God’s Heart – 1 Samuel 16: 1-13

All right, settle down, settle down. Good morning, everyone. When you're an elder candidate, one of the things you need to be able to do if you're going to be an elder is you need to be able to come and teach and preach the Word. And so a few months ago, I was given my first opportunity to do that. And the elders actually have a really low bar that you have to clear.

And that low bar is you have to use the correct name of the church that you're in. And if you were there last time, you know, that was a low bar that I couldn't clear. And so they're making me do it again. We're continuing on in 1 Samuel this morning. And we're going to be in chapter 16, reading the first half of the chapter, verses 1 through 13.

If you have a white and blue Bible, that page number is 154. If you have an all blue Bible on the seat, it's 136. If there's a third type of Bible, I can no longer help you.

Let's go ahead and open God's Word and read it.

The Lord said to Samuel, how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse, the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons. And Samuel said, how can I go? If Saul hears it, he will kill me.

And the Lord said, take a heifer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. And invite Jesse to the sacrifice, and I will show you what you shall do, and you shall anoint for me him whom I declare to you. Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling and said, do you come peaceably? And he said, peaceably, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord.

Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. And he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, surely the Lord's anointed is before him. But the Lord said to Samuel, do not look on his appearance or on his height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees.

Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel. And he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one. Then Jesse made Shammah pass by, and he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one. And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel.

And. And Samuel said to Jesse, the Lord has not chosen these. Then Samuel said to Jesse, are all your sons here? And he said, there remains yet the youngest. But behold, he is keeping the sheep.

And Samuel said to Jesse, send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes here. And he sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said, arise, anoint him, for this is he. Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers.

And the spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for this beautiful morning that you have gathered us all here together. Lord, we pray for your spirit to descend. That your word, Lord, would ring forth. Father, I pray that long after my words are quickly forgotten that your word would be remembered. I pray, Lord, that the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts would be acceptable in your presence.

Amen.

So quickly let's look at the context of what we've been studying in chapter 16 of 1 Samuel. And in chapter 16 we see really God's part two from chapter eight. Looking back at chapter eight, the prophet had, or, excuse me, the people had demanded a king. They had not waited on the Lord for his king in his timing, but insisted Samuel anoint a king so that they could be like all the other nations. Samuel had informed the elders of God's mind on the matter.

Starting in verse 11 of chapter 8, he said, these will be the ways of the king who will reign over you. He will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots and. And he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of 50s and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest and to make him implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants.

He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. Servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys and put them to his work. He will take a tenth of your flocks and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king whom you have chosen for yourself.

But the Lord will not answer you in that day. God is very specific about how bad it was going to go. But the Israelites remained calloused, and God gave them what they wanted. In chapter nine, Saul is chosen to be king. Samuel made his farewell address in chapter 12 after renewing Saul's kingship.

But Saul made an unlawful sacrifice. And Samuel told him in chapter 13, you have done foolishly. You have not kept the commandment of Yahweh, your God, which he commanded you. For now the Lord would have established your kingdom on Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue.

The Lord has sought for himself a man after his own heart, and the Lord has appointed him to be prince over his people because you have not kept the that which God commanded you. In chapter 14, Saul made a rash oath battling the Philistines. He made a rash oath that put his son Jonathan at risk of death. In chapter 15, Samuel told Saul, now go and strike Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have and don't spare them. Saul defeated Amalek but spared Agag and the best of the livestock.

Saul did this not out of mercy, but out of pride and selfishness. The Lord responded by telling Samuel, I regret that I have made Saul king. Saul pled for pardon, but Samuel said, the Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours who is better than you. Samuel, as an example of the cost of sin and disobedience, cut Agag to pieces before the Lord in Gilgal. And God grieved that he had made Saul king over Israel.

And this brings us to where we start this morning in chapter 16. The structure I'm going to use to go through the first half of chapter 16 breaks down into four pieces. First, we're going to look at verses one through three, which is looking at Samuel and God and two different points of view. Verses four and five are going to show us that Samuel obeys. Verses six through ten looks at two ways of seeing.

We have God's view and we have man's view. And then 11 through 13, we see the one, the God.

Starting in verse one through three, the Lord said to Samuel, how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse, the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons. And Samuel said, how can I go? If Saul hears it, he will kill me.

And the Lord said, take a heifer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord and invite Jesse to the sacrifice, and I will show you what you shall do, and you shall anoint for me him who I declare to you.

