I came across this poem. I was shocked, confused, bewildered as I entered heaven's door. Not by the beauty of it all, nor the lights or its decor, but it was the folks in heaven who made me sputter and gasp the thieves, the liars, the sinners, the murderers, and the trash there stood. The kid from seventh grade who swiped my lunch money twice.
Next to him was my old neighbor who never said anything Nice. Herb who I always thought was rotting away in hell, was sitting pretty on Cloud nine looking incredibly well. I nudged Jesus. What's the deal? I would love to hear your take. How do all these sinners get up here? There must be some mistake. And why is everyone so quiet, so somber.
Give me a clue. Hush, Child Christ said. They're all in shock. No one thought they'd be seeing you.
And that leads very nicely into that Old Testament reading from First Samuel and the subject of judging people. Israel has just lost its king. He was Saul, the first king of Israel. Now dust off your childhood memories of storybooks, featuring knights and princesses, dragons and witches. And you'll remember what kings are like, tall, good looking, intelligent, charismatic, and brilliant in all their ways.
And that pretty much summed up Saul, so you'd think he'd be a good monarch. And if intelligence were more important than wisdom, if accomplishment were more important than humility, if achievement were more important than integrity, and if charisma were more important than character, then yes, king Saul would've been a roaring success, but they aren't, and he wasn't.
Saul turned out to be a control freak, insisting that he performed the duties of the priests and not just those of the sovereign. He was prone to violent fits of rage that sometimes ended in him throwing spears at people. He was driven by a pathological desire to hunt down and destroy anyone who made him feel insecure.
Saul's final act of disobedience to God occurred when he visited a medium to consult a dead prophet. As our reading opens, Saul has rejected God and God has rejected Saul. So the search for a new king is underway, and God has given Samuel the task of finding and anointing. Saul's successor. And God sends Samuel to a little town called Bethlehem and to a man named Jesse.
Now we know all about Bethlehem. It's really, really famous. It's where Jesus was born, but this was 1000 years before that, and Bethlehem was not famous for anything. It was a sleepy village where nothing happened and no one famous had ever visited. So for God to send Samuel there rather than to the lofty power filled streets of Jerusalem or some other big city was odd.
Isn't it wonderful how, uh, this Bible reading falls on the same day as college basketball selection Sunday. Uh, we are waiting to see how our teams will be seeded and who our opponents will be. So God called Samuel to his own kind of March madness. The scene is set for a wonderful dramatic coronation.
Samuel arrives in Bethlehem, goes to Jesse's home as God instructed and is introduced to Jesse's oldest son, Elia. He is tall, strong strapping, and Samuel thinks well this must be him. This is the new king of Israel. He is every inch a monarch, a majestic figure. Plus he's the eldest, so he must be king. And Samuel is just about to clear his throat and make this proclamation.
When God whispers in his ear, don't consider his appearance or his height for I have rejected him, for the Lord does not see as mortals see, they look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. This really is March Madness. So Jesse calls his next son a ada, but Samuel knows that he isn't God's choice either.
Then the next one in line Shamar. But again, Samuel's just not feeling it. And on and on they go with this beauty contest until seven of Jesse's sons had stood in front of Samuel and had all been told that they were not God's choice. And then Samuel asks, Jesse, is that it? Don't you have any more sons?
And Jesse shrugs his shoulders and says, no, well, not unless you count that useless kid looking after the sheep, but believe me, you don't wanna waste your time on him. But Samuel says he needs to see David. And so they call for him, and then he comes a nice lad, but obviously not royal material. But when Samuel sees him, God says, yes, that's him.
Anoint him King of Israel, curious selection. But we know that David became the greatest king of Israel there ever was because. The Lord does not see as mortal. See, they look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. God's march madness is inside out and upside down. Now it's hard to believe, but back in Bible times, people judged each other based on their appearance.
I know it's almost impossible to imagine, isn't it? Living in a culture where a person's worth is measured by how they look. I'm so glad we've evolved since Bible times.
