Session 7: Chosen

As you read, look for

• How you have been chosen by God to do great things with God.

• How you have been chosen to be Holy.

• How you have been chosen to do good works.

STUDY

THINK IT THROUGH

It is such a great feeling when in elementary school for the latest game of dodgeball a captain chooses you to be on their team. Or after high school tryouts to make your team roster, you anxiously look for your name on the posted sheet to find out you were chosen to be on the varsity team this year. We all have the deep desire to be seen, heard and valued in this world and we often get that validation when we are chosen for something or by someone.

Good news! We serve a God that chose us from the beginning when He decided to create us in His image.

He created us to love us. He created us to have a relationship with us.

GOD chose us. We are CHOSEN.

And if we were chosen by God, we must ask the question, “What were we chosen for?”

THE WORD

Review the verses below. While there are hundreds of them that point to aspects of being chosen, we’ll start with some basics to get a handle on being chosen in Him. Take 10 minutes to read the following verses and record in notes what it says about who you are:

We see different people through the Bible who were chosen to complete certain tasks. For instance, Mary was chosen to carry and give birth to Jesus the Messiah. Moses was chosen to lead God’s people, the Israelites, out of Egypt and out of slavery. Joshua was chosen to lead those same people into the Promised Land. Paul was chosen to bring the Good News of Jesus to the Jews and the Gentiles. These individuals would be considered the Big League Players, the starters, the names we have all heard before. But then, there’s someone like Bezalel.

Read Exodus 35:30-31 below and consider Bezalel’s attributes. What talents has God given you to use for His Kingdom?

And what was Bezalel chosen to build? The new Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant. The Tabernacle was the one place God’s people went to worship God and the Ark of the Covenant represented the presence of God. This was the most important job at the time yet today very few people know his name. But because “Bezalel made everything just as the Lord commanded….” It is God’s name that he is remembered not his own. The work came through his hands, but it didn’t come from his hands. We must understand that because we were chosen, created in God’s image and can have a relationship with God, we were never supposed to work for God, but with God.

What about us? What were we chosen to do?

We are chosen to be set apart.

Colossians 3:12 says, “Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” The Greek word for holy is hagios which means, “to be set apart by God.” As followers of Jesus, we have been called to be holy, living a life set apart by God from the world. How we act and how we react; how we love and how we live should look different than the world.

When the world says be prideful and make sure you get yours, God has chosen us to be humble. When the world says if you hurt me then I will get revenge on you, God has chosen us to show mercy and kindness because the battle is not ours but His.

When the world says YOLO so do everything now, God has chosen us to trust Him and be patient.

We are chosen to do good works.

TAKEAWAY TRUTH

Here’s the bottom line:

Because we have been set apart, there are Holy Spirit tasks God wantsus to do as a follower of His. You can read Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount to see that God wants us to love our enemies, help the poor, set a good example by being a light in this dark world and so much more. But remember, salvation doesn’t depend on our good works but our influence does. We love others because He first loved us.

As female athletes, we can constantly feel like we are being rejected. But, be encouraged! We serve a God that not only loves us but has chosen us to be on His team not to do great things for Him but to accomplish great things with Him!

TEAM TIME

Application

As teammates, you can help each other learn the Truth about who you are as God’s daughters. The theory that there’s strength in numbers is supported in Scripture—starting with the Father Himself as One of Three—and it certainly applies to you in your quest to embrace who you really are. By joining forces with your teammates, you can multiply your strength and resources in the battle for your souls. As a group, let’s work through the following questions and activities together:

Read Ephesians 1:5

1. Write down the feelings when you read this knowing God chose to adopt you as His own child.

2. In what ways do you think God want us to be like His son?

3. In what ways do you do things like the world that God wants you to be set apart and different from the world?

4. Write down a prayer of thankfulness for being chosen by God and then ask how to be used by God.

WORK IT OUT

Read Ephesians 1:11 before our next session and attempt to memorize it.

PRAYER

As we embrace being chosen by God today, let’s close in this prayer: