Life Is Just Not Fair (And That's a Good Thing)

“Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord; Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy. If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you. I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning. Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love and with him is full redemption. He himself will redeem Israel from all their sins.” Psalm 130

Life is just not fair.

It doesn’t take long for us to learn that. As kids, we say it constantly—that’s not fair. Someone got a bigger portion, stayed up later, or got another turn. It starts early, and even as we grow up, we never really lose that internal standard. We still expect fairness from the world around us. You feel it when someone takes your parking spot at the last second, or when the table next to you gets their food before you, even though they arrived after you. Something rises up in you—that’s not fair.

And while those are small things, there are heavier ones too. The kind that actually hurts. The kind that makes you look at life and think, this really isn’t right. Tragedy, loss, injustice, suffering that doesn’t seem to make sense. We take those moments and often point them toward God, asking, Where’s the fairness in that?

But here’s the truth—and it may sound a little surprising at first: life is not fair, and God is not fair. And that’s actually a really good thing.

Psalm 130 begins in a place most of us know well: “Out of the depths I have cried to You, O Lord…” This is a psalm written from the pit, a place of sorrow, stress, anxiety, and remorse. It’s a place where things have gone wrong. Sometimes we end up in those depths because of what’s been done to us, but if we’re honest, we also know what it’s like to end up there because of what we’ve done ourselves—choices, words, actions, things we knew better than to do. We find ourselves looking up from the pit, asking how we got there, and realizing more often than we’d like that we played a part in it.

But here’s the turning point: “Out of the depths I have cried to You…” From that place, the psalmist chooses to turn to God. That decision reveals something powerful—he’s counting on God to listen.

The Way He Listens

“Lord, hear my voice. Let Your ears be attentive…” Think about that. He didn’t listen to God, and now he’s asking God to listen to him. If life were fair, God could say, You made your bed, sleep in it. But God isn’t fair. Just because we don’t listen doesn’t mean He won’t. That’s the beauty of His mercy. His compassion doesn’t fail. His mercies are new every morning. His arms are open wide, even when we’ve ignored Him, resisted Him, or gone our own way. We cry out from the depths, and He listens. That alone is enough to be grateful that life isn’t fair.

The Way He Forgives

The psalm continues, “If You, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?” It’s an honest moment. If God kept score, if He gave us exactly what we deserved, none of us would stand a chance. We talk a lot about fairness, but deep down, we know what fairness would mean. It would mean consequences. It would mean judgment. It would mean standing before a perfect God with imperfect lives, and that’s not a position any of us would want to be in.

But then comes the shift: “But there is forgiveness with You…” That’s not fair. That’s grace. God doesn’t rub our mistakes in our faces or respond with I told you so. He forgives. Mercy is not getting what we deserve, and that’s exactly what God offers. Not only that, but this kind of forgiveness changes how we live. It reshapes how we treat others, because if God has forgiven us so freely, we’re invited to extend that same grace to the people around us—not treating people as they deserve, but choosing forgiveness anyway.

The Way He Heals

The psalmist goes on, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I do hope…” God doesn’t just forgive us and leave us as we are. He heals us. We come to Him broken, with wounds, baggage, regret, and patterns that don’t change overnight. While forgiveness happens in a moment, healing is a process. Salvation is instant, but deliverance takes time.

That’s why the psalm describes a posture of waiting, hoping, and watching. Waiting for the Lord means choosing day by day to seek Him. Hoping in His word means letting His truth shape us. Watching expectantly means trusting that what God has promised will come to pass, even if it takes time. Sometimes it feels like nothing is changing, like the darkness is lingering longer than it should, but just like the morning eventually comes, God is working even when we can’t see it yet. It may not be quick, and it may not be easy, but it is happening. And again, that’s not fair—that’s better than fair. That’s grace.

The Way He Makes Good

Finally, the psalm declares, “With the Lord there is mercy, and with Him is abundant redemption.” Not just redemption but abundant redemption. Even after we’ve been forgiven and are being healed, we still carry memories and regret. We wish we could go back and do things differently. But God is so good that He doesn’t just forgive the past, He works through it. He gives opportunities to make good, to bring healing where there was hurt, and to build where we once broke things down. It doesn’t erase what happened, but it does redeem it. There can be a bright future, even after your biggest failure. And that’s not fair.

When you step back and look at all of it–the listening, the forgiveness, the healing, the redemption—it raises a question: who pays for all this? Because it isn’t free. The answer is Jesus. The reason God can be both just and gracious is because Jesus paid the price. The weight of sin, the cost of wrongdoing, the consequences of everything we’ve done, it was all placed on Him. Justice wasn’t ignored; it was fulfilled. Not by us, but by Jesus.

So yes, life is just not fair.

And that’s exactly what makes the gospel so beautiful. Because fairness would mean we get what we deserve, but grace means we get what Jesus deserves. God doesn’t treat you based on your worst day, but on Christ’s best. So when you find yourself in the depths, remember that He listens, He forgives, He heals, and He redeems. None of that is fair. It’s better than fair. It’s grace.

To go deeper, request an exclusive devotional ebook through the Psalms of Ascent: Happy Trails. This devotional and video sermon series walks you through one Psalm each day (Psalm 120-134), helping you realign your heart, refocus your faith, and fix your eyes. Request your copy today!