Of course, it's one of our culture's biggest sins, and I think it's getting bigger. We are obsessed with how we appear. We are either damning other people's looks, Orly envying them. Image is everything. A lot of people make a lot of money by telling us that we are not acceptable the way we are. And our frail human natures are quick to agree with them.
We make snap decisions about someone's character based on external things. Now, clearly this is true with the sins of racism, antisemitism, and Islamophobia, and we rightly condemn those things when we see them in ourselves and in others. But speaking now only for me, my prejudices usually take a more subtle form than those gross sins.
I can make a judgment about a person's character based on whether they have a job, and if so, what it is, we can do it with accents and dialects.
really the British are, are brilliant, uh, at doing this. When I hear a British accent, I feel the need to locate them on my mental map of the uk. Often I can name the county that they are from and then I will assassinate their character based on the stereotypes of that counting.
I do it too with the vehicles. People drive and people do it to me. So I just know that when people see me in my all electric Chevy Bolt, they think I'm a tree hugging, cappuccino, suing, patchouli, smelling, bleeding, heart liberal. But actually, I'm just a guy who doesn't like spending money at gas stations.
I judge people according to their age, their clothes, their standard of education, their hair, their hobbies, even the dog they own can lead me to judge their character. Ugh, he has a Jack Russell, so shallow.
Let's get back to selection Sunday in Bethlehem. What was it that God saw in David at the start of that match March Madness character. Nothing external, nothing flashy, nothing shiny. Just character, A love for God, a gentle spirit, a courageous heart, a humble approach to the world. That is where greatness lies.
He went on to show those things in his life as a poet and a sovereign character. Not personality or achievements is what God looks at, and character is what will make us. It is also what will kill us if we lack it.
The Scots have a hero. Uh oh. I'm prejudiced about them as well, actually.
The stuff of legends, he is the guardian of the highlands, vanquisher of Kings, defender of the Crown. Uh, not quite the mother of dragons, but you get my drift. Even today, some 316 years later, Misty, I Scots will raise a wee whiskey to his noble memory and pronounce the little gentleman in black velvet.
This pint sized assassin pounced in London in 1702. The king struck down was William iii, who had seized the English and Scottish Thrones 13 years earlier by overthrowing Scotland's James ii and now in Kensington Palace, William Lies dying, the victim of an insurgency that was as unforeseen as it was brutal.
There he languishes a living and dying testimony to the truth that many mighty men and women have tragically discovered. Your downfall is caused by small enemies. Now, if you look at William II's Wikipedia page, it will tell you that he died of pneumonia, which he did, pneumonia that he caught while recovering from a broken collarbone, which it was.
A broken collarbone that was sustained when he fell from his horse, which he did a fall that occurred when his horse tripped on a mole hill. The King of England and usurper of the Scottish throne was slain by a mole. The little gentleman in black velvet. The toast of patriotic Scots and a reminder that what we see can scare us, but what we can't can kill us.
And so we don't find our security and our self-esteem in our wealth, our power, our looks, our dazzling displays of glory. We find it in this ancient truth. God made you and Christ died for you. Yes, you and I are not perfect far from it. Sure. We make a mess of things from time to time. We don't live according to the potential God gave us, but neither did David and his future moral failures shocking and appalling.
Though they were, did not hide the character that was visible to God on that selection Sunday. So we can afford to feel good about ourselves because God loves us and we are his children. That is where our true identity lies. A good lentil practice might be this. You're gonna love this. To spend as much time cultivating our character as we do our external appearance.
How does that sound as a challenge for the last three weeks of Lent to spend as much time and money making ourselves inwardly beautiful as we spend on our outward looks. If you spend half an hour a day making the most of your physical appearance, then spend half an hour a day also in prayer and Bible study.
'cause that's how God makes us beautiful on the inside. And then let's allow that to shape the way we see others. Let's do like God, let's look beyond the outward appearance and glimpse the hearts of those we encounter to all men.