I wasn’t picked for spelling bee teams or kick ball teams. So it was a very exciting thing when I moved to a new town just as I entered high school and found a group of young people who seemed to want me. I attended a retreat with the youth group from church, and while there was plenty of fun, there was also enough of the gospel presented that my heart was strangely moved. I heard the message I had been chosen by the one who loved me best.
In the Word there are many references to our being chosen. I found this one while thumbing through Isaiah the other day: “But as for you, Israel my servant, Jacob my chosen one, descended from Abraham my friend, I have called you back from the ends of the earth, saying, ‘You are my servant.’ For I have chosen you and will not throw you away(Isaiah 41:8-9, NLT).”
Have you ever felt thrown away? What gets thrown away? Things that are useless, broken, spent. Things that are no longer needed. Things that are no longer wanted. We throw things away every day. Have you ever thrown away a person? Have you ever felt thrown away? Maybe you’re one of the blessed ones who has no clue what it would be like to be thrown away. But there are people walking through life with a far greater experience of being trashed than chosen.
What kind of difference would it make in our interactions if we looked at and treated people like they were chosen by God? I’m not suggesting a short course in evangelism. I am suggesting we consider the annoying checker at Walmart, the pain in the neck co-worker who just took credit for your idea, the jerk weaving in and out of traffic. The person you can’t forgive. See them as chosen. Even the person who left you—they’re chosen.
Paul knew what it was like to be distrusted and surrounded by people who would rather throw him out than work with him. He had been murdering believers in God’s name. Murdering. Leaving families without fathers, or mothers. And then he experienced God’s grace and his own chosen-ness on his way to Damascus. How could God use him? Surely, his being chosen was a mistake. Nobody, including Paul, could believe God would use him after what he did; after the life he lived. Throw him out!
But Paul penned these words: 4 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes (Ephesians 1:4, NLT).
We’ve been picked for God’s team. You may have made some pathetic choices, the hounds of shame may be nipping at your heels. I know what that feels like, but I also know that I am his servant and he will not throw me away. Not because I’m broken or because others might label me as trash, but because he loves me. His Word is true: he loved us before he even made the world.
He wants us on his team. How cool is that?
Pot of Manna 