“You did not choose me but I chose you” – John 15:16
As we hear in this Gospel reading, Jesus said, it was not you who chose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.
You have to admit that there is a huge difference between you choosing to follow Jesus and Jesus choosing you to follow him.
This divine love relationship between Jesus and you did not begin with you. It began in the heart of the Trinity with a voracious search for you and an invitation to the life of the Trinity, which ispure love.
The very first paragraph of the Catechism condenses this concept of being chosen so succinctly.
“God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself in a plan of sheer goodness, freely created man to make him share in his own blessed life. For this reason, at every time and in every place, God draws close to man. He calls man to seek him, to know him, to love him with all his strength. To accomplish this, when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son as Redeemer and Savior.In his Son and through him, he invites men to become in the Holy Spirit his adopted children and thus heirs of his blessed life” – Catechism of the Catholic Church 1
The only way you could become a disciple of a rabbi was to be chosen. And there was one phrase that all the rabbis employed to grant an invite, and that phrase was come follow me. Come after me. That is why Jesus said it was not you who chose me, but I who chose you.
Hearing communicates that you are wanted and desired, and it shows that you have value and a mission in life. Jesus doesn’t choose you with a word or a common phrase of his time. He chooses you with a love that is willing to lay down his life for you in order to call you a friend.
Settle your mind and look up to Jesus, catch His gaze and hear His words, “I choose you. Follow Me.”