“The LORD will not abandon his people, because that would dishonor his great name. For it has pleased the LORD to make you his very own people.”
1 Samuel 12:22 NLT
http://bible.com/116/1sa.12.22.nlt
This verse gives us some great insight into the heart of God and His incredible grace for us. If you haven’t read, Part 1 of this series, don’t skip ahead, go back and read it now.
This powerful verse hidden in the history of God’s Word to us also tells us that our potential is not a bargaining chip to God. Yes, we do have potential and yes, when we accept Jesus into our life He creates a new spirit in us and our potential gets a huge upgrade. But God never looks at us as an investment to simply calculate.
There are no bean counting angels reporting to God if we are a good bet. From a human perspective we see the people we invest our resources in with an eye on their potential. It’s impossible not to. These people may be employees, baby sitters, friends, people in need, the cranky barista that never smiles at you, and a dozen more people in our community. We also intuitively assess whether our investment will pay off or not. Did you ever wonder if the person your dating would be good spouse material? Did you ever consider if you’re baby sitter will be available in the future or if you should look for someone you can develop an ongoing relationship with and not have to train every Tuesday night how to operate your husbands ridiculously complicated TV remote that never works anyways? Did you ever consider if the money you were donating to a disaster would actually make it to the area and do any good? These questions are instinctual and most of the time helpful. But what happens when the person in your life becomes a liability? For many of us other factors come into that decision such as loyalty, family relationship, fear of conflict, and a landslide of other analytics and emotions. I have counseled many people facing some of life’s greatest challenges as they determine what is best for them and the person they are invested in. God, however, does not share most of the risks in our lives. He never needs to protect Himself and He has unlimited resources. He will never run out of money or time. He does have a few vulnerabilities: His heart for you and His reputation He entrusts to us. In a shocking turn of events in the story of God, we see Him risk everything to share His heart with us. We see Him make a permanent decision to tust us with His Name. And because of these decisions, He is uniquely positioned to make promises like this one in 1 Samuel 12.
So we see a God here in 1 Samuel that doesn’t look at our liabilities or the potential His investment can make. He simply sees us, His loved creation. And He has a promise to uphold: bringing glory to His Name. How does He bring glory? He brings glory to Himself by making us His own! We can help God glorify Himself by submitting to the process and allowing Him to make us His.