Whose Are You?

I just learned a new word from my friends at Bible Project: sᵊḡullâ. (Strongs #5459)

It’s not used often in the Scriptures — just eight times. Twice it refers to the personal treasure of a king (I Chron 29:3; Eccl 2:8), and six times it refers to the children of Israel (Ex 19:5; Deut 7:6; Deut 14:2; Deut 26:18; Ps 135:4; Mal 3:17).

The first time it’s used, the Israelites are camped out in front of Mount Sinai, their sixty-first day out of Egypt, and Moses is up talking to God. It may have been one of those sessions when Moses was hoping to grumble to God about the grumblers below. Who could blame him?

“What’s there to drink?”“What’s there to eat?”“Gross. Is there anything else?”

God isn’t about that today, though. He was about to deliver His A-number-one message to Israel. He told Moses to tell them this:

You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession”. (Exodus 19:4–5a, NIV)

His treasured possession. His sᵊḡullâ.

How many years had it been now? Moses had stood before this very mountain and listened to a voice from a burning bush say:

“I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.” (Exodus 3:12, NIV)

And here they were.

At the time of the bush, Moses had been a bit of a skeptic. Not that he doubted that God could do it, but he doubted that he could. He’d asked: Who am I? And God had responded: I AM WHO I AM. Who Moses was didn’t matter. What mattered was, who was his God?

Moses’ identity was changed at that bush; now the Israelites’ identity was about to be changed there, too. God was revealing who they really were. Not a bunch of dusty, sweaty slaves but His treasured possession, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation. His sᵊḡullâ.

By no means had they earned those titles as they stumbled through the wilderness. All they were was who God had chosen them to be. All they were was in relation to Him.

When God broke the news to Moses, He didn’t tell him only who they were but also what they would do.

Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ (Exodus 19:5b-6, NIV)

So Moses went down, told the people, and they said, “It’s a deal!” Then Moses went back up to get the details.

When the Lord finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the covenant law, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God. (Exodus 31:18, NIV)

If Moses had been expecting some post-inscribing fellowship up there on the mountain with God, it was cut short when God said, “Get down the mountain! Your people…

“What?!? Now they’re my people?!?!

“…whom you brought up out of Egypt…

“Whoa! Whoa! Wait a minute! This wasn’t my idea!”

…have become corrupt.”

“I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.” (Exodus 32:9–10, NIV)

But rather than an arm pump and a fist bump, rather than celebrating his liberation from an ungrateful bunch of whiners and the prospect of a great reputation, Moses presented God with a question: “Why?”

And he had a request: “Relent.”And he had a reason: “Remember.”

And God said okay.

So they all continued together through that dry and weary land where there was no water unless a stick and a stone were nearby. For forty years, they drew circles in the desert until the entire generation of the faithless had perished (Deut. 1:28–35). Now their kids were standing right there, on the edge of the promise, the land of the covenant, the land God said was theirs. Why? Because they had been such troopers? Because they had shown such excellence in the desert?

No.

Because they were His sᵊḡullâ.

Lest their parents hadn’t passed down the news, Moses was happy to: “For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.“(Deut 7:6, NIV).

God’s sᵊḡullâ. That’s twice.

While God was giving them some instructions that would definitely make them stand out:

“You have been set apart as holy to the Lord your God, and he has chosen you from all the nations of the earth to be his own special treasure.“ (Deut. 14:2, NIV)

His sᵊḡullâ. That’s three times.

When Moses was reminding the people that God doesn’t change His mind: “And the Lord has declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possession as he promised, and that you are to keep all his commands.“ (Deut. 26:18, NIV)

His sᵊḡullâ. There’s four.

David reminded them 300 years later: “Praise the Lord, for the Lord is good; sing praise to his name, for that is pleasant. For the Lord has chosen Jacob to be his own, Israel to be his treasured possession.“ (Psalm 135:3–4, NIV)

That’s five.

And 600 years after that, after the dividing of the kingdom, the Assyrian invasion, and the Babylonian captivity; when they had turned their backs on God, He had seemed to give up on them, and they had obviously forgotten who they were, through the prophet Malachi, God announced: “On the day when I act,” says the Lord Almighty, “they will be my treasured possession. I will spare them, just as a father has compassion and spares his son who serves him.” (Mal. 3:17)

That’s six. Six times God called them His sᵊḡullâ. Because Malachi was speaking to a covenant people — still God’s treasure because of His goodness; to be His treasure again because of His promise.

Then the voice of God went silent.

Five hundred years of silence, then a voice thundered from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And His Son went around doing good, healing and delivering, and drawing all kinds to Himself, inviting them into the covenant. And some said yes.

So now Peter, called to be a messenger of that great good news, was writing to a church trying to figure out how to follow their Messiah. Not only was there persecution outside, there was uncertainty on the inside. Jews and Gentiles learning to live in fellowship with each other, trying to find common ground in the workings of the covenant. Wondering who they were to God. Who they were to one another. Who they were in the world.

And Peter told them:

“You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.“ (I Peter 2:9, NIV)

God’s chosen. His nation. His treasured possession. All of them, Jew and Gentile alike. One for all and all for One. To show forth the praises of Him.

That would be a good place to end, but we haven’t yet looked at the other two times the word sᵊḡullâ is used.

When David was stockpiling money for the building of the temple, he reached into his treasury — not the treasury of the nation, but his own personal sᵊḡullâ — and pulled out his riches in devotion to God. But the preacher of Ecclesiastes found that when he amassed a sᵊḡullâ for himself, it was meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

So where’s your treasure? Who’s your treasure? Whose treasure are you?

By now it’s quite clear, but lest you forget:

You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own special treasure, that you may show forth the praises of Him who has called you out of the darkness and into His wonderful light.

You are His sᵊḡullâ.