It is strange how we can sometime ascribe to God faults that are found in ourselves, especially our prejudices. There were those Jews who believed that every Jew would be saved simply because he was a Jew, and that every Gentile would be lost because he was a Gentile. However, God is not biased against any one.
God loves and cares for all people. Notice the prayer of Solomon in I Kings 8. “Moreover concerning a stranger, that is not of thy people Israel, but cometh out of a far country for thy name's sake; (For they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy strong hand, and of thy stretched out arm;) when he shall come and pray toward this house; Hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for: that all people of the earth may know thy name, to fear thee, as do thy people Israel; and that they may know that this house, which I have builded, is called by thy name” (I Kings 8:41).
Our God is the God of all people and He loves all people. When Solomon offered up this prayer to God at the dedication of the temple, he spoke favorably of the stranger. The stranger is the foreigner, a Gentile, a people not accepted by the Jews. However, Solomon prays for the stranger who comes to Israel because he has learned of God and has come seeking God's help. Though God had a special covenant relationship with Israel, He loved all men.
Under the new covenant many things have changed, but one thing that remains constant is God's love for all mankind (John 3:16). Peter reminds us of that truth when he said, “Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him” (Acts 10:34, 35). Because of God's love for all people, all people matter to God. As Jerry has reminded us “You have never looked into the eyes of anyone who does not matter to God”.
God gave His only Son that all might have eternal life and He still desires that all people should be saved. “Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth” (I Tim. 2:4).
- Tim D. Shoemaker