Short Answer
God chose Israel not because they were better, but out of His own love and purpose. His plan was always to bless all nations through them—not to exclude the rest of the world.
The Overview
The question of why God chose Israel is ultimately rooted in His sovereign will. Scripture makes it clear that God did not choose Israel because they were stronger, greater, or more deserving than other nations. In fact, He specifically says the opposite—they were among the least. His choice was based on His love and His promise, not human merit.
A helpful way to understand this is through analogy: just as a person chooses one spouse to love in a unique way without denying the value of others, God chose Israel for a special role without diminishing the worth of other nations. This choice was about purpose, not favoritism in value.
Importantly, God’s plan was never limited to Israel alone. From the beginning, His intention was global. In Genesis, He declares that through Abraham’s descendants, all nations would be blessed. Israel was meant to be the channel through which God’s blessing would reach the entire world.
Even in the Old Testament, God was already working beyond Israel. Non-Israelites are seen worshiping Him, joining His people, and experiencing His grace. By the time we reach the New Testament, this plan becomes fully visible—God’s message is clearly extended to all nations, fulfilling the original promise.
Key Takeaways
- God’s Choice Was Based on His Will
Not on Israel’s greatness or merit. - Special Role, Not Greater Value
Israel was chosen for purpose, not superiority. - Global Plan from the Beginning
God intended to bless all nations. - Israel Was a Channel of Blessing
Not the final destination of God’s plan. - God Worked Beyond Israel Too
Gentiles were always part of His work. - Fulfillment Comes in the New Testament
Salvation is clearly extended to all people.
Transcript
[00:00:01 – 00:00:56] Hi, Mike. Um, first I want to say you’re you’re just excellent and I’ve learned so much from you and um just bless you and we appreciate that you um being on the air and um being such a good disciple. Thank you. Second of all, my question is I’m probably opening a can of worms. Um and you could probably talk about this for weeks, but my question isn’t so much of why did God pick the Jewish people to be his chosen people? Um because God is God and he can do whatever he wants to do and he will do
[00:00:28 – 00:01:20] whatever he wants to do. And you might not know that answer exactly. It might not be in the Bible anywhere. But then and then the Gentiles, why did he separate all of us if we’re all the same? Um I mean, was it to like show us that, you know, when the Israel, you know, when Jew all the Jewish people sinned and all of that that he made them, you know, become slaves to other countries and that type of thing? Was it to show us what we we shouldn’t be doing or you know I just want to pick your
[00:00:54 – 00:01:49] brain on that really. No, it’s a great question and does that make sense? Yeah. No, it to makes total sense. And let me ask you a question, Connie. Are you married? Yes. Okay. Um you and and and again, it’s not a perfect illustration, but you decided to pick this one dude, right, in your life and treat him different than every other dude, right? Every other guy out there is treated differently. You’re going to do things for him you’re not going to do for other people. You’re
[00:01:22 – 00:02:06] going to serve him. You’re going to love him. Going to care for him. You’re going to put his needs before. You’re going to do all kinds of things you’re going to do for other people. But if I asked you in a classroom, say we’re taking some humanities class or something, un is everyone right of equal worth? Or just go back to our constitution. Everyone, right, h have been endowed with the same unalienable rights before the creator. Is God given? You’d say, “Yeah.” So, I
[00:01:44 – 00:02:42] could introduce you to a man you’ve never met from India and Russia and Australia and line them up and say, “Are these men as important as the man that you’re married to?” And you’d say, “Well, they are as important, but they’re not as important to me cuz this is my husband.” So, in that sense, there is something about God doing in his his life kind of what we are all doing in our personal lives. And in Deuteronomy 7, the amazing thing about God’s choice is you and I went out to find a spouse
[00:02:13 – 00:03:05] is the best we can find, the best we could land, right? We tried to even stretch out of our league, you know, to find some some spouse and and I did and I assume you did. We got the best we could get. But when God is musing about his choice in Deuteronomy 7:7, he says, you know, I chose this nation not because you were more in number than the other peoples, right? I didn’t set my love on you because of that. Matter of fact, you were the fewest, right? Why did God set his love on you? Here’s what
[00:02:39 – 00:03:38] he says in Deuteronomy 7:8. It is because, right, the Lord loves you and he’s chose to keep an oath that he swore to his fathers. So, the the great thing about God in choosing Israel is at least we know it’s not even like our choosing of a person to specially love. We choose someone that we think is the best we can find and the best that’ll marry us, right? But God says, “I chose someone and they weren’t the best.” So he’s showing something even in his special work of loving the people of Israel and
[00:03:08 – 00:04:07] saying this even itself is a gracious choice. And when we go back in Genesis 12 and we say why uh does he pick one man to start a nation through the man of Abraham in in in Genesis 12 he says at the end of the decision to say you’re going to be my special man and your descendants will be my special people and I’m going to make a great nation out of you. And then he says this, “So that through your offspring, all the families of the earth will be blessed.” So here’s the thing. Unlike our marriages, the
