Amy Kelley, Dir. of Program Ministries, Gethsemane

2 Samuel 7:22-24
22 That is why you are so great, Lord God! No one can compare to you, no god except you, just as we have always heard with our own ears. 23 Who is like your people, like Israel? Is there another nation on earth whose God went to redeem it as a people, and to make a name for himself, doing great and awesome things for them, by driving out before his people nations and their gods? 24 And you established your people Israel for yourself to be your people forever; and you, O Lord, became their God. 

Reflection:
I encourage you to read all of 2 Samuel 7. It is a key point in the Bible where everything seems to come together to remind us of God’s promises of redemption and hope. King David had been through battles and had lost men. He was exhausted and God provided him a time of peace and rest. But even during that time of rest, David’s mind was still racing. We can relate, right? David was living in a cedar palace and wanted to build something more substantial for “God’s chest,” the Arc of The Covenant to reside in other than a tent. David shared his thoughts with Nathan. But God instructed Nathan to tell David no. God reminded David that God had never expected God’s people, the Israelites, to build him anything. It was time to rest. God knew David and his people had been through enough for the time being.

But here’s the amazing good news! In verses 12-17, David, and the world, are promised Jesus. The Light of the World. As many of us do, David wonders how he is worthy of such a promise. His prayer beginning with verse 18 sounds like our prayers sometimes. We all have moments of feeling not good enough to receive God’s goodness and love. But we are! We’ve been redeemed. One summer, when I was a youth director, we were on a U.M. ARMY mission trip. We were building a really long wheelchair ramp for an elderly man and his wife. Over the week we came to know this couple really well and got to hear some amazing stories. The man, we’ll call George, had served time in prison for 25 years. We never asked why, and we didn’t need to know. What we did know was that he loved God and his wife. When we finished the wheelchair ramp, cleaned up our worksite, we always circled up with the family we served for prayer. George began to weep, as his wife pushed him lovingly down the newly built ramp. We all hugged him as he joined the circle. He said to us, “I don’t deserve this. All the things I’ve done in my life. What have I done to deserve such generosity?”

I will never forget this. His wife leaned down and spoke a version of verse 23-25 to him in his ear, but loud enough that a few of us could hear. She said “That is why God is so great! We are one family that God redeemed as his own by doing wonderful things for us. We’ve been redeemed. We love him and praise him always.” We prayed and loaded in the church van. That night, I laid on my air mattress with a flashlight searching for that scripture. FOUND IT! In that heavy-eyed, exhausted search, I realized I had been redeemed too. Just like the Israelites. Just like George. Just like all of us.

Closing Prayer:
Patient God, thank you for loving us. You love us when we whine. You love us when we sin. You love us when we just don’t get things right. You love us when we fail to realize we are one nation. You love us when we can’t sit still and rest in you. Help us to see that we are redeemed. You have given us peace that we can experience if only we’d accept our redemption. Thank you for your promises of hope and love! We love you, God. Amen.