What does many are called few are chosen mean?

Welcome to episode 246.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Spending time in the Word of God is the best way to spend time with God. Welcome to No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast, where we will encourage, inspire, and empower you to live your best life in Christ. Here's Greg.

Welcome to episode 246. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, I am going to start a new teaching, and the title is Many Are Called But Few Are Chosen. And you will find this scripture in Matthew 22:14. Jesus is talking to the crowd, but he's addressing the chief priests and Pharisees. And he's talking about God inviting all of his chosen people. And you can find this in Matthew 22:1, talking about the people that have been called. And the king sends out his servants, and none of the people that he had invited took him seriously. They made up excuses. "No, I've got to go tend to my business," and "I've got to try out these oxen," and all of this stuff. So they were making excuses, and then the servants came back and told the king Hey, we told everybody, but none of them are coming. Well, the king gets upset, and we'll pick it up in Matthew 22:8. Then he said to his servants, the wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Therefore, go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding. So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good, and the wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in, to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. So he said to him, 'Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?' And he was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.' And this story is going to be our backdrop for the next few lessons. We're going to use multiple scriptures, if you can imagine that. We're going to dig into the word maybe from an angle that you haven't really thought about before. But this chosen and called, I want you to concentrate on those two words. Many are called, but few are chosen. Now with that story in mind, I wanna take you to a very familiar verse, and it is in 3:16 of John. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Now I want you to think about many are called, but few are chosen. And I want you to hear God's heart. You gotta understand that God loves all of his kids. I don't care who you are out there. If you have not accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, God loves you. He sent his only Son. And he's calling. Many are called, but few are chosen. And this is where God uses man's free will. And this is why I say God is danger— he's a dangerous God. And he's such a loving and kind Father, but he gives you and I free will to do with our life as we choose. And that is so incredible if you think about the Creator of heaven and earth giving you and I free will over our own lives, and when he knows that if we choose the wrong direction, if we choose the wrong path, we will end up in hell for eternity. Now that is love, and that is freedom. I just want you to see how much God loves you. He wants you to choose the right path. He sent his own Son to die so that you had the opportunity to be saved. It is an incredible love story. God so much loves you that it is— it's hard to believe that God so loved the world. It's the good news. That's the gospel, and that's why Paul jumped up and down. That's why they stoned him. That's why they beat him. Back in the day when Paul was preaching this, this was blasphemy. He was saying things that people just did not agree with at all. In fact, they didn't agree with Jesus. They killed Jesus. I'm telling you, the religious folk will rise up and get all wrapped around the axle in a heartbeat when you start preaching the true grace and you start preaching the true gospel. When you say that is only God, there's one God and he had a son and that son's name was Jesus, and he died, and on the third day he rose again and became eternal, and he will forever be on the throne. This is the son of David. This is the promise: David's throne will be forever through eternity. Jesus is a direct descendant of King David. It is amazing how the Bible kind of comes together and how it all, it all just plays into one big love story. And I've told you multiple times that it's a love story with a war in the background with all of these sons of God, these demons, Lucifer, all of these fallen angels. They were all created as sons of God as well. Now these were God's kids also, but there's a difference between a son of God that is a spiritual being and a son of God that is a human. And the humans must walk by faith because most humans cannot see into the spirit realm. But a spiritual being, now they can see God. They've seen heaven. They've seen the spirit realm. They know what's going on. In the spiritual realm, and they chose to disobey God anyway. Now, when you and I disobey God and we start walking by our sight and not by faith, that's called sin. That's called missing the mark. That is what Jesus died for. He died for all of our mistakes. All sin, past, present, and future sin has been placed on Jesus, and it was nailed to the cross, and it was buried with him in the tomb. And when Jesus was resurrected, the sin and all the disease and everything stayed in the ground. And that is why we can walk in victory. That is why we can walk in health and healing. It is incredible. That is the grace of God. I'm telling you, you got to get a hold of this. That is a rabbit. I don't know who was supposed to hear that, but praise God you got to hear it. I'm not going to cut it out. But many are called and few are chosen. Everybody. Matthew 18:11, for the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost. And then you go down to 14, even so it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. He did not come to condemn the world, he came to save the world. And the way he saves the world is through his sacrificial death and resurrection. He died for all sin. All you have to do is declare Jesus was the Son of God and receive the price he paid on the cross for yourself. He did it for you. I'm telling you, he did it for me, but he did it for every one of his kids. He did it for you. I don't care who you are when you're listening. The only thing you have to do is humble yourself before God. God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourself and ask for forgiveness and accept what Jesus did for you, and you will be chosen. That is— it's as simple as that. Many are called, for whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. You are a whosoever. You are called. The only reason God would resist you is because of pride. As I read it, you are too proud to accept the free gift of salvation that God so freely gives. It is so simple that a child can understand it. Everyone can understand. When we stand before God, and when I stand before God, and he's going to say hopefully, "Well done," I'm certain that he's going to say, "Welcome." I am going to be welcomed into his kingdom. I'm still working on the "well done" part. The welcome, I am certain that my salvation is sure. I am going to be in heaven. If something happens to me tomorrow, do not be sorrowful, rejoice that I am standing before my Father in heaven. But I've still got a lot to do here. I'm not planning on going home anytime soon, but I just want to start this off, the thought many are called, but few are chosen. God is not sizing you up. He's not trying to wean you out. He's trying to open the door wide. But we're going to go to Matthew 7 to finish this up. I know I said I was going to finish up, but I just had this thought. Matthew 7:13: Enter by the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it. That is called and chosen. Many are called, few are chosen. I just need you to hear this because it's difficult. It's not so easy just to say a prayer and be saved. If you've ever said a prayer and didn't really mean it, you just said it because someone told you to say it, well, I'm not sure that you have the salvation that the Bible's talking about. But we're going to get into that in future episodes, but I just want to finish up real quick. I just looked up at the clock and I saw that I'm dragging this thing on. Let's pray. God, I thank you so much for your word. God, I thank you for sending your son Jesus. Thank you for coming for all of us. Holy Spirit, thank you for never leaving us nor forsaking us. And God, I want to pray for this person listening to this episode. I pray in Jesus' name that you would stir up into them a hunger for your word and a hunger to spend time with your Holy Spirit. Lord, we thank you. We love you. We ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you in the next episode.

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