Thursday, June 5, 2014

GOD OFTEN CHOOSES THE MOST UNLIKELY TO SUCCEED

On June 1, I preached from Mark 2:13-17. This incident was just one of many where Jesus is criticized for associating with certain types of people. In this case he calls Levi, a tax collector, to be his disciple. Tax collectors were despised and therefore were outcasts. But Jesus tops this off with a dinner party with Levi and other "tax collectors and sinners." 
Look through scripture and you will see the ones God often chooses are the rejects, the outcasts, the most unlikely characters, the most unlikely to succeed.
Here are some examples: Rachel and Leah were sisters, both married to Jacob. Rachel was Jacob's favorite. But God gave Leah more children including Judah who was the forefather of David and of Jesus.
Israel as a nation was the smallest of all the nations. It wasn’t their greatness that drew God’s gaze because they were not great. It was that through them HIS greatness would be more visible.
When Samuel came to the house of Jesse to anoint Israel's next king, no one in the family thought for a second that David needed to be there. He was the runt of the family. The bratty little brother that nobody wanted around. Yet, it was David that God chose to be king over his people.
Even our Lord Jesus was born in obscurity, poor, unassuming. And when people heard that Jesus was from Nazareth, they laughed! "Can anything good come from Nazareth?"
Why does God choose those who are most unlikely to succeed?
Paul explains it this way in 1 Corinthians 1:26–29.  
"For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God." 
See the point? God chooses the most unlikely characters because when God does amazing things in them and through them, it is clear that God has done it and not them! They are the least likely to succeed but also the least likely to hijack God's glory for themselves. But also it keeps the proud in a state of confusion. They don't get it! And this is part of how God opposes the proud. He leaves them confounded and confused in order that they may be humbled and then be made useful for God's purposes.

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