In our series looking at our identity as the people of God, we looked tonight at the fact that we are known by God. Paul mentions this in Gal 4:9-11 as he tries to teach the Galatians that salvation is by faith alone and there is no need to celebrate special times and dates or be circumcised in order to be accepted by God. We often speak of us knowing God, but the fact that God knows us is even more revolutionary, for it gives us stability, worth and significance.
Names are hugely important in the Bible; God says through Isaiah, ‘I have summoned you by name; you are mine.’ (Is 43:1) Moreover, God does not just know our names (which in the Bible implies He knows all about us), He has enabled us to be called by His name. (Is 43:7) He will, moreover, give us a new name (see Is 62:1-2, Is 65:13-15, Rev 2:17), again, an indication of a deep personal knowledge and relationship. Our names are written in the Lamb’s book of life (Luke 10:20); we cannot be forgotten by God. (Is 49:15-16)
Psalm 139 is probably the most comprehensive account of God’s intimate knowledge of us, from conception onwards. In this psalm, David celebrates God’s knowledge of us and reminds us that we are not an accident. We are not unwanted, even if our parents did not plan for us! God made us and knows everything about us: ‘all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.’ (Ps 139:16)
Jesus describes himself as the good Shepherd and says that he knows us, his sheep, and that we know his voice. (John 10:5-15) He likens His knowledge of the sheep to His knowledge of God the Father, and we see that ‘being known by Jesus produces an intimate and abiding relationship between Jesus and the individual believer modelled on the relationship of Jesus and His Father.’ (‘Known by God’, Brian S. Rosner, P 137) This intimacy and individual knowledge make a huge difference to us in our impersonal and isolated world. We have significance because we are known and loved by God. This is our core identity, which does not change. Since we are known by God, let’s not turn back, as the Galatians were tempted to do, to what we knew before or to things that simply cannot satisfy. Let’s allow God’s knowledge of us and love for us to shape us into the people He has made us to be and let’s hold our heads up high, for we are known by the King of Kings and welcomed by Him each day.