Chosen in Christ!
Ephesians 1:3-14
Our Lesson for today is among my favorites in the whole Bible. It’s declaration of praise that starts in verse 3, and runs “non-stop” to verse 14... one, single sentence in the original Greek. It is almost as if Paul couldn’t find a stopping point in praising God.
Of course, while praising God, the very first thing Paul’s thankful, or grateful for... is the fact that God has chosen us! Praise be to God because “he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world.”
What a amazing Truth! Even before the world was formed... before the stars were hung in place... before the Sun began to shine... God knew you. God had already planned to create you, and decided to have a relationship with you. You and I have been chosen to be part of God’s family. It is an amazing, freeing, truth, when we really embrace it.
God chose us, in Christ. We can be confident of that. And even when our plans for this life don’t work out, even when it feels like God is a million miles away and we couldn’t fathom choosing him... He chose us... and we can rest secure that unchanging Truth. God has chosen us, and no choice of ours can ever change that fact.
Paul was a student of the Old Testament - it was his Bible. And a very prominent theme in the Old Testament is that Israel is God’s chosen people. All the way back to “Father Abraham”, whom God chose to be the father of many nations, and through whom all nations would be blessed... Abraham was chosen and blessed in order to be a blessing to others. That theme continues when Abraham’s descendants are rescued from Egypt. In Deuteronomy 7:6, God’s people are told: “You are a people holy to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on earth to be his people, his treasured possession.” The Israelites were chosen... BUT, they were chosen for a purpose. They were chosen to be a light to the nations, and to bless all nations of the world.
Sometimes we think of being “chosen” as being something reserved for clergy... ministers... missionaries... We forget (or chose to ignore) that we’re all chosen!
Of course, even more often, I think, we “shy-away” from the Truth of being “chosen” because we get hung-up on the idea that God hasn’t chosen others... and we can’t conceive of a loving God choosing some, and not-choosing others. God says, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy!” God will be God no matter what you and I think or believe.
But that really isn’t what Paul is talking about here. Paul is wanting us to understand that we are (the church) the new Israel; we have been chosen to bless the world. The church, the disciples whom Jesus has called, has been chosen to be a light to the nations. We have been chosen to do God’s work in this world – to care for the poor and the sick, to feed the hungry, to bring hope to the hopeless, to strive for righteousness and peace, and to do all of this in the name of Jesus. That is what we have been chosen for.
We have been chosen in Christ, as Paul puts it, to be holy and blameless before God in love. There’s only one problem with that! Who among us in holy and blameless? I’m not holy and blameless, and I’m guessing you’re not, either. As Paul reminds us elsewhere, none of us are. The nation of Israel wasn’t. The church certainly isn’t. And none of us as individuals are, either.
And that, of course, is why we need a Savior. We need one who IS holy and blameless. We need Jesus. We don’t always get it right. But Jesus does. He is holy. He is blameless. He is God’s beloved, in whom God is well pleased. He is God’s treasured possession. He is the light to the nations. He is the promised descendent of Abraham. He is the one in whom all nations, all peoples, are to be blessed. And we who place our trust in Christ, are adopted into God’s family - we’re grafted into the vine.
Listen: We haven’t just been chosen (like kids choosing up side for a baseball game)... We have been chosen in Christ. And when you accept the fact that Christ as accepted you... you are part of the chosen, the Elect!
And as the next verses remind us, that as the chosen... we’ve redeemed through his blood, forgiven of our sins, and have an inheritance awaiting.
God has chosen for us to be part of God’s family; and just in case we’re ever tempted to forget it, God has marked us with the seal of the Holy Spirit.
You know... life gets confusing at times, and we question our choices at times, and we are hurt by other people’s choices at other times. But in the midst of the confusion and chaos that sometimes swirls around us, we have this wonderful, amazing, unchanging Truth: we have been chosen in Christ.
I try to remind us often of who and Whose we are. And that’s because we struggle with that simple, yet profound reality. We’re seldom all that we want to be, and we can get discouraged at times. We know the real us... the Jerry that struggles, and sins... the Jerry who finds it difficult to forgive and forget. The Jerry who’d rather be on the back pew of the sanctuary, instead of behind the pulpit.
But knowing who we are is tempered, when we remember Whose we are. No matter how confusing and confounding our understanding of life and self gets... whoever we are, we belong to God. God has chosen us. What a powerful truth to rest in, and to build our lives on. We belong to Christ.
And we have been chosen in Christ for a reason; for a purpose.
We have been chosen to live for the praise of God’s glory... and to be a blessing to others. We’re blessed to be a blessing.
Praise be to the God who has blessed us in Christ, to the God who has chosen us to be a blessing to our world. Amen.
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