Title: My Chosen / Isaiah 42:1-9
What would you think if you were in a car accident and had a fatal disability? What would you think if you lost your leg or was paralyzed? What would you think if you were diagnosed at the hospital and were told that you could not live more than a year? What would you think if the person you love suddenly turns away from you one day and turns away from you? What would you think if you heard that a very close friend would distance you from you and end your relationship with you? In order to get a job at the job I wanted, I had asked the officials in advance, but it didn't work out the way I wanted. So what would you think?
Perhaps it will make it clear that you have been abandoned. Why is that person so healthy, why do I have to suffer from an incurable disease? Why do I have to suffer so much when that person eats and lives well? Why do I have to wander like this when that person got a good job? As you do this, you will feel that you have been grieving for your own situation and have been abandoned.
Abraham could not have children with his wife Sarah. Eventually, a son was born to Abraham and Sarah's servant Hagar. His name is Ishmael. Ishmael was growing well when loved. Then one day, Abraham and his wife Sarah gave birth to a son, Isaac. As Isaac grew up, he grew up being beaten by his older brother Ishmael. His wife, Sarah, could hardly see it. Eventually, Hagar and Ishmael were expelled from their families. All that was left in Hagar's hands was a piece of bread and water. When the water runs out and the bread runs out, his beloved son Ishmael begs for something to eat. Hagar, who was driven out in this way, weeps out loud.
What was in Hagar's mind? Surely I will feel abandoned.
If you look at the history of Israel, they are always caught up in a sense of victimization. God chose the people of Israel to be God's people, and they were deprived of their country, taken into slavery, and even possessed. The history of the people of Israel was also a nation with a sense of loss that they were "forsaken".
Look at the life of Jesus. Jesus is the Son of God. He is the Son of God who created the whole universe. When Jesus was active, many people followed Him. Thousands of people follow Jesus. However, when Jesus is arrested, everyone around him leaves. Jesus was rejected by many people. Even Peter, whom he loved so much, promised that I would never forsake Jesus. But even Peter abandoned him because he did not know Jesus. The Son of God takes up the cross and is insulted. Are you a son of God? If you are the Son of God, jump down! suffer a humiliating insult.
Jesus is in so much pain that he cries on the cross. Eli eli llama sabachthani. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Think of the voice Jesus cried out on the cross. Why have I been abandoned here? Jesus, the Son of God, also made it clear that he was forsaken by God, and he clearly cried out that he was forsaken.
There are times in our lives when we think that we have been abandoned by people and abandoned by God. What do you do at a time like this? I'm abandoned, so will I give up my life? I have been abandoned, so will I end my life as I am?
A few years ago, there was an incident where a son murdered his father. In 1985, the 4-year-old son was placed in an orphanage due to the divorce of his parents. After more than 15 years, this son could not shake the feeling that he had been abandoned by his father. In the end, a terrible thing happened in which he went to his father's place and killed his father who had abandoned him. When the son was arrested at the police station, he expressed his deep resentment towards his parents, saying, "I have no memory of being treated as a human being," and "I do not regret the crime, and I had plans to kill my mother as well."
In this way, they may live in a spirit of revenge because they have been abandoned. But when you think that you have been abandoned, you must judge accurately.
Here is the clear answer. The beginning of God begins when man confesses that he has forsaken himself. Moses became a murderer in the land of Egypt. became a fugitive. He came to Midian and worked as a shepherd for 40 years. Then, at the age of 80, God calls him from Mount Horeb. The meaning of this Horeb is a desolate place, an abandoned land. The life of Moses was an abandoned life. God calls Moses from Mount Horeb. He called from the deserted land. Moses was an abandoned man. God calls Moses to Horeb, an abandoned land. And he opened the way for a new beginning there. He was given a mission to lead the Israelites out of Egypt.
The forsaken Moses was called by God in Horeb, the abandoned land. Dear saint! No matter how real we live in a place like Horeb, an abandoned land, God allows us to start anew there.
