A Theological Primer
Snippet 2: God's Treasured Possession
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Almost immediately from the Red Sea, God led the Israelites to Mount Sinai. There, God offered the Israelites a deal:
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[The Lord said,] “You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on the eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”
(Exodus 19:4-6)
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Already, we see that God is repeating the story of the Exodus. “Look here,” He says, “see what I have done for you. See what I want to offer you. I only require one thing: that you obey me and keep my covenant.”
It's easy to get hung up on the concept of obedience. We hate obedience; we want to live life our own way. We want our dignity, and we believe that to obey anyone would violate our own standards of freedom and self-respect. We believe that, by running our own lives, we will achieve something marvelous, innovative, and precious. And from our experience with humans, that seems to be true: any human power which attempts to control and direct ends up corrupted and destructive; marvelous things happen when people are free to explore their own ideas.
Yet the absolute opposite is true with God. God has the capacity to consider every possible outcome, and to choose the best; more importantly, God is utterly loving and trustworthy. We will never look back on life, and conclude that our plan was better than God's. His wisdom, combined with His goodness, is unbeatable.
What God requires, though, seems unbearable. God promises to love us, to celebrate us, and in fact to give us wide latitude in our life. But He requires that there be nothing which is off-limits to Him. There is nothing in our life which we are entitled to hold back; nothing which we are entitled to protect against His encroachment. We must allow Him to set any limits that He chooses for us; we must agree to restrain ourselves, and to live within those boundaries. We may never restrain Him.
What we discover, if we are willing to submit, is life! Our souls were meant to walk with God in the Garden of Eden; our very nature cries out to Him, and for Him. There is nothing more satisfying than enjoying God, and knowing that we are likewise enjoyed. Nothing feels safer than the knowledge that we are known, accepted, and loved – by Someone who has the power to protect us from absolutely anything and everything. In hindsight, we see what seemed impossible beforehand: that life with God, in submission to Him, is always freer and more fun than anything else.
That is what God means when He says that Israel will be His “treasured possession.” The Israelites, if they only will obey, will know that God thinks of them as the most precious thing in the entire Universe. Through obedience, they will find freedom; through humility, God will celebrate them in front of the entire world. |