[00:03:38 – 00:04:28] thing about God choosing Israel, he says, “The end goal is to specially love a group of people different than I love the Gentiles, but I’m going to love them so that every family, people from every part of the world will have my special love on them.” That is God’s plan. And like you said, and I would agree, Connie, God has he can do whatever he wants. He’s God. I’m not. You’re not. So, we can’t even tell him what we want him to do. He’s going to do what he’s
[00:04:03 – 00:04:53] going to do, and he’s right in what he does, and we just have to trust that. But I can see something that at least is copathetic with my feelings. And that is, don’t you want to love the Gentiles, the Italians, right, the Australians, New Zealanders like you love the Israelites? And and the answer is yes. And that was his goal from the beginning. I’m going to preach a sermon this weekend. And it’s not really a traditional um uh Christmas text, but I’m going to preach from Genesis chapter
[00:04:28 – 00:05:26] 3 and try and show how the coming of Christ was fulfilling God’s work in trying to crush the enemy’s work to get all of humanity back in a relationship with him. And that really was the first time we see it in the curse in Genesis 3:15. And I’m thinking to myself, really, that was his overarching plan from the beginning. And even before, even in the middle, let’s think about it. Abraham himself when he’s coming back from a battle and trying to get his nephew out of trouble. It says there in
[00:04:57 – 00:05:50] Genesis that he runs into a priest that has nothing to do with Israel. He’s a he’s a servant of God the most high. And I think to myself, even when God was choosing a special nation, it wasn’t like, hey, the rest of the world can go take a hike, you know? No, he’s he’s got he’s got people that Abraham is bowing down to and giving a tithe to and saying, “I’m going to worship God and I I recognize you as a king and a and a priest.” And I’m thinking, “Okay, God’s
[00:05:24 – 00:06:17] at work outside of Israel and always has been.” Something I think we miss, too, when we think about God’s special relationship with Israel is when he’s bringing them out of the promise or bringing them out of Egypt to take them to the promised land, the Bible continues to call this group in Exodus the mixed multitude. So there are not only Jews, right, but anybody who wanted to be a part of God’s of covenant people, right? They could join in. They we call them procelites, right, in our
[00:05:50 – 00:06:43] language, but they came to attach themselves to the God of Israel. And God says you’re going to treat them just fine. You you’re not going to exclude them, right? They’re going to have the the the grace of God, the benefits of God as a part of the children of Israel. So remember that even when God was exclusively well it wasn’t completely exclusive when it seems like he’s exclusively working through his chosen people right he’s also we got all these patterns we could scatterplot these
[00:06:17 – 00:07:21] people throughout the Bible that’s not an Israelite that’s not an Israelite right’s not an Israelite right think about that we have all of these others right all the work being done around Nebuchadnezzar the archeneemy of Israel is bowing down and praising God At one point it’s like, okay, God is inclusive even in what we see as his exclusive phase. Now we get to the New Testament times, which is a fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 and Genesis 12. And what happens? He’s now saying, “Go make disciples of
[00:06:49 – 00:07:49] all the nations, Jerusalem, Judea, and here’s one that should ring a bell, Samaria.” They the Jews hated the Samaritans, and yet go save the Samaritans and go to the ends of the earth. We can’t get to chapter 10 of of Acts until we got Romans. The Romans who crucified Christ, he becomes a critical conversion in the book of Acts. So yes, God has chosen his people and and yet that chosen group was to bless the whole world. It took a long time, but while he was doing it, he was setting his love on
[00:07:19 – 00:08:20] a lot of people that were Gentiles. So in that sense, we just got to say that was God’s big plan. And that would be my quick explanation of it. Connie, does that help in any way? Okay. Oh, yeah, it does. And like I said, um um I’m I’m glad that Israel is, you know, I mean, the only country, this small little country has made it for all this time when there’s so many, you know, Babylon and all these that um that aren’t even around any longer and Israel is. And it’s it’s because the you know,
[00:07:49 – 00:08:48] God has protected them and you know, so that’s great. And um uh so and you know, I’m saved. That’s all mostly what I care about anyway. It doesn’t matter that he didn’t pick the United States to be chosen, right? You know, it’s that um I know, you know, Jesus is my Lord and Savior. And I’m just very thankful and grateful that I have that. So, I was just kind of curious on that because he sees everything, right? He knows the beginning, the end, and the middle. And and so I was just curious on if he just
[00:08:19 – 00:09:22] started with them and then went on or what. Yeah. Well, here’s what I might suggest. I I mean that was a quick fiveminute answer but if you go to pastormike.com you can find a sermon if you just use the word exclusivity exclusivity uh I preach some messages maybe more than one that deal with p passages that deal with the exclusivity of God and I talk about the inclusive exclusive God. I mean, it seems contradictory, but there’s so much to the answer of what you brought up as a question, and it’s a great question, and
[00:08:51 – 00:09:16] I’m glad you asked it, Connie, and thanks for calling in. Go to pastormike.com, search for inclusive, exclusive, and I think you can get me talking for an hour about that very topic from very important passages of scripture.