Just as we reviewed in chapter 15 ended with Samuel giving one last rebuke to Saul, administering God's divine judgment, both in actuality to Agag, but also as a symbol of the ultimate cost of sin. And as we open chapter 16, Samuel has returned home to Ramah. Saul returned to Gibeah. Never would the two see each other again. After some unknown time had passed, Samuel hears from the Lord again.

Verse one starts, the Lord said to Samuel, how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Samuel had known all the way since chapter eight that this was not going to end well. He knew that Saul was the people's king, not God's king. God had told Samuel how it would end and that he would turn his back on the people's anointed. Still, even with that knowledge, Samuel grieved.

The first 15 chapters of 1 Samuel are interwoven with Samuel's sensitivity and love for God, but also for God's people.

Samuel loved the people so much that he even loved Saul, this man who was rejected by God from the start, who was always on a collision course. Samuel still cared for him deeply. We see in chapter 13 when faced with Saul's failure at Gilgal, Samuel cried, you have done foolishly. In chapter 15, when the Lord told Samuel of Saul's more dramatic failure with the Amalekites, the text says Samuel was angry and he cried to the Lord all night. Now Samuel is grieved over Saul's latest actions and God's ultimate rejection.

Samuel felt the weight of calamity to which he was complicit, even though God gave him the roadmap. In chapter eight, even though he knew Saul wasn't God's king, I think it's safe to assume that he had developed an affection for Saul. And as Saul failed, as he disobeyed God's commands, it greatly affected Samuel.

Australian Old Testament theologian John Woodhouse, and get used to that name this morning, makes the following comment in this Samuel was not unlike Jeremiah, who because of the word of the Lord, could not sit in the company of revelers or rejoice, but felt unceasing pain. Something like Samuel's agony would be experienced both by Jesus in Matthew 23 and the apostle Paul in Romans 9 and Acts 20. All of these men of God grieved because of the consequences of sin, particularly on the people of God. Samuel knew and felt the gravity and weight of the consequences of sin. My first question is, do we?

Do we grieve over the sins of Madison? Has it ever brought us to tears? Do we? Better yet, has it ever brought us to prayer? Have we resolved to fight sin in our own lives so when we are out in the world, those around us would not see us, but would see what one Peter says, the hope that is within us?

Jonathan Edwards knew of the gravity of sin. He was determined to live his life for Christ, so much so that he created 70 resolutions for himself that he would read every week. He said the following Being sensible that I am unable to do anything without God's help, I do humbly entreat him by his grace to enable me to keep these resolutions so far as they are agreeable to his will, for Christ's sake. John Piper's Desiring God website took these 70 resolutions and categorized them topically, with which, if you want to read them, I found that very helpful. Although I have to say one thing, that if you go to the Desiring God website, it has the article and it says the article is written by Jonathan Edwards and then below that it says guest contributor, which I find kind of hilarious and gave me an idea that I think I'm going to start a blog where I just copy portions of Lewis, Chesterton, Tolkien, Dante, Shakespeare, and they're all going to be guest contributors to my blog.

But anyways, I want to read a few of Edwards resolutions to engage, to grieve, and to fight the sin in his life. Number four. Resolved never to do any manner of thing, whether in soul or body, less or more, but what tends to the glory of God. 23. Resolved frequently to take some deliberate action, which seems most unlikely to be done for the glory of God, and trace it back to the original intention, designs, and ends of it and if I find it not to be for God's glory, to repute it as a breach of the fourth resolution.

8. Resolved to act in all respects, both speaking and doing, as if nobody had been so vile as I as if I had committed the same sins, or had the same infirmities or failings as others, and that I will let the knowledge of their failings promote nothing but shame in myself, and prove only an occasion of my confessing my own sins misery to God. 24. Resolved Whenever I do any conspicuously evil action, to trace it back until I come to the original cause, and then both carefully endeavor to do so no more, and to fight and pray with all my might against the origin of it.

Number 37 resolved to inquire every night as I'm going to bed, wherein I have been negligent what sin I have committed, and wherein I have denied myself. Also at the end of every week, month, and year. 68 Resolved to confess frankly to myself all that which I find in myself either infirmity of sin, and if it what concerns religion also to confess the whole case to God, and implore to needed help. 56 Resolved never to give over nor in the least slacken my fight with my corruptions, however unsuccessful I may be. Never to give over, nor in the least slacken my fight with my corruptions, however unsuccessful I may be, take sin seriously.

