Favorites
You are one of God’s favorites!
Like everyone, I have favorites. Favorite flowers (I’m looking at you wisteria and peonies!), views, food, people, and songs. We all have our favorites. And we all want to BE somebody’s favorite person. To know you are someone’s unique, called-out, favorite person is a delicious feeling.
The mother of the sons of Zebedee wanted this favoritism for her sons. In the book of Matthew she boldly went up to Jesus and asked, “Grant that one of these two sons of mine may sit at your right hand the other at your left in your kingdom.” Two thousand years later we laugh and are astonished at her brazenness and chutzpah. (Maybe she was the first, documented helicopter parent?)
Yet Jesus tactfully answered her, “To sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared by my Father.”
The disciples each wanted to be the favorite one as well. The Gospel of Luke records that even during the Last Supper, right after Jesus broke bread and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you,” the disciples immediately began to argue.
Luke records, “A dispute arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest.” That amazes me. In the middle of one of the most significant moments in history, a scene that we revere and act out in churches around the world, the disciples were behaving like children. They each wanted to be the favorite, the special one.
Sitting here two thousand years later, we think we would never be so small-minded and selfish. Oh, but we are.
In the podcast I talk about how a Bible Study I was a part of asked me to be one of the leaders for a small group. When I was mulling over the decision, my husband asked me, “What are the reasons you would do it?” I found my answers to be less than flattering to my character.
I was thinking about prestige. Well, it would be nice to be in the inner circle, I first thought. I had been considering how I could best serve God with my talents when they asked me, but I found it interesting that my first thought was self-oriented.
I do want to serve God, I do want to be in the middle of His will, but my selfish nature tends to jump in and usurp the greater goal. We all want to feel special, included, and part of the favorite group.
Sometimes things we’ve done in our past hold us back from feeling as though we are one of God’s favorites. We think the do-gooders and those whose pasts are free from sexual sin, stealing, addictions, lying and murder are in better standing with God.
Sure, we may have our salvation, but we feel as if we’re squeaking into heaven to sit in the back row while the do-gooders are front and center. But this is incorrect.
God has told us in His Word that we are his favorites. He has bestowed on us tender titles indicating what He thinks of us. Titles like children of God (Romans 8:16), heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17), sons and daughters of God (2 Corinthians 6:18), friends of Christ (John 115:15), loved and chosen by God (1 Thessalonians 1:4), to name just a few.
Even more to the point, in Romans 8, we are told that we can call the creator o fthe universe, God Almighty, Abba, which means, Daddy (Romans 8:15). Throughout the Bible, God has tried to communicate His tender heart towards us.
One of my favorite stories about knowing and tasting God’s favoritism comes from Brennan manning’s book, Abba’s Child. He relates a story about a priest from Detroit, Edward Farrell, who went on vacation to Ireland. One morning before dawn, Edward had his eighty-year-old uncle Seamus were walking along the shores of Lake Killarney. They stopped to watch the sunrise in silence.
Suddenly the uncle turned and went skipping down the road. he was radiant, beaming, smiling from ear to ear.
His nephew said, “Uncle Seamus, you really look happy.”
“I am, lad.”
“Want to tell me why?”
His eighty-year-old uncle replied, “Yes, you see, my Abba is very fond of me.”
When I stroll about my favorites in the garden at twilight, I’m amazed at the beauty and diversity in God’s creative handiwork. I treasure just sitting and being surrounded by it all—the humming bees, the chattering birds. And instead of thinking about how much I’m not doing, instead of comparing myself to others or thinking about how little I’ve prayed lately, I try to remember He’s my Abba—Father. I’m one of His favorites, and He’s very fond of me.
And He’s very fond of you too!
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