We Are God’s People

Throughout Scripture God habitually claims “I will be your God and you shall be my people.” Yes, God has chosen his people of old, and he chooses us now. God promises to be just (sedegah), faithful (amunah) and kind (hesed). And God lets us hold him to his part of the bargain! We’re held to our part of the bargain, too. We have been covenanted in baptism, and we have our own personal vocation signed with our God-name, which we will know some day when we receive our white stone (Rv. 2:17). We have the responsibility to keep our baptismal vows. We have a duty to live our personal vocation. We can even expect that God will treat us as peculiarly God’s own. And God can expect us to treat Him according to the sacred image that we hold of the Godhead. God knows our innermost being, our dreams, our neuroses, our masks, our grace and gifts. It is comforting to be so well known. God knows what our inner perfection must be and guides us toward that goal, where our perfection and God’s perfection converge, where God’s name and my name meet in one hyphenated word.