Who are God’s “Chosen People”?

PANWEL, SOUTH SUDAN: Unidentified worshipers sing and clap at an outdoor worship service in South Sudan.

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. (Colossians 3:12)

by Brian Shilhavy

A common false belief in Christian Western cultures today is the belief that the “Jews” are God’s “chosen people.”

People who believe this are usually biblically illiterate, because this belief is not backed up by what is written in the Bible, especially the New Testament portion.

The New Testament portion of the Bible, which introduces the “New Covenant” ushered in by the Jewish Messiah, Jesus Christ, is centered around “the Gospel,” where the word “gospel” means literally “good news.”

And what is the “Gospel/Good News” of the New Covenant?

It is defined throughout the New Testament in the Bible, and its origins are traced all they way back to Abraham, 430 years BEFORE the Old Covenant began with Moses and the Law:

Consider Abraham:

“He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham.

The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham:

“All nations will be blessed through you.”

So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. (Galatians 3:6-9)

As is written here, God announced “the gospel” to Abraham, and that gospel message is that “all nations”, where the original word here means more “ethnic groups” than geopolitical nations, would be blessed through Abraham’s faith.

Not just some nations that have privileged status, but ALL NATIONS.

And the reason why Paul writes that this promise to Abraham was the gospel “in advance,” is because it was not ultimately fulfilled until the Jewish Messiah came in Jesus Christ, instituting the New Covenant.

It is also important to point out that Abraham was NOT a Jew!

He was a Hebrew, and it was his grandson, Jacob, who was renamed to “Israel” and became the patriarch of the “Jewish people.”

I put this in quotation marks because the term “Jew” came much later, and referred to the tribe of “Judah”, which along with the tribe of Benjamin, were the remnants of Israel after the northern 10 tribes were conquered and carried off into captivity by the Assyrians.

So the gospel message is that there are no longer any distinctions between ethnic groups since the Jewish Messiah came and instituted the New Covenant through his execution on the cross and subsequent resurrection from the grave defeating death.

Throughout the entire New Testament the “gospel” is defined as ALL believers, regardless of ethnic group or any other group one belongs to, are “One in Christ.”

This is one of strongest statements to this fact that Paul wrote to the Colossians:

Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.

Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another.

Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. (Colossians 3:11-14)

So the “chosen people” are everyone who are “in Christ.” Nothing else matters. What matters is that one has the same kind of faith that Abraham (who was NOT a Jew) had, because God announced the Gospel to Abraham first.

In most Christian groups today, at least in Western cultures like the United States, they define the “gospel” as simply the facts surrounding the life of Jesus Christ. What is taught is that intellectual belief and acknowledgement of these facts, that Jesus was born from a virgin woman, lived a sinless life, offered himself up as a sacrifice for the sins of the world, and then defeated death by rising from the grave three days later.

But one can believe all these facts, and still not be part of the Gospel. Satan and his demons believe all these facts, because they lived through them.

The proof that one has gone through the Spiritual rebirth and has come into the family of God and the Kingdom of God through the Gospel, is that one loves everyone just as Christ loves them, and died for them to be free from Satan’s world system.

It is actually the fulfillment of the Law of Moses and how we treat our fellow human beings even in the Old Covenant, which Jesus taught is summed up as “Love others as you love yourself” (known as the “Golden Rule”).

So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12)

In fact, Jesus took the concepts of the Law of Moses to love others as one loves themselves to an entirely new level in the New Covenant, which was to love others as Jesus loved them:

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35)

Here is how Paul describes this new standard of love that is part of the Gospel, which was not to love others as we love ourselves, but to love others as better than ourselves:

If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.

Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:1-8)

Here is what John wrote about living out the Gospel and following the example of Jesus:

Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning.

This old command is the message you have heard.

Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.

Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble.

But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him. (1 John 2:7-11)

And now, dear lady, I am not writing you a new command but one we have had from the beginning.

I ask that we love one another. And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands.

As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.

Many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh, have gone out into the world. Any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist. (2 John 1:5-7)

This command by Jesus to love others just as he loved them, and that Paul describes as loving others “better than ourselves,” is the evidence that one is participating in the Gospel. It is sometimes referred to as the “law of Christ”.

Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:2)

Now compare this to how Christians in the U.S. and most other western nations behave. They define the gospel as strictly an intellectual agreement to the facts surrounding the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The “law of Christ” to love others as Jesus loves them, is either not taught or not obeyed.

Most of these Christians support the pop culture in condemning whole groups of people, like Muslims, Chinese, Russians, Iranians, and especially Palestinians.

That is not the Gospel.

And here in the U.S., the Christians condemn other Christians who do not believe like they do, and if they are Conservative Christians, which make up the largest portion of the U.S. population, they condemn their fellow U.S. citizens if they are on the opposite side politically, using terms like liberal commies, leftist terrorists, etc., condemning other Americans based on what groups they belong to.

This is not the Gospel.

To embrace the Gospel, and go through the Spiritual rebirth to be taken out of Satan’s world system in the spiritual realm, and begin to love your fellow human beings no matter what ethnic, religious, gender or nationality group they belong to, is to become God’s Chosen People.

We are chosen to carry out in Satan’s domain the same love for others that Jesus loved.

We are the minority, but we are plugged into the superior power source of the Holy Spirit which inhabits blood and flesh (but NOT electricity and machines), and we will prevail, even if it means giving up our life in love, just as Jesus did.

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