Chosen for

Do you believe that you are chosen by God?

In today’s reading from Exodus, we see God’s action on behalf of the Israelites, to free them from slavery. The Israelites knew that God chose them to live in a relationship with him, and so for God to decimate another people to save the Israelites seemed reasonable to them, worth celebrating in song!

Because of our modern understanding of God through Jesus, we now know that God is for ALL people. Does this mean, then, that we must change our understanding of what it means to be Chosen? In the Hebrew Testament to be God’s chosen people was to be set apart, special, holy and to have a unique relationship with God. The same is still true today for us; we are God’s chosen, we are special, called to be holy and to have a unique relationship with God.

But the difference today should be that we know ourselves as chosen FOR all. My gifts and all the good work that God does in my life is not so that I can feel special and important; it is for others, for the whole of humanity. The Israelites did not understand then that their special relationship would bring about an opening of the doors of the Kingdom to all people.

We do understand it. Let us, therefore, not rejoice in the suffering of those who we see as “others.” Rather, like Jesus, let us live for the good of all.