Psalm 135: Chosen

 Last night my wife won a giveaway for two books that she had been hoping to read. Out of nearly 300 entries, her name was chosen, at random for the prize. She didn’t win because she was more worthy than the other entrants. She didn’t convince anyone that she was more deserving, in fact, no one even asked for any information other than her name. She didn’t earn this gift, these books will not be a sign of some sort of victory and her winning them was not a slight to any of the other 299 people that had hoped to get the books for free, she was simply chosen. 

Psalm 135 begins with a call to “Praise the LORD!” because He is good and to praise His name because it is pleasant. Do you ever wonder what any of that means? In many places, if you say, “God is good” you will be immediately met with the refrain, “all the time”. We believe in God’s goodness, we preach about it, sing about it, encourage each other in it, but what does it mean? What is it that makes God good? 

The answer to that question is simple, “nothing”. There is nothing that makes God good. He’s not good because of what He does or doesn’t do. His goodness is not based on my approval or even on His effort. God’s goodness is a truth of His character. He doesn’t do good things, He is good. His being is the embodiment of goodness, in fact, James 1:17 says that “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” This means that not only is God good, but everything that has goodness in it is from God and its goodness is attributed to God. God’s goodness does not have an explanation, He’s not good because, it’s simply an immovable truth, God is good. 

As true and biblical and theological as that may be, it doesn’t really help us in trying to understand what it means to say that God is good. The psalmist tries to help us understand, “For the LORD has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as his own possession.” Now, this is not what makes God good, it’s the reason to Praise the LORD and it’s evidence of His goodness. Consider reading it this way with me, “Because God is good, He has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as his own possession.” It was the nature of God’s character, the content or fabric of His being that cause Him to choose Israel. He’s not good because He chose Israel, He chose Israel because He is good. 

We touched on this in the last chapter, but we’ll look at it deeper now, how did God choose Israel? While still in the Garden of Eden, after Adam and Eve’s sin, God promised that the seed of the woman would one day crush the head of the seed of the serpent, setting into motion the promise of redemption. When the earth was filled with violence to the point that it grieved the heart of God, He chose to send the flood that would blot out all of mankind except for the family of one man who the Bible describes as a preacher of righteousness, a man who found favor in the eyes of the LORD. God started over with Noah. Then as the people of the earth began to multiply again, they came together and decided to build a tower that would reach heaven to establish themselves as gods. God gave the people different languages and dispersed them throughout the face of the earth. And then, God chose Abram. 

Abram was from Ur of the Chaldeans but was living in Haran when God spoke to him, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” God chose a man with no children to become the family that would become the nation that would be His people. God kept Abram and his wife Sarai childless until he was 100 and she was 90. God had given them wealth, He had given them a covenant, He had changed their names, but it was not until they were too old to have children, that God gave them the child that would start that family that would become the nation. Abraham didn’t choose to be the father of God’s nation, he didn’t apply for the position and beat out other candidates, God chose him out of His goodness because Abraham, like and I, had not goodness from which to be chosen. 

God didn’t choose Israel over all the other nations; He chose her out of and for the sake of all the other nations. God chose Abraham and Sarah to birth a child, that would birth the nation, that would birth the Child that would bring redemption to all the nations. His goodness is revealed by not only His initial, but His continual choice of Israel. God’s character is revealed by His relationship with Israel, that’s what it meant for them to be a nation of priests (Exodus 19:6). God chose her out of and for the display of His goodness and so, Israel’s place in God’s heart, His plans and His love is not based upon her faithfulness, but His. This choice and their relationship was not temporary or else there would be a shadow of turning in God’s plan and His character. If Israel does not remain forever the “natural branch” then there is nowhere for the “wild branches” to be grafted into (Romans 11). This is what we must understand about God’s goodness and His plan of redemption, those He chooses stay chosen. 

This is what Jesus was teaching the apostles in John 15:16, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.” This may be the best news we could ever hear! We did not choose Him, He chose us. That means that our salvation is not fragile, it is not as strong as our faith, but as strong as His love. His commitment to our redemption goes beyond our commitment to be redeemed because His commitment came before our, He loved us first and chose us first. This means that He won’t leave us, be done with us, use us up or move on from us—we are chosen not by our effort but by His goodness and His goodness can not fade. 

This means that everything that happened in the life of Israel was by and from God’s choice of them. He chose not only the birth of Isaac, but the bondage of Egypt, the Passover and the Promised Land. He chose discipline when their hearts wandered because His goodness would not allow Him to treat them as they deserved because He had not chosen them by their merit. Famine was the goodness of God, choosing to bring Israel to repentance rather than let them continue in their sin. Drought, captivity, even destruction of the temple and being scattered throughout the earth, it was all from and for God’s choice. 

Some may be reading and wondering why this matter so much, why does God’s dealing with Israel matter to us as Christians today? The only reason we can be confident in God’s choice of each of us is because of how faithful God has been in His choice of Israel. The promise to redeem Israel is why the Philippian jailer could receive and believe the promise that his whole household would be saved. The reason I can believe that God will never leave me nor forsake me is because He has never left nor forsaken Israel. His goodness is revealed in His choice of Israel and His choice of Israel is what has allowed Him to choose you and me. Praise the LORD for being chosen, but even more, praise the LORD for choosing Israel, from her came Jesus and for her Jesus will return because everyone God chooses stays chosen, He’s too good to change His mind.