The news this morning is about the 2020 census, especially how it will change representation in the House of Representatives. Here in Illinois, we will lose one House seat. Other states will also lose one seat: Ohio, Michigan, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, and California. Those seats are going south or west where, interestingly, states gaining tend Republican and have lower taxes. All the reporting led me to this conclusion: I don’t matter. You don’t either. You are simply one number in the monstrous, impersonal scheme of things.
But an effort of the will, let’s call it faith, says, “No, I am not an inconsequential number. God knows me, me, “just as I am.” About all His people, He says, “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name” (Isaiah 43:1). And that comes down to you and me individually. “Nathaniel said to him (Jesus), ‘How do you know me?’ Jesus answered him, ‘Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you’” (John 1:48). “The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name” (John 10:3). “The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; he knows those who take refuge in him” (Nahum 1:7).
This comfort takes some effort on our part, further growing in our life of faith. God gives this maturation through His Word, but the impersonal nature of this world doesn’t hurt either. Like a child needing a hug, the stuff of this world makes Jesus' invitation so welcome, “Come unto me” (Matthew 11:28). “I know my own; My own know Me. / You, not the world, My face shall see. / My peace I leave with you. Amen.” (Lutheran Service Book, 645:5)
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