Furthermore, because we are united with Christ, we have received an inheritance from God, for he chose us in advance, and he makes everything work out according to his plan.
Ephesians 1:11
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Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.
Colossians 3:12
Chose. That word says so much. Here are a couple of definitions that I found for this word; looking at the definition helps me to better understand the full impact of the meaning of a word.
- To want; desire.
- Make a deliberate decision: to make a deliberate decision to do something
We can’t choose our earthly family, we are gifted (doesn’t always feel like it but yes) with them by God; they are genetically ours. We love them for their good characteristics and pray them through their bad; as my son says “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.” This principle can be easily applied to our earthly families because, like Teresa said, these relationships are tangible, we can see the connections and they are sometimes easier to grasp than the concept of a spiritual family, whose connections we cannot see with our eyes.
Our spiritual family is different. It’s a family chosen by God; we’re related by blood,—but not flesh and blood like siblings are related—but by the blood of the Lamb.
We don’t choose our family in this life, but God chose us. He picked each and every one of us. If nothing else this gives us reassurance that we are part of the I AM’s family; take confidence that He wanted us! He knew our past, present, and futures and still chose us.
He desires to have a relationship with us. He made a deliberate decision to call us into His family.
There’s something that Teresa wrote that truly touched my heart: “When it comes to our spiritual family, we like to pick and choose.” We walk around life looking at those around us, questioning why we have to accept them, and questioning why God chose them. They may have hurt us, we may know things about their past, and we may wonder why we have to accept them. I know I have been guilty of this.
Look at Colossians 3:12 again…and see how we are to interact and love our spiritual family:
Tenderhearted – Merciful – Kind – Walking in Humility – Gentle – Patient
Why?
Because He chose you. Because He chose me.
Because we are the family of The Great I AM.
__________
Let’s Pray:
Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank You for choosing me despite my past, despite my present, and despite what my future holds that does not live up to Your word. Lord, please give us the hearts to accept our spiritual family as You have accepted and chosen us. Lord, please guide us and give us the opportunities to walk with a tender heart, with mercy, in kindness, with humility, gently, and with patience. Help us to embrace that we are a part of Your family. Thank You, Father. In Jesus’ name we pray.
Amen
About Tonya Ellison
I’m so happy God chose you and I to be Sisters! 🙂
Ditto!
I love the fact that we are related by blood–the blood of the Lamb!
In a physical family we cheer each other on, whether it is encouraging our kids in their school work, cheering for them in an athletic game, or celebrating a birthday, a new job, etc. Through the letters to the early Church, we are instructed time after time to encourage our spiritual family. Acts 11:23, “When he (Barnabas) arrived and saw the evidence of the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts.”; I Thess 4:18, “Therefore encourage each other with these words.”; I Thess 5:11, “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.” ; Heb 3:13, “But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.”
I’m so glad that we are all a part of the I AM family! I’m praying your prayer, Tonya, right along with you.
Clella Thank you for that reminder and thank you for the scriptures! I think that encouragement has gone by the wayside and we don’t do it nearly as often as we need to. Awesome reminder!
me, too (praying your prayer along with you and our sister clella)! knowing of the TRUTH that the Great I AM has chosen us — just amazing!!! we should never, ever lose grasp of the immensity of this fact. it is grace upon grace! <3
Amen!
Beautiful words, Tonya, and I am using your prayer, too! The Gaither hymn says it well: “I’m so glad I’m a part of the family of God. I’ve been washed in the fountain, cleansed by His Blood; joint heirs with Jesus as we travel this sod. For I’m part of the family, the Family of God.” So happy to call you all my sisters!
How awesome does it feel to say that we are the family of God!
I like that, He “Chose us”, He loves us that much and chose us and wants that personal relationship with Him, that I try to do everyday is reading the Word, just not as much as I should and need to and I haven’t prayed like I should. For our Spiritual family, I do pick and choose, well so does every other Christian around here, They pick you if you’re spiritual enough for them, seriously I’m tired of the hypocrisy around here, I’m glad God doesn’t do that with us!! As for our earthly family, I was just thinking of that this morning, I’m not close to my family, my family is I say dysfunctional! I don’t have a relationship with either one of them in my family, my sister was just here at my moms this week and never called or came by, we never talk period, I’m not the favorite, or the “wanted one”, as someone said God wants that relationship with me, and when I have that desired relationship as they say with Him then He’ll bring friends into my life. I have my Online study friendships. Seriously I don’t know if that is true I know I have a ways to go in my relationship with Him but seriously how far? It’s just me during the day so I seriously need to spend MORE time with the Lord, I need to spend more time in his word. I am in fact today, as hubby told me “take it easy today”, well I am, I’m getting my Bible and my highlighter and I’m going to spend time reading. He chose me!! He loves me, I want to love him back, with the relationship He does desire, does that make sense?
I love that I am apart of a great family of God
remember those old days when we used to have to wait to be picked to be on someone’s kick ball team….well we don’t have to wait with God……HE always picks us first !!!. aint it great!
Thanks Tonya for a beautiful blog today
Thank you for your blog. It’s always a good reminder to think about God choosing us with all of our faults especially in a world that exploits or focuses on those and God loves us through them!