to be perfect.

The Holy Spirit will then continue to remind us of the mercy and kindness shown to us in Christ, as undeserving as we are, and will call us to extend that same mercy and kindness to those around us when our natural inclinations automatically pull out the measuring stick of Law (expectations) and stand ready to condemn.

Will we ever completely escape our expectations here on earth? Sadly, no; but my belief and hope is that the more we bask in the knowledge of the grace which has been lavished on us by our Savior, the more we will be compelled to lay down our measuring sticks and share that same grace with others.