Sixth grade was the year of nicknames for me. I explained before that I had received the nickname Rico Suave that year. However, that wasn’t the only nickname I’d received. It was my first year at a new school, so everybody in my class was just getting to know me. It was during a game of kickball that I received my second nickname that year, “PK.” It wasn’t short for “pastor’s kid,” (my dad most certainly was not a pastor). Instead it stood for “power kicker” (kids are very original).
I soon became the favorite when picking teams for kickball. However, that fame didn’t last too long, because the kids in the outfield quickly learned to back up when I was up to kick. Regardless, I experienced my fifteen minutes of junior high fame. For that brief moment, I was somebody special.
Each one of us wants to be special. As we grow up, we try to find the one thing that we’re good at so that we can get the praise and adoration that we desire. It’s an important part of our development. When we’re little it can be something as simple as identifying with your family or identifying by gender.
I remember the excitement of my boys when I would take them to Men’s Breakfast (FYI, Men’s Breakfast will be this Saturday at 8:00 AM). Their faces would grow in excitement as they realized that they were able to go to this event because they were boys. Mom didn’t get to go, but they did because they were boys.
Each of us wants that one thing that will set us apart. For some it may be school. For others it may be sports or other extra-curricular activities. However, for some, be it right or wrong, it is the group they’re associated with, be it some secret society or their religious group. This was the case with the Israelites in the Bible. They prided themselves as being God’s chosen people, and they weren’t unjustified in thinking this way. God specifically told them, “I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people.” (Lev. 26:12).
That kind of praise can easily go to your head. God repeatedly tells them that they are special, even going as far as to say, “The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.” (Deuteronomy 7:6). It’s understandable that the Israelites began to see themselves as special. If someone began referring to me as their prized possession, I think it’d go to my head a little bit too.
The Israelites had been hearing this same message for generations. Throughout the course if Israel’s history, God repeatedly tells them of his great love for them and how he has set them apart from all other people. It started when He came to their forefather Abraham and set he and his descendants apart as his chosen people. He came personally to Abraham and made a covenant with him. Over the years, God promised him many great things going all the way back to Genesis 12:1-3.
God told Abraham, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you.” He ultimately told Abraham that the blessings and curses upon other people would be dependent upon how they treated him. We see this throughout the history of the Israelites. Abraham goes to Egypt and has his wife taken by Pharaoh. Even though he didn’t know he was doing anything wrong, Pharaoh is afflicted with diseases until he returns Sarah to Abraham. The same thing happened with King Abimelech with both Abraham and Isaac.
Throughout the history of Israel we see these blessings and curses falling upon the people they meet. The Pharaoh in Egypt experienced the ten plagues. City after city fell to Joshua’s army under the Lord’s guidance. Nations that rose up against Israel were destroyed by the power of God.
Israel was clearly God’s chosen people. He had set them apart to be a nation of priests, but what was it that made them so special? Scripture tells us that “Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” (Genesis 15:6). That helps to explain why God chose Abraham above all the other people of the world, but the question still remains, why did God need to choose a special people?
God owns the cattle on a thousand hills (Psalm 50:10), and he created all mankind. God’s love for all mankind is shown through his interactions. He took care of the widow at Zarephath. Jonah was sent to Nineveh that they might repent and keep from ruin. On the day God created mankind he called his creation “very good.” All people inherently belong to God. Why then did he need to select a special people from among all his creation?
For the answer to this, we begin by looking under the Christmas tree. We love to give good gifts, the kind that take someone’s breath away. It won’t be long before we start seeing the commercials that a mom opening a small box containing a beautiful necklace, or they might show a snow-covered lawn and in the driveway sits a brand new car with a bow on the top of it. Those are the kinds of gifts each of us wish we could give to our spouse or our children.
It’s been a few years ago, but when Dylan was just a baby, Renee and I received a special gift from her mother. Due to Dylan’s prolonged stay in the hospital, we were in a tight spot. One day when she came to visit, she gave us a small, wrapped box. When we unwrapped the box we found a set of keys. It wasn’t a brand new car by any means, but those keys were special to us. We knew what they meant. That car, as beat up as it was, was our ticket to freedom.
I don’t know if you’ve ever received a gift like that. Maybe it was a birthday present on your 16th birthday, or maybe it was a graduation present. When I was eighteen, I opened a present from my family to discover a simple piece of paper. I had a few months left in paying off my first car, and my family banded together to give me the car title early.
When you open a box like that and find a set of keys or a piece of paper you immediately know what that means. Your heart fills with excitement, not because of the piece of paper or the key, but because of what that item leads to. The piece of paper isn’t what’s special about the gift. The keys aren’t what’s special about the gift. While the keys as a present is special, the real gift is the car that awaits. Can you imagine the gift if it were merely a set of keys or a piece of paper with no car waiting outside? While they are special, they are only because of the true gift that lies behind them.
Likewise, God set aside Israel as his chosen people, as his prized possession. This wasn’t because they were inherently better than any other nation. At many times they were just as corrupt as the rest of the world. However, the reason they were special is because of what lies behind them. God’s explanation of this comes at the end of his promises to Abraham. He tells Abraham that he will make him into a great nation. He tells him that he will bless him and curse those that curse him. However, he concludes those promises by saying, “and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
Much like the set of keys or the piece of paper, Israel was not inherently special. What made them special was the gift which would come through them, the messiah that would save the world. Paul points this out in his letter to the Galatians, “The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’” (Gal. 3:8).
We’re all familiar with the nativity story. I’ve said before, my favorite gospel is the gospel of Luke, mostly because of the historical research that Luke put into it. However, the gospel of Luke is also the gospel to the Gentiles. Luke, being a gentile himself, understood the importance of Jesus unlike the Jews ever could. This is why he includes in his story the angels appearing to the shepherds (Luke 2:8-11).
Just like God before him, the angel did not limit the blessing to just the people of Israel. “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.” Not some of the people, but all of the people. Regardless of nationality, age, wealth, fame, social position, education, etc. It doesn’t matter if you’re Democrat or Republican, blue-collar or white-collar. You don’t even have to be an American. You can be Jamaican, Russian, or Syrian.
This good news of great joy is for all the people, whether they believe it or not. God didn’t say that this good news is only for those that will ultimately believe in him. Of course, you have to believe in him in order to experience the great joy that is offered, but the good news is for everybody. This is why Jesus said, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16).
This is the love that we celebrate during this Christmas season, that God so loved the world that he sent his one and only son. As we prepare ourselves for the coming of our savior, we look forward with anticipation and hope. He is our source of hope. It is good that we remind ourselves of this often, that He is the reason we have hope. God is eternal love, and he wants to show that love to us.
I heard a story this week that came from the book The Broken Way by Ann Voskamp. In it, she told a tale from her pastor during his trip to Jerusalem. He sat in an Orthodox Jewish classroom as the Rabbi began to teach them about the marriage customs of first-century Jews. The Rabbi explained that when a man wished to marry a young maiden, his father would pour a cup of wine and pass it down to his son. With the cup in hand, the young man would turn to the woman he loved and, with all the solemnity of an oath before the Almighty God, would hold out the cup of wine to the woman and ask for her hand in marriage. He would ask with these words: “This cup is a new covenant in my blood, which I offer to you.”
Isn’t it amazing that those are the same words spoken by Christ when he shared Communion with his followers. Not only were they sharing a meal together, Christ was demonstrating his love for us, just as a groom for his bride. This is the love that desires to shower upon us and all mankind.