Title: The Slight Problem
Text: I Samuel 15:34-16:13
Thesis: The difference between one human being and another is the heart... that only God can see.
Introduction
In his book Blink, which is a book about thinking without thinking, Malcolm Gladwell told about the bias of those who judged classical musicians who auditioned for symphony orchestras. They believed their ears were unbiased until proven otherwise.
For the last thirty years prospective musicians have auditioned behind a screen which has resulted in many musicians being admitted to the orchestra who would previously have been rejected because of an unconscious bias with regard to appearance or gender.
At the time when Julie Landsman auditioned for the role of principal French horn at the Met in NYC, no women had been admitted to the brass section of the orchestra because everyone knew that women could not play brass as well as men. She played well and at the end of her piece she held the last high C for a very long time, just to leave no doubt in the minds of the judges.
The judges were impressed and amused and immediately declared her the winner. But when she stepped out from behind the curtain they gasped in surprise. It was not that she held the high C for so long or the fact that her sound was as macho as any man’s macho. It was because they knew her. She was a substitute player… it was not until they listened to her with their ears that they realized just how outstanding a musician she really was. (Malcolm Gladwell, Blink, Little Brown & Company, 2005, pp. 250-254; submitted by John Beukema, PreachingToday.com)
All those years they could have had this outstanding musician in their brass section, but everyone knows women cannot play brass as well as a man. The judges experienced both a bit of embarrassment and regret.
We often have regrets. So does God.
I. Even God has regrets about some people.
And the Lord was sorry he had ever made Saul King of Israel. I Samuel 15:35
The bible speaks of two instances in which God actually expressed regret over a decision he had made:
1. Before the flood in Genesis the bible says, “The Lord observed the extent of the people’s wickedness, and he saw that all their thoughts were consistently and totally evil. So the Lord was sorry [or grieved, NIV] he had ever made them. It broke his heart. And the Lord said, ‘I will completely wipe out the human race that I have created… “ Genesis 6:5-7
2. After Saul failed to obey God as the first King of Israel the Lord said to Samuel, “I am sorry [grieved, NIV] that I ever made Saul king for he has not been loyal to me and he again refused to obey me.” (I Samuel 15:1) Later Samuel confronted Saul and told him, “Since you have rejected the Lord’s command, the Lord has rejected you from being king of Israel.” Then a few verses later the bible again says, “The Lord was sorry [or grieved, NIV] he had ever made Saul king of Israel.” (I Samuel 16:35)
God did not create human beings for the purpose of failure. God did not set Saul up as King of Israel so he could fail. In fact Samuel told Saul that it was God’s intent to bless his reign saying, “Had you obeyed, the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever.” (I Samuel 13:13)
I know from my own experience as a person and a pastor that we can only regret a decision when the outcome is other than what we had hoped.
A passenger flying from Philadelphia to Seattle on US Airways convinced airline representatives that her pig was a “therapeutic companion pet” – like a see-eye dog and was permitted to sit with the pig in 1st Class. However eventually the pig became restless and began to wander about. One passenger said the pig kept rubbing his nose on people’s legs trying to get a handout or a back scratch. Other passengers described the pig as “enormous, brown, angry, and honking.”
When the plane landed in Seattle the pig panicked, running up and down through economy class squealing.” It was reported that passengers were standing in their seats, screaming.
It took four attendants to escort the pig from the airplane and to the terminal where the pig escaped squealing through the concourse.
Later, US Airways spokesman David Castelveter said, “We confirm that the pig traveled, and we can confirm that it will never happen again.” (Linda M. Gehrs, assistant editor of PreachingToday.com; from AP story, Chicago Sun Times, 10.30.00)
We have all done something that seemed right at the time but later said, “I regret that things have turned out this way. It was not what I intended or hoped would happen.”
People are not puppets. People have amazing capacity, by the grace of God, to be good and godly. And people have amazing capacity, apart from the guidance and grace of God, to be bad and ungodly. And God grieves when people he destined to be good and godly do evil.
One would think that God would be reluctant to bring up another king to replace Saul. God could have said, “I confirm that I selected a king a king to reign over Israel, and I can confirm that it will never happen again.
