Mark’s sermon last night looked at the topic ‘You’re special!’ From special offers (on cars, bikes, clothes, guitars, kebabs and fried rice!) to special editions (cars with ‘go faster’ stripes, for example!), using the word ‘special’ indicates there is something different about the item that is worth noticing or having.

special offersThe most special things in our lives are probably the things that can’t be bought (love, family, friendship, health). Mark challenged us to fill in a ‘scale of specialness’ graph where we think about the 7 most important things to us. If God filled in such a graph, it would probably simply say ‘family, family, family’, for that includes Jesus and us and everyone in the universal church of God!

Ps 135:4 says For the Lord has chosen Jacob to be his own, Israel to be his treasured possession. God chooses people to be part of His family and to Him, we are His special treasure. Rom 8:15-17 reminds us that we are adopted children, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. We are so special that we are considered royalty!

Deut 7:6 expands these thoughts further, telling us that Israel was chosen out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be God’s people, His treasured possession. To be special means that we are different from all the other items or people, that we occupy a place in God’s heart that nothing or no one else could fill. Treasure is precious, valuable, desirable and loved. We need to understand that to God we are not ordinary, cheap, dirty or repulsive; we are children of God, inheritors of God’s kingdom, a beautiful bride and part of His family.

1 Pet 2:9-10 reminds us that we are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, hand picked by God for this particular moment in history to serve Him as priests and to be set apart for Him alone. We are not a second choice, an accident, but we are loved and precious to God. That does not mean we’re perfect, but it does mean we can be the recipients of God’s amazing, unconditional love, for He sees us as irreplaceable treasure. We are not worthless or rubbish for He was willing to pay an immeasurable cost for us. We are His special treasure!