The burden and understanding of our sin is what makes the cross so glorious.

In the cross of Christ, the great expositor John Stott says it this way. The essence of sin is we human beings being substituting ourselves for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for us. We put ourselves where only God deserves to be. God puts himself where we deserve to be.

And that's the first half of verse one. I'm going to speed it up a little bit, I promise. Move on. Second half of verse one. God says, fill your horn with oil and go.

I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons. Bethlehem was a town about 11 miles straight south of Ramah. There's no reference that Samuel knew Jesse and his family, but Jesse would almost certainly have known who Samuel Samuel was. God says to Samuel to take his horn of oil, dust it off the shelf, and go and prepare to anoint his king. Because in Bethlehem the next chapter of God's great story was about to unfold.

Woodhouse says that the literal translation here is I have seen among his sons for myself a king. He says the literal translation is important because God sees in a particular way, and his scene is the key theme of the chapter. God has his own point of view. Important also is God's wording that I have provided for myself a king. In chapter eight, God was very careful to call Saul you your king, whom you have chosen for yourself.

This time it was God's king that was to be anointed. Verse 2. And Samuel said, How can I go? If Saul hears it, he will kill me. And the Lord said, take a heifer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord and invite Jesse to the sacrifice and I will show you what you should shall do, and you shall anoint for me him whom I declare to you.

Samuel's a little reluctant to get involved with the anointing of another king. And not only that, he is understandably worried about the trip to Bethlehem. Why? Well, if you look at an ancient map, Ramah again is about 11 miles straight north of Bethlehem. And in Israel at the time, there were two cities that you had to pass through in order to go from Ramah to Bethlehem.

The second city just north of Bethlehem was Jerusalem. No problem there. But there was one other city just north of Jerusalem, just south of Ramah that he would have to pass through. That city's a problem. The city was Gibeah.

Why was that a problem? Who's in Gibeah? Saul. And so Samuel has kind of gamed this out in his mind and you can just kind of see it, he and his entourage entering the city or even being around it would be major news. The captain of the guard, certainly probably loyal to Saul, would immediately want to know the purpose of Samuel's passing through.

The captain with perhaps a bit of anxiety coming up to Samuel saying something like, great prophet Samuel, we are blessed by your visit. Can we let King Saul know that you'll be seeing him? Samuel would respond, no, that's not the reason that I'm passing through. Then the captain of the guard maybe would ask, oh, well then, for what reason are you passing through?

Now what does he say?

That's an issue. So like in so much of Scripture, in so much of life, God provides. He says, take a heifer with you and say, I am going to sacrifice to the Lord. He is going to Bethlehem to sacrifice. Make a sacrifice to the Lord and maybe one other small thing.

Verses 4 and 5. Samuel obeys. Verse 4 says, Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling and said, do you come peaceably? And he said, peaceably, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord.

Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. And he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. Samuel did as he had always done, what Saul had failed to do. He obeyed. Samuel always obeyed.

Even when he didn't understand, even when it was hard, he obeyed. Samuel is such an example of obedience to us in the way to Glory. One of my all time favorite books, C.S. Lewis, says this obedience is the road to freedom, Humility, the road to pleasure, unity, the road to personality. Freedom is only possible through submission of our wills to God's will, insisting on our own way like the elders in Chapter 8, like Saul in Chapters 13, 14 and 15, or only leads to bondage.

This is exactly what Paul told the Galatian church in Galatians 5. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Samuel made the trip from Ramah through Gibeah and Jerusalem to Bethlehem. Once he arrived in Bethlehem, the elders nervously came to greet him. In Samuel's last public appearance that the Bible records he had condemned Saul, the feud probably well known by now, and had hacked a guy to pieces with a sword. This news had spread throughout the kingdom, no doubt, and the elders were understandably nervous at his presence. Would his visit put them at odds with Saul?

Was Samuel there to administer God's justice? So they anxiously asked, do you come peaceably? And he said, peaceably. Samuel assured the elders that he had no hostile intentions towards them and asked that they prepare for a sacrifice. Samuel obeyed God's instructions, invites Jesse and his sons to participate in the ceremony.

The scene is set for the next chapter of God's great story, and it involves two ways of seeing. Verses 6 through 10 we see these two ways of seeing. We see God's views and we see man's view starting verse six. When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, surely the Lord's anointed is before him. But the Lord said to Samuel, do not look on his appearance, nor on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him.

For the Lord sees not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel, and he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one. Then Jesse made Shammah pass by, and he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one. And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel.

