If this question hits home, you’re in good company. I cannot count the times I’ve asked this of myself. Short answer: God chose us because He knows us. – inside and out, from beginning to end. In my own case I tend to wonder if He’s offering proof of His sense of humor. Please, God, hold that lightning bolt!
Looking back to my own painful school days, gym class often comes to mind. You know where I’m going with that. Coach always chooses one of the popular kids as captain of each team. The captains choose their team, often based on popularity first, ability second. To be fair, a lot of these popular kids were also good athletes. I never was either and, of course, I was usually the very last one “picked”.
This mindset haunts me every time I wind up the pity-party machine and start wondering what God could possibly have been thinking when He chose me. Where do these doubts, this mindset come from? It should be obvious – they come from the accuser, i.e. the devil himself. As with most of his work, he doesn’t bother with the likes of me personally. He, of course, delegates. No matter. The effect is the same.
The real question we should be asking and responding to is: why DID God Almighty choose me? For what purpose? Ah! A much more pertinent question indeed. Before we explore this, it may help to get a grip on the WHEN God did this choosing.
Psalms 139:13 For you formed my inmost being. You knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I will give thanks to you, For I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. My soul knows that very well.
15 My frame wasn’t hidden from you, When I was made in secret, Woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my body. In your book they were all written, The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there were none of them.
Ephesians 1:4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and without blemish before him in love;
5 having predestined us for adoption [sonship] as children through Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his desire,
You were no mistake, certainly no afterthought. God Almighty, the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, THE Master of the Universe chose you – before the foundation of the world. Let that sink in.
Needless to say He also knew all about you. Even today He knows you better than you know yourself. He knows your past. He knows your present. He knows your future. He knows the eternal you. You cannot hide from Him. You can hide nothing from Him. And yet, still, He chose YOU! Isn’t that marvelous? But there’s more…
Romans 8:30 Whom he predestined, those he also called. Whom he called, those he also justified. Whom he justified, those he also glorified.
To be “justified” is to be made righteous. What is righteousness? It is the ability to stand before God Almighty without any sense of guilt, sin, or condemnation. Now consider the context of the above verse.
Romans 8:30 Whom he predestined, those he also called. Whom he called, those he also justified. Whom he justified, those he also glorified.
31 What then shall we say about these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
32 He who didn’t spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how would he not also with him freely give us all things?
33 Who could bring a charge against God’s chosen ones? It is God who justifies.
34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, yes rather, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could oppression, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 Even as it is written, “For your sake we are killed all day long. We were accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”
37 No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,
39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This the very God who chose you before the foundation of the world to be holy and without blame before Him in love! But WHY? For what purpose? Um, “purposes” actually, as in plural.
Our first purpose is easy to point out:
Ephesians 4:20 But ye have not so learned Christ;
21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:
22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;
23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;
24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
Romans 12:1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Our first purpose – our mission – is to ourselves. We are to put on the “new man” and walk in love. Yes, it is easier said than done but that doesn’t make our purpose any less important or achievable.
As for our secondary purpose and beyond? Refer back to Psalms 139:13 and note none of us were mass produced in a people factory. Our Heavenly Father crafted each of us with great care. He bestowed upon each of us unique talents and abilities. Thus each of us has a unique purpose specifically designed around those abilities. You need not look to me nor any man or woman to discover your purpose. God knows you and it intimately. He designed you for it and He will reveal it to you. All you need to do is ask.
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