Therefore, even if we are abandoned, God gives us a fresh start. Dear saint! What are you struggling with right now? Are you suffering from the thought of being abandoned somewhere? God started anew in the abandoned land of Horeb.
So how can this happen? There is a clear answer to this. The people of Israel were like the outcasts, but they were the chosen people. Although the people of Israel had wandered without their land for thousands of years, the consciousness that “we are the chosen people” was clearly ingrained in their consciousness.
It is the same with us as children of God. The Bible clearly tells us. “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession.” If the people of Israel are God's chosen people, then God's children are also God's chosen children.
The church is called the ekklesia. The word ekklesia means one who is called. Those who are called are the chosen ones. The church is a community of the called and the elect. All members of our church are called and chosen.
So, what are the benefits to the elect? Look at the text of the text. clearly teaching. “I will not break a bruised reed, nor will I put out a smoldering lamp.” It is a promise that God will hold on to you even in the midst of a crisis of abandonment. Called children of God, chosen holy saints, and all the saints in the church, may you have a clear consciousness. "I will not break a bruised reed, nor will I put out a smoldering lamp." It is a promise that God will hold on to us and protect us even in times of crisis.
Where was Moses called? Where did Moses start anew? It was Horeb. In a desolate, deserted land, God supported Moses. God opened up an opportunity for Moses to start anew.
A fresh start in 2002. A person who gives up on life may say that a new year has no meaning to me. But the Bible clearly tells us. I will uphold the one I choose. I will not break a bruised reed, nor will I put out a smoldering lamp. Members of the church are called people. They are the chosen ones It is you that the Lord sustains. He does not break a bruised reed. He does not quench the extinguished lamp.
Our church was planted in Guro-dong in 1964. At that time, this was the town where the emigrants lived. It's a town where I can't live without boots, even if I can't live without my wife. Guro-dong was a neighborhood where people who failed because of their aunts and lows lived. It was like a place where people who were wounded and exhausted by the world lived together, and where bruised reeds gathered. It was a place where all the lights were lost and the lights went out because it was too strong.
However, in places like barren land, deserted land, and Horeb, churches were established, and the number of called people began to increase, and the number of chosen people increased. What is clear is God's promise to sustain his chosen people. It is God's promise that he will not break a bruised reed or put out a burning lamp.
Then why does God hold us like this? Why do you not break a bruised reed or put out a smoldering lamp, and why are you holding on to us like this? It is to show us that God is alive. "I will make a light to the Gentiles, I will light the eyes of the blind, I will bring the prisoners out of prison, I will bring those who sit in darkness out of their prisons." This expression is God's request to show that God lives because of me.
Look at the text of the text. Reeds are fragile and worthless. It cannot be used as timber for building houses, nor can it be used as agricultural implements. But the shepherd makes a flute out of reeds and blows it. In ancient Israel, shepherds tending their flocks often cut the reeds into suitable sizes, hollow them out, and then combine two or three reeds to make a reed flute similar to the modern fanpipes. The reed seems weak, but it was used as a sounding flute. The bruised reed seems to be thrown away easily, but it should be used as a tool to convey the existence of God.
The church is the gathering place of the elect. The chosen people's consciousness was not given to us to have a sense of superiority. A sense of choice is more of a responsibility. God has chosen us. The church is the gathering place of the elect. To be chosen means to bear more responsibility.
What responsibilities do we have? We have a responsibility to communicate that God lives. It seems that the world is increasingly not afraid of God. The responsibility of the church is to convey that God lives. God chooses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chooses the weak things of the world to shame the strong. A bruised reed, a burning lamp, how weak is it? God does not forsake the weak. Hold on to the weak He makes the weak proclaim that God is alive.
The church is a community of people chosen by God. You should not feel superior because you are chosen. Because we have been chosen, we must have a stronger sense of responsibility. We have a responsibility to proclaim that God lives.
If we fall in weakness, we cannot play the flute in which God lives. When we are weak, we must have courage to rise It must show that God is alive.