And Samuel said to Jesse, the Lord has not chosen these.

Jesse had come with his sons. Samuel sizes them up, and in Samuel's eyes the oldest jumps out of him. Eliab was imposing, he was tall, good looking, the look of a king. Samuel looked on Eliab and said, surely the Lord's anointed was before him. Even godly Samuel falls into the trap of his own understanding.

Samuel saw a kingly figure. Surely this is the kind of man that God would anoint. However, we already had Saul, who checked all the boxes the world looked for in a king, 1 Samuel 9, 2 says, and he had a son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he from his shoulders Upward. He was taller than any of the people.

From Samuel's perspective, he saw a specimen in Eliab, a man who could take the crown from Saul and lead Israel onward. God, however, had other ideas. Verse 7. But the Lord said to Samuel, do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees.

Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. Woodhouse says God has a point of view, and his point of view is different from the human point of view. If we take the text as it is literally translated here, it tells us that God is not limited as humans are, and his point of view is final. He is not deceived by outward appearances. He sees a person's heart, he sees a person completely.

We, as fallen humans, have very limited knowledge, and therefore none of us is very life skilled. We only can see with our eyes. Back in chapter eight, I used the comparison of our knowledge to the Widener Library at Harvard with three and a half million books, the Bodleian Library at Oxford with 130 miles of shelf space. We make judgments all the time and we know so little. The ancients saw the problem with this gulf in knowledge, which is why they had so many words.

In Greek for knowledge, you have the word oida, it meant head knowledge. You have the word ginosko. It meant experiential knowledge. You had the word episteme. It meant skill.

But it is the word that's been used to talk about that realm in philosophy called epistemology, the study of knowledge. How do we know? Can we know? Do we know? And how do we know we know?

You have the word Sophia, which means wisdom, but then you have this word epigonosco, and it's the word that talks about the most intimate levels of knowledge you can have. So intimate is it. It's sometimes used to say that a man knew his wife, but it means so much more than that. It means that you know someone completely. We have limited knowledge.

God has unlimited knowledge, complete knowledge, epigonosco knowledge. These are two competing points of view. And if God has a point of view, it is not one view among many. His point of view is all encompassing, with absolute finality.

So God can penetrate the heart and can see our character like no one else. But now we get to the depth of verse seven, the most pivotal verse in this chapter, and I'm going to lean on Woodhouse here, because verse seven is saying way more than God looks on the outside and we look on the inside. Or, excuse me, God looks on the inside and we look on the outside. The verse translated more literally the last sentence of verse seven goes like this. For the Lord sees not as man sees, for man sees according to the eyes, but the Lord sees according to his heart.

Did you catch that? God sees according to his heart. God sees according to God's heart. Alistair Begg drives this point home. God views things from the perspective of his eternal counsel and will, from the eternal perspective of his purpose from all eternity.

So he is not looking to see if this person meets all the qualifications necessary for being put in this position, because nobody meets all the qualifications necessary for the position. In chapter 13, verse 14, when Samuel says to Saul, but now your kingdom will not continue, the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart. The preposition after is the same as according to. So the same thing could be said. The Lord is looking for a man according to his heart, God's heart.

So the picture is not a man who is a particularly good man who has a lot of God in his heart. It is rather a picture of God who has a man in his heart, God's heart, the man of God's own choosing. Woodhouse says this understanding of verse seven is very important. In fact, in his opinion, it's the key to understanding the whole of 1 and 2 Samuel. More than that, it's really the key to understanding life, the universe, everything.

These vital statements are about God's gracious and sovereign purposes, not the quality inside of a man. Look at King David's own words in 2 Samuel 7. Notice what David says about what God has done for him. Because of your promise and according to your own heart, you have brought about all this greatness to make your servant know. Know it.

What made David so very different than Saul in God's eyes? David had a place in God's heart for God's purposes. Saul did not.

In his collected letters, C.S. Lewis says the following I could well believe that it is God's intention, since we have refused milder remedies, to compel us to unity by persecution, even in hardship. Satan is without doubt nothing else than a hammer in the hand of a benevolent and severe God. For all, either willingly or unwillingly, do the will of God, Judas and Satan, or Saul as tools or instruments, John and Peter or David as sons.

It should make a great deal of difference to us whether we are mere tools and instruments, or daughters and sons.

Back to verses 8 through 10. We can now understand what God is doing for his own purposes. Verse 8. Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel. And he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one.

