1:21 “Therefore, of
these men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and
out among us, 22 beginning from the baptism of John to that day when He was
taken up from us, one of these must become a witness with us of His
resurrection.”
23 And they proposed
two: Joseph called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. 24 And they
prayed and said, “You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these
two You have chosen 25 to take part in this ministry and apostleship from which
Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place.” 26 And they
cast their lots, and the lot fell on Matthias. And he was numbered with the
eleven apostles.
This whole process is interesting. From a sizeable group of
men they chose 2. From those two it seemed like they wanted or expected Joseph
to be chosen. I say that because of the attention paid to his name. Names were
important and when they really wanted to highlight someone they paid special
attention to their name. This man to whom we have never been introduced before
was Joseph, but called Barsabas, whose surname was Justus. That's quite a
mouthful and a careful deliberate introduction. The other man was Matthias.
Almost seems like an afterthought.
The names associated with the first man are strong names.
Joseph of course is a strong Hebrew name. He was called Barsabas which means
either son of war or son of hosts. Again a very strong name. His surname Justus
simply means just and upright. That's quite a trilogy of names. Makes one
wonder why he was not just automatically chosen. He appears to be the
favourite.

For some reason in that room they were able to narrow the
candidates down to two and it appeared Barsabas would be the chosen one but
after prayer and casting lots it was Matthias who came out as the 12th
disciple. Matthias. It means Gift of God.
Turns out when we pray and seek God's will we don't choose
the "best person", we choose the right person. So next time you have to make an important decision use your
head and then use your knees. Make sure the choice you make is a gift from God
and not a Saul or a Judas Iscariot.
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