The power of God’s call is not a reward for the perfect, but a summons for the willing.

The first truth we must grasp is that God does not show partiality.

No matter who you are, or where you have been, you are the beloved of God.

When we look at the stories of the Bible, we see a gallery of the “unqualified” according to world standards.

God chose them, prepared them, and then sent them out into the harvest.

Their backgrounds were messy, their status was low, and their standing was often compromised.

Think of the tax collectors like Matthew, the prostitutes like Rahab, the murderers like Moses, and the doubters like Thomas.

The list goes on: sinners, saints, kings, and outcasts.

They were all chosen, and they were all prepared for a specific purpose.

There is a divine reason why God chooses the broken and the overlooked.

It is because they can understand others better; they have walked the dusty roads of failure and know the scent of shame.

Because they have been mended, they know how to handle the shattered pieces of another person’s soul.

This unique preparation leads to a specific charge, which we hear in the soaring words of the prophet Isaiah.

“Thus says God, the Lord, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it...”

“...who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it.”

The One who holds the cosmos also holds your specific, fragile life.

“I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you.”

“I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations.”

This is not a call to sit in a comfortable pew, but a call to be a “covenant” for others.

God’s chosen ones are sent “to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.”

As the poet Mary Oliver once asked, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

God answers that question by pointing us toward those who sit in darkness.

We see this most clearly in the baptism of Jesus, where the heavens open and a voice declares, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).

Jesus did not wait until he had performed miracles to be called beloved; he was beloved before he ever started his ministry.

You, too, are chosen and beloved before you “do” anything for the kingdom.

The late Henri Nouwen wrote, “Being the beloved expresses the core truth of our existence.”

If we don’t believe we are beloved, we will try to use our call to prove our worth.

But when we know we are chosen, we can give our glory back to the One who called us.

As Isaiah reminds us, “I am the Lord, that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to idols.”

God is doing a new thing in you, even if you feel like you are still standing in the old wreckage.

“See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them.”

You are called to be a light to the nations precisely because you know what it feels like to be in the dark.

Your scars are your credentials.

Your past is the soil in which God is planting a new future.

The world may see a sinner or a failure, but God sees a light-bearer.

Do not be afraid of your brokenness, for it is the crack where the light gets in.

Walk out into the world knowing you are taken by the hand by the Creator of the heavens.

Open the eyes of the blind with your kindness.

Bring out the prisoners with your compassion.

Be the beloved community that God intended from the beginning.

Amen.

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