Reading this morning in I Peter I stumbled in the pre-dawn dark across this description of God’s people: “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession.”
I’m familiar with the first three—people, priests, nation—but the third shook me awake.
I am, we are, God’s special possession.
London has a special possession. She has a few—a parrot, a duck, a battered baby doll.
London carries these toys everywhere. She took the duck to the beach and ran with him in the surf. She buried him in sand and swam with him in the sea. He smells like salt. She takes her baby to the YMCA and to dinner and to play in the backyard. She asked me to sew up baby’s leg when the stuffing came out and she dresses baby in her very own Easter dress from years ago. The parrot goes to school. London reads it books. Parrot is smart.
The parrot, the duck and the baby are her companions, her loves, her children, her treasures. She says, “Mom, they’re special to me.”
Just the thought of being God’s special possession, of being his duck or baby doll, being picked up and carried into the sunshine, being held in the sea, being cradled and told a story, being the thing he doesn’t ever forget, the thought of that ties my tongue. I have no words for a thing as beautiful as that.