Not Worthy

In my last post I referred to an accident my husband had recently.  The photo above is not a
photo of our car but it looks much the same. It was deemed 'not fixable'.
We were talking about the accident today  and my husband made a remark that I immediately saw was a wonderful picture of what God has given us.

The accident was my husband's fault and our car was old.  It was in good condition but had a lot of miles on it. We did not expect we would get much of a settlement from our insurance.  But to our surprise, we were awarded more than we paid for the car a year ago.  It was a wonderful surprise but totally beyond our wildest hopes!
The remark my husband made in our conversation was ...
"It was totally my fault, and yet the reward was so generous!" 

I thought of the words ... "not by works of righteousness which we have done".  We are all a mess, like a car after a serious accident.  Not only are we not fixable but we are also undeserving of God's favour because the condition we are in is our own fault.   And yet, God offered to us salvation that is far beyond what we deserve. 
Tit_3:5  "Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit," 

Just as our insurance settlement had nothing to do with our rights but had to do with the willingness of the insurance company to give us more than we could have expected, so also God does not measure His grace and forgiveness and salvation by our 'good deeds'  or our 'deserving character' and even though He knows our 'mess' is our own fault , He offers salvation with a generous hand so full and free!

Our almost unbelieving joy in receiving the insurance settlement was an appropriate response ... but I had to honestly wonder ---   Do I respond the same way to what God has so generously given to me, not just for this life, but for all eternity? Do I just take it for granted?  Should I not live in joyful praise to Him for His goodness to me?