You Have Been Chosen

Posted on September 4, 2019 by Mike

You are God’s chosen envoy. God selected you out of all the people in the world to be his representative. As a follower of Jesus Christ, you were most likely selected by God before you were born. Consider what God said to the prophet Jeremiah:

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.” Jeremiah 1:5 (NIV)

I understand this to clearly mean we are completely formed spirits before we enter these mortal bodies. At least, this seems to be the case for Jeremiah. We might therefore extrapolate that we are all formed as spirits by God first and then placed into the body which is to be our vehicle for the work we have to do in this world. In the book of Luke, we are told that God in fact, knows every detail of our existence.

“Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.” Luke 12:6-7 (NIV)

Luke implies we are all God’s treasured investments. We have been expertly crafted by God to be part of the community of faith. In addition, in the book of Ephesians, we learn that the good work we are doing as a result of our connection to Christ has also been engineered in advance.

“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10 (NIV)

Before we come to Christ, all of our onboard pre-installed good works are placed on hold as we are fully developed by our experiences in this world. At the appointed time, our old self is released and a new self is born in Christ Jesus. We experience a radical reorientation of life. Everything changes – the way we think, the way we feel, the way we make decisions, and the way we go about our daily life.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)

As believers, we share the rights and privileges of children of God. We are members of a household built on a foundation with Jesus Christ as the cornerstone. We are the new Temple of God in which he takes residence through his Holy Spirit.

“Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” Ephesians 2:19-22 (NIV)

As followers of Jesus Christ, by faith, our sins have been forgiven and we have been given a new standing before God; though underserving, we have been declared righteous. Now, connected to the body of Christ, we have become his messengers in this world.

“We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 2 Corinthians 5:20-21 (NIV)

Our calling has been planned well in advance; it seems before we were born – the details of which have been precisely arranged. Probably not every life event, but exactly who we are and how we will perform on any given day is well known by our Creator. The stage has been set. All we have to do is follow the teaching of Jesus. Praise Jesus for placing us center stage in the most important performance the world has ever known – the conquest of evil and the creation of the Kingdom of God.

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