We are His Portion

My son, Judah, is three years old. He’s at the age where everything he hears comes out in what he says. We’ve tried to be careful about what gets put into his head so that we can avoid potential humiliation.

To that end, we have been careful about the music that we listen to when driving in our minivan (a Honda Odyssey, mind you, the manliest minivan around). If you were to ask Judah his favorite song, he would tell you “How He Loves,” a song made popular by the David Crowder Band. While it is a catchy song, there is one line in it that bothered me for a little while: “We are His [God’s] portion.”

“Wait a minute,” I thought, “God doesn’t need us. He is His own portion. He is enough for Himself.” I’m probably overly skeptical and critical of music, especially songs that contain theology within the lyrics. However, my skepticism and criticism of this particular line was proved wrong a few days ago when I came across Deuteronomy 32:9, which says, “For the LORD’s portion in His people; Jacob is the place of His inheritance.”

You would think that might have settled the issue right away. But again, my hyper-cynicism set in, and I found myself declaring, “Moses is talking about Israel in that passage. It doesn’t apply for us in the church age.” After all, a thorough examination of Eschatology will show that Israel and the church are not the same organization.

(If at this point, you are convinced that I over-think things and that my dogmatic mind must be a mess, you are exactly right). But the church is as much the people of God as Israel is. In other words, God indicates in Scripture that He has two programs (one for Israel and another for the church). But regardless of origin (Jew or Gentile), if one belongs to God he is part of the people of God.

This is made very clear in Galatians 3:26-29. “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

The letter of Ephesians also makes this very clear by showing that Jews and Gentiles “have access by one Spirit to the Father” (2:18). In the very next chapter, Paul teaches that Jews and Gentiles are members together of the same body in Christ (3:1-7). The point is that members of the church are as much the people of God as the congregation of Israel was in the Old Testament.

In fact, just as Galatians 3:29 calls those belonging to Christ “Abraham’s seed,” Jesus also referred to those who received Him as children of Abraham. In Luke 19, Jesus said that Zacchaeus became a Son of Abraham, not because of his ethnic background, but because he received salvation (Luke 19:9-10).

So the words of the song which I once questioned, I now loudly proclaim: “We are his portion and He is our prize, drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes.”