There is no better way for God to show off His awesome power and strength than to do great and mighty things through ordinary people. You know, God could have chosen the nation of Egypt to bless and call His own. They were much stronger and their culture was much more civilized and refined. The Egyptians would have been a much better choice. They had much more going for them. The Israelites were smaller (Deuteronomy 7:7) and therefore weaker. They were stubborn (Deuteronomy 9:6-7) and sinful. There was nothing that would attract God to them. Yet God chose them. Why? The best answer that Scripture gives is that He chose them because He chose them. He loved them because He loved them (Deuteronomy 7:6-9).

“For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 7 It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 9 Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations . . .”

Notice in these verses the link between God’s choice and God’s love. God’s love is so strong and His choice so certain, that for God to choose is for Him to love. He chooses based upon His desires, his love, and He always chooses to give Himself the most pleasure, to satisfy His greatest desire (If you were an infinite Being, you would do the same thing). He only chooses those whom He loves. In fact, His choice indicates His love. It can be no other way. Because we are finite and sinful, we must often choose things we don’t necessarily love. But not God. He has the freedom to choose strictly according to His love.

God has chosen the weak and the small and the ordinary (1 Corinthians 1:26-29). He has poured His love on the unrighteous and the sinful and the unattractive (Luke 5:31-32). He has chosen you to be His child, to be the recipient of His grace and mercy and blessings. He has chosen you in order to love you. His love for you makes certain His choice of you. Why? Why would He choose you and love you? It is nothing about you (or me), I’ll assure you of that. There is nothing about us that impresses God. It is so “that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Corinthians 4:7).

So, go be weak and small and ordinary. Go be unimpressive and incapable and overwhelmed at the task before you. Go be . . . a bumpkin. Let’s go be bumpkins for Jesus!