Then Jesse made Shema pass by, and he said, neither has the Lord chosen this one. And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, the Lord has not chosen these.

None of these were the one that God saw. This deeper, penetrating look at verses 6 through 10 by Woodhouse and Begg give us the foundation of what we call the doctrine of election. God's good purposes arise out of his perfect and sovereign will. We are completely depraved, and only God can bring us to Himself. Woven throughout the Old and New Testament is the story of God choosing Israel to be his people, David to be his king, Jerusalem to be his city, the 12 to be his disciples, the church to be his bride, Revelation to be his judgment.

Charles Spurgeon put it this way.

I believe the doctrine of election because I am quite sure that if God had not chosen me, I should never have chosen him. And I am sure that he chose me before I was born, or else he never would have chosen me afterwards. He must have elected me for some reason unknown to me, for I never could find any reason in myself why he should have looked upon me with special love. Don't you resonate with the truthfulness and the tenderness of that?

Moving to the final section, verses 11 to 13, we see the one that God saw. Verse 11. Then Samuel said to Jesse, are all your sons here? And he said, there remains yet the youngest. But behold, he is keeping the sheep.

And Samuel said to Jesse, send and get him, for we will not sit down until he comes here. And he sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome. And the Lord said, arise, anoint him, for this is he. Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers.

And the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah. As we get to verse 11, Samuel had to be a bit confused. He's been through all the sons that were present. And so he asks Jesse, are all your sons here?

Jesse, probably equally confused and a bit embarrassed, responds, well, the remains yet the youngest. But behold, he's keeping the sheep. This young boy was an afterthought. Never did Jesse think that Samuel would want to see him. Samuel responds, send and get him, for we will not sit down until he comes.

And they waited. This boy finally arrives, and we get an interesting description in verse 12. Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. He was ruddy, in other words, red faced or probably sunburnt. He had beautiful eyes and was handsome.

I find it ironic that the passage spends considerable time laying out the way God sees as opposed to the way man sees only to have the boy be described as having beautiful eyes and handsome. Perhaps it is helpful to balance the fact that yes, God looks on the inside with complete full understanding, but that doesn't mean that he doesn't also see beauty. This saves us from a perverted twisting of the passage that God doesn't like tall, handsome people. He prefers short, ugly ones.

The Lord looks upon this young man, the boy who was in his heart, and says, arise, anoint him, for this is he. He is anointed for one reason and one reason only. The Lord has willed it. Verse 13 Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. This was the one that God saw, the one in God's heart.

Samuel anoints him. The text says the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David. From that day forward, this is the first time that we actually get a name, Little David. We have gone the whole passage without knowing his name until now. Why?

Because it's not his story, it's God's story. Something special has happened in Bethlehem. God has anointed his king from his heart. Samuel, having fulfilled God's purpose, rose up and returned home to Ramah, Jesse, his sons, David, even Samuel couldn't have possibly known what had just happened. Like us, they only see through human eyes.

They had no idea what this scene foreshadowed. It would be 200 years until the prophet Micah would say, but you, O Bethlehem, Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth from me one who is to be ruler of Israel, whose coming forth is from of old. From ancient days it would be another 700 years and 28 generations until shepherds would once again be called out of the hills to witness the anointing of a king. Luke recounts that an angel appeared to the shepherds and said to them, fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a savior who is Christ the Lord.

David was the boy in God's heart. Jesus was the man who had God's heart. Jesus was called the Son of David, a messianic title meaning that he was the long awaited deliverer. As Jesus says in Revelation 22 I am the root and the descendant of David. That is, he is both the creator of David and a descendant of David.

Only one who is fully God and fully man can make that statement. He would live a perfect life and yet take your sins, take my sins on himself, dying on a cross in our place so that we could be reconciled to a perfect God forever. If you are here this morning and you do not have that blessed assurance, you can have it today.

Donald Bloach wrote one of my favorite quotes, and it's this. For our peace and confidence are to be found not in our empirical holiness, not in our progress towards perfection, but in the alien righteousness of Jesus Christ that covers our sinfulness and alone makes us acceptable before a holy God.

Samuel couldn't have known how God would use his faithfulness. He never got to the end of the story. We also can't see like God sees. We don't get to see the end of the story. And in this life we have no idea how God will use your faithfulness over the course of his great story.

The Bible is full of ordinary people used by an extraordinary God. Therefore, be encouraged. 1. Be encouraged because God's point of view is absolute. This is the reason