But despite our ability to disappoint God, He continues to choose and use people.
II. Despite our ability to disappoint God, God continues to choose and use people.
“You have mourned long enough for Saul. Now fill your horn with olive oil and go to Bethlehem. Find a man named Jesse who lives there, for I have selected one of his sons to be my new king.” I Samuel 16:1
You would think that God would have been a little gun-shy about selecting a second king. Up to that point humankind had not exactly been setting records for exemplary behavior. But God seems to be the eternal optimist.
It was God who said, “Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. Love is not irritable and keeps no record of when it has been wronged. It is never glad about injustices but rejoices when truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful and endures through every circumstance.” (I Corinthians 13:4-7)
When Thomas Edison and his staff were developing the incandescent light bulb, it took hundreds of hours to manufacture a single bulb. One day, after finishing a bulb, he handed it to a young errand boy and asked him to take it upstairs to the testing room. As the boy turned and started up the stairs, he stumbled and fell, and the bulb shattered on the steps. Instead of rebuking the boy, Edison reassured him and then turned to his staff and told them to start working on another bulb. When it was completed several days later, Edison walked over to the same boy, handed him the bulb, and said, “Please take this up to the testing room.” Imagine how that boy must have felt. He knew that he didn’t deserve to be trusted with this responsibility again. Yet, here it was, being offered to him again as though nothing had ever happened. (Ken Sande, The Peacemaker: A Biblical Guide to Resolving Personal Conflict, Baker Books, 1977; submitted by Van Morris to PreachingToday.com)
God has not given up on the human race. God is still entrusting his work to us and it is his hope that his work will be accomplished through us. We are as unlikely candidates for this great task as Edison’s errand boy and yet God chooses to use unlikely people.
I used the word “unlikely” because that is precisely what God does sometimes. We do not see people through the same lens that God sees them.
III. People generally judge people superficially.
Samuel took one look at Eliab and thought, “Surely this is the Lord’s anointed!” I Samuel 16:6
This verse is the verse that provided the fodder for my choice of a message title: A Slight Problem.
One of the definitions for the word “slight” is to treat or regard someone with disdain or indifference. When we slight someone we are disregarding or disrespectful or disparaging toward them.
It was a slight problem that James addressed in his letter when he charged the church with honoring the rich man who came into their gathering with the best seat in the house while relegating the poor man a seat in the corner on the floor. He said, “Doesn’t this discrimination show that you are guided by wrong motives?” He went on to say that loving your neighbor means you do not see rich or poor… you treat everyone the same. (James 2:1-9)
In our story Samuel, who had kept his ear tuned to the voice of God since he was a small boy in I Samuel 3, loses his perspective for a moment as he oversees what was to become a parade of the sons of Jesses to see just which one God had selected to be the new king of Israel.
The moment the oldest son stepped into the room Samuel took one look at the young man and said to himself, “Surely this is the Lord’s anointed!” Eliab must have been a tall, dark, and handsome young man.
He did not have the look of North Korea’s Kim Jong-il. He was not the rotund William Howard Taft, nicknamed “Tubby” for having gotten stuck in his bathtub on more than one occasion. He was not a wheel-chair bound FDR. He was not bespectacled Harry S. Truman. He had more the look of a JFK. Eliab was a Tom Selleck. He was boyishly handsome. Tall and broad shouldered. He was tanned and athletic. When he walked into the room, every eye turned admiringly toward him.
Centuries later, we Americans are as superficial and appearance conscious as Samuel ever hoped to be. In 2008 355,671 received breast augmentation surgery; 341,144 received liposuction; 195,104 received eyelid surgery; 152,434 had their noses reshaped; and 147,392 had a tummy tuck. (Michelle Healy and Sam Ward, “USA Today Snapshots: Top Cosmetic Surgeries in 2008,” www.usatoday.com, 4.24.09)
Dr. Katrina Fink, neurosurgeon and author of Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, wrote in her book of an incident that occurred in her final year of residency. She wrote of how her years of training had left her a bit jaded to the neurological tragedies she saw day after day. She said she walked into an examination room and noted the patient: skinny, special wheel chair, arms contracted, head support, and mouth hung open. It was clear that she was not going to get any information from him so she turned to speak with his parents.
As she began to write down the history her senior mentor entered, introduced himself, and surveyed the room before taking a seat on the exam table. He sat quietly for several very uncomfortable seconds and then he looked the young patient in the eye and asked, “So, when did your graduate from high school?” She said the young man’s face lit up like she had no idea it could.
Her mentor had taken the time to notice that the patient was wearing a large high-school class ring, so large that it looked silly on his bony finger. His body, far more than his mind, had borne the brunt of his cerebral palsy. He was a proud, beaming high-school graduate, who used a special computer to help him communicate. (Katrina Firlik, Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Random House, 2007, pp. 138-139; submitted by Hugh Poland, PreachingToday.com)
God’s immediate response to Samuel when he immediately gave the handsome Eliab a thumbs up was to remind him of how God thinks and see people.
God is more concerned about character than appearance.
IV. God looks at a person’s heart.
“Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The Lord doesn’t make decisions the way you do! People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at a person’s thoughts and intentions.” I Samuel 16:7
Of course, we know the story. Samuel sat through a parade of seven of Jesse’s sons. Despite what appeared to be apparent qualifications to be king, God quietly told Samuel that the king was not among these sons. So Samuel asked, “Are these all the sons you have?” Jesse replied, “Well, there is the youngest. He is out in the fields watching the sheep.” So Samuel told Jesse to send for him.
Carl and Mary Jo Harder invited Bonnie and me to celebrate my birthday at Mt. Vernon Country Club. It was a Friday night sea food buffet. It was not your typical buffet… this buffet had shrimp, caviar, smoked salmon, mahi mahi, orange roughy, king crab legs, and a bunch of other deliciously prepared and presented foods.
The entrées were presented in a long line of pans with the coveted crab legs at the end. When I neared the end and was passing over a couple pans in anticipation of collecting a few crab legs, I distinctly heard the orange roughy and mahi mahi asking, “What am I, chopped liver?”
The phrase, “What am I, chopped liver?” is a Jewish-American saying. Those who know about liverwurst or liver sausage know that it is not pretty and most definitely is an acquired taste. It is never the main course… it is more of a side dish. It is something easily passed over in anticipation of a leg of lamb. So when someone asks, “What am I, chopped liver?” he really feels overlooked and under-valued.
David was not exactly chopped liver. The bible says he was ruddy and handsome, with pleasant eyes. And the Lord said to Samuel, “This is the one; anoint him.” (I Samuel 16:12
But it was never about David’s ruddy complexion or his handsomeness or even his pleasant eyes. It was about his heart. In I Samuel 13:14 it says the Lord sought out in David, a man after his own heart. David had a heart for God.
When you go to someone’s house they will likely invite you into the front room. This room has carpet and curtains and is furnished for receiving guests. It is not the everyday room of the house… it is where you sit on the edge of your seat, sip coffee or tea, and engage in polite conversation.
When you leave the family will likely abandon this room and retreat to the family room. The family room is where people live. The pretenses of the front room are abandoned in the family room. The family room is where people let down their guard and become who they really are at heart.
What the bible is saying is that people have a public face that may include an expressed spirituality. But people also have a private face and the private face is the expression of who and what we really are down deep inside.
I cannot adequately explain what it means to have a heart for God other than “down deep inside” David must have loved God with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength. At the very core of David’s being was devotion to God. He thought about God, he talked to God, he noticed God’s activity all around every day as he watched the sheep in the fields. He wanted to know God’s Word and God’s will and he wanted to obey God in all he thought, said, and did.
It may be said, the difference between one human being and another, as God sees us… is the heart that only God can see.
I imagine Eliab and all of David’s brothers wondered, “Why not me? Why was I not chosen? What made David so special?” And the answer was and is today, “It’s the heart that matters to God.”
Conclusion:
The challenge before us today has two edges.
God does not want us to have a “slight problem” rooted in outward appearances.
1. God wants us to see people the way he seems them. God wants us to place value on the heart for God.
2. God wants us to do the work necessary so that what people see in us is a reflection of who and what we are down deep inside… God wants us to value having a heart for God.
