Accepted

Ephesians 1:6

To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.

Accepted.

I always thought that just meant that He wanted us, that He chose us. However, when I look up the original Greek, it means, "to make graceful, charming, lovely, agreeable."

The word, "make", threw me so I looked back at the verse and it says, "made." Hmm. This is important.

In our sin, we are not lovely or even agreeable to God. We oppose Him and His ways. Our sin makes us filthy and even when we think we are doing good, "our righteousness are as filthy rags."

The important thing to realize is that He chose to make us clean and acceptable! He did all the world. It is nothing we can do!

Adopted

Romans 8:14-16 KJV

14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. 15 For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. 16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

If we are adopted, we are certainly wanted/chosen. God desired us to have a closer relationship with Him than to just be His creation.

When we are led by the Spirit of God, we then have His power! We no longer need to be slaves to sin and fear. That is why we can cry out to Abba Father, and He will answer. He has sent His Spirit to speak to our hearts to comfort, encourage, and reprimand just like we parents do for our earthly children.

A.W. Tozer explains it well in His book, God's Pursuit of Man.

How can one personality enter another? The candid reply would be simply that we do not know, but a near approach to an understanding may be made by a simple analogy borrowed from the old devotional writers of several hundred years ago. We place a piece of iron in a fire and blow up the coals. At first we have two distinct substances, iron and fire. When we insert the iron in the fire we achieve the penetration of the iron and we have not only the iron in the fire but the fire in the iron as well. They are two distinct substances, but they have co-mingled and interpenetrated to a point where the two have become one.

Elect

1 Peter 1:2

Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.

The children and I are studying 1 Peter in our Bible class for school. we have read through the whole book and again through chapter one a few times (and we have been studying 1 Peter on Wednesday nights at church, too!), but it wasn't until recently that the word "elect" stood out to me.

elect = picked out, chosen, chosen by God

Maybe it is because I am really trying to learn who I am in Christ, but this hit me. Not only was I chosen, but He chose me before the world began. The foreknowledge of God the Father means He created a way of sanctification (Christ) because He had already chosen me!

Doesn't it feel good knowing you have been chosen? As children, we desire to be chosen to play on teams and as long as we aren't "chosen" last, we feel good. But do you remember how it felt on the rare occasion you were chosen first? It made my day!

Well, this is even better! God chose us before we even knew we were available to be chosen! We don't have to wonder if we were just the best option available. He wanted us!

In fact, He desired us so much that He sent His Son to earth do die for us-our sins, our wrongdoings. As a mother, I can't imagine that level of sacrifice, but God did it freely!

Chosen

Ephesians 1:4

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

chosen-to pick out, choose, to pick or choose out for one's self.

Being chosen means we are wanted, desired, and loved.

Before God created this world, He knew man would sin. He knew He would have to send His only Son to shed His blood for us. Yet He still created this world knowing the sacrifice that was needed. He did so because He loves us and wanted us. He desires us to be with Him.

He doesn't just want us to love Him because He created us to do that, He desires us to choose Him back. This cannot be a one way relationship! I have chosen to follow Him, but I can't forget that He chose me first.

Even despite knowing that I would forsake Him, that I would follow fleshly lusts, that I would break His heart-He still chose me!

I am special because He chose me, but that doesn't mean others are special! He chose all of us. Christ can so that all may be saved!

2 Peter 3:9 KJV 9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

Our identities should rest in the knowledge that the creator of this world desires us-chose us. If you would be excited to be chosen to meet the president of the US or the Queen of England, how much more special are you that God chose you?!