A recent business article argued in favor of bosses playing favorites in the work force, but cautioned:
“What you’re trying to do is to get the other employees to raise their level of performance, not raise their level of suspicion.”
It turns out that what they mean by playing favorites is showing that good performance is favored and leads to good things for the employee. That makes a lot of sense in the workplace.
That’s not how it works in God’s kingdom, though, “For God does not show favoritism.” (Romans 2:11.) As Peter told Cornelius:
I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right. You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. (Acts 10:34-36.)
John explained:
Whoever has the Son has life … . And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. (1 John 5:12, 20.)
That’s it. Everyone in God’s kingdom has life eternal by virtue of being in the Son, meaning it’s because of Jesus and not because of us. Since Jesus is the eternally beloved Son of God the Father, and because we are in the Son for all eternity as well, we are as favored as can be.
God may not play favorites, but he certainly loves the favored ones.
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Questions to ponder: Do you sometimes wonder whether God seems to love others more than you? When is that thought most likely to crop up?
From an atheist perspective (which you can feel free to take or leave) it does sometimes come across that the way god is presented to us by believers, it looks like he plays favorites. And we won’t even mention heaven and hell.
What I mean is, many believers tell me that I have to believe by faith. However, the Bible has many stories where characters are given direct, physical evidence of god and angels. And occasionally believers will say that they have real life, direct experiences with their god.
All I can think from that is, if your god exists, then he must play favorites. Or he must not care if I believe or not.
I think it’s till faith, even in those face to face encounters, NAS. It goes back to Abraham’s question to God in Genesis 18:25 – “Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” And the answer to this rhetorical question, of course, is yes God always does what is right even if it makes no sense to us. He’s not bound by our limited logical abilities, after all..
But if I have a face to face encounter, what do I need faith for?
Jesus said even those who have seen as many miracles as they could hope for won’t necessarily have seen enough. And don’t forget Satan. He has been in the presence of God yet still rejected him.
I think we may be talking about two different things.
I’m talking about believing that a god exists at all. Not about whether or not I would love/follow/worship that god. That’s a separate issue entirely.
Of course, I don’t see the need for faith in either of those issues, but still. If other people (like Satan) get direct evidence of the existence of a god, and I don’t, and I’m supposed to believe anyway…isn’t that playing favorites?
Or at least ‘playing arbitraries’?
All the time I feel as if I am unworthy of God and that he loves others more than me. I do think that he definitely did show favorites and He hated two people in the Bible (one I read in 1 Kings recently, and obviously Esau). I don’t really think I have paid mind to when it crops up. I’ll have to take heed in that matter more.
As one of God’s people sealed with the Holy Spirit Victoria, God is crazy about you! Always is, always will be, even when you are smack in the middle of committing some sin or another no matter how egregious. That’s what it means to be cleansed by Jesus’ blood. It’s a once for all time event according to Scripture, and it lasts forever. Jesus himself said so.
Oh. I love this. When I was a teenager I heard a sermon on these passages and it touched me deeply. When I got home I wrote on a note card, “God has no favorite children.” and taped it to my bedroom mirror. During that critical decade (16-26) when I was laboring over important decisions that would determine the course of the rest of my life, this thought often comforted me and kept me afloat. Excellent post today, Tim. Thank you.
What a wonderful note card to place on the mirror, Adriana. You gave yourself very good insights as a kid!
Actually, I don’t really think about, “Why does God love OTHERS more than ME,” but rather, “Why does God love me so much?” I’m not kidding. When I look at my life in comparison to others, I feel like my non-Christian friends must look at me and think, “Well, no WONDER she believes in God! Her life is perfect!” Now true, my life is far from perfect, and certainly I have dealt with many dark and difficult times, but overall — and especially recently — my life has been beyond amazing. And I always think of that verse — “What is man that you are mindful of him?” And seriously, WHY is God so good to ME? It doesn’t make sense (grace!).
Rachel, your comment here is such a wonderful testimony to the wonderful grace of Jesus. He washes us clean so that he can present us to the Father as pure and spotless as he is. It’s all grace and all wonderful.
p.s. Thanks for highlighting the business article — I might use it in a blog post for my work.
P.S. How about sharing the link when you do? I’d love to read it.
Do you sometimes wonder whether God seems to love others more than you? When is that thought most likely to crop up?
All the time. All, The. Time. All the (insert expletive emphasizer of choice) time. Now more than ever. I’m 53 now, and my life has been knee-deep in trouble since roughly age 28. Now more than ever with health problems, sick family, my best friend in prison for something I’m convinced he didn’t do . . . the list goes on and on. Feels like I missed the love bus, all right. Chasing behind it, waving my arms and yelling, “Wait for me—!”
And in the middle of this I’ll read something in the Old Testament where God says something along the lines of, “For David’s sake I’ll—” Fill in the blank. WHAT is the big deal with God being so goo-goo eyed over David?! The man was plotting revenge on his deathbed.
Sorry to spray poison around like this, but sometimes it’s all just too much. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? And could “right” PLEASE hurt a little less?
I don’t think that’s poison at all, Mary Anne: it’s honesty. I appreciate it very much. And I hear you about King David. He is one of the characters in the Bible I have the hardest time with. When I read in Psalm 51, “Against You [God], You only, have I sinned,” I get angry and want to say, “Uh, no — you hurt many, many people! Don’t try to spiritualize your way out of it!” (And yes I know the Psalms run the gamut of human emotion etc. so I don’t take that Bible verse as a statement of doctrine, but still …) Anyway I just want to say I’m thankful for your words and that you say them in a context of a tenacious faith. That’s what I see, anyway, and I admire that.
MA, I don’t think your points are at all poisonous. They remind me of Psalm 74 and Psalm 137. Now there are a couple of Psalmist who would have read your comment and added a hearty Amen to it, joining right along with you at every point I bet.
My prayers are joining you too, Sister.
Tim
Mary Anne, I don’t have anything wise to say. I just wish I could reach my arms through the web right now and give you a big hug. Bless your heart, dear one. Feeling like you “missed the love bus” — that puts a lump in my throat!
I got a tweet from Donald Miller the other day and he said that there is this woman in the UK who lights a candle every time she prays for him. Maybe she’s Catholic — I don’t know — I’m not Catholic, but I love that and I’ve decided to start doing it. So, I want you to know that right now, I am lighting a candle and praying for you. You are the first person I’ve ever lit a candle for.
Thank you for sharing your heart.
Thanks, everyone. Sometimes it just all TOO hard and has to come out . . .
Not just the Psalms, either. I think especially of Jeremiah: “We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health, and behold trouble! . . . Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail?” Or, as someone once wrote to Guideposts magazine: “Where’s my miracle?”
Thanks for the prayers and support, everyone. I appreciate it—and frankly, I’ll take all the help I can get.
The question of favoritism has a direct correlation to our desire for justice, doesn’t it? There is so much injustice in our world (a theme you deal with on a direct and daily basis in your work, Tim) that it is nigh impossible to try to comprehend how God is any different than what our experience in the world is. I appreciated NotAScientist’s comments, above, because asking the questions he or she asked is in itself an expression of faith. The desire for justice, too, is an expression of faith.
When I’ve been on the blunt end of injustice, It is faith in a just God that sustains me and informs my responses. Or at least, I’d like it be. Sometimes I struggle to hang on to that faith in a world where favoritism is celebrated. Those times confront me with the reality faith is more than my feelings and is beyond my own ability to reason and analyze. I simply can’t know my opponents’ motives or story, or all the circumstances that contributed to the injustice done me.
Great conversation starter post – and wonderful discussion in the comments section.
Michelle, that is such a good insight about how we can’t know the motives or story of those who we perceive to have done us wrong. Maybe it turns out they haven’t. I’m reading Lois Tverberg’s “Walking in the Dust of Rabbi Jesus” right now, and she discusses a tradition in Israel of making every effort to come up with excuses on behalf of those who have wronged us. Interesting way to love our neighbor, to say the least.
Not unlike walking a mile in a person’s moccasins, eh?
Yes, although I like to think of that advice this way: “Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.”
Tim
Wow! What a great post, Tim. Thanks for pointing out that article and adding your perspective. I have seen myself how a healthy kind of “favoritism” does spur on excellence, or at least the striving for it. But I’d never been able to articulate the phenomenon before. I’ll be referring to this post and the study cited from now on.
Thanks Karen. And when you do cite this, please let me know so I can benefit from whatever you write on the subject!