The Lord did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples. But it was because the Lord loved you and kept the oath he swore to your ancestors that he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the land of slavery, from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments. Deut. 7:7-9 (NIV)
Dear heavenly Father, unless I keep blasting my heart with the gospel, I default to the arrogant notion that you love me because of something good in me; or the perilous notion that you withdraw your love from me because of something bad in me. But this Scripture, like the whole Bible, sabotages every self-centered notion about our salvation. We are your chosen people, not your choice people.
Hallelujah, you set you affection upon us with a view to the day Jesus would come and fulfill the law for us—every jot and tittle of it. You never compromised the demands of your law; you established a covenant of love to meet the law’s demands, once and for all. Indeed, you made extraordinary promises that find their resounding “Yes!” in Jesus (2 Cor. 1:20). Now and forever, we look to Jesus’ obedience, not ours, as the basis of our hope and the fuel of our joy.
Father, you didn’t just redeem us out of Egypt’s slavery and Pharaoh’s power; but also from sin’s slavery and the devil’s dominion. We are free—so very free. We are loved—so very loved. We have hope—so great a hope.
And now, because we live in your permanent favor and under your unrestrained affection, of course we love you, of course we want to obey you, of course we want to honor you with everything we have, are, and do. What else could we possibly desire? So very Amen we pray, in Jesus’ holy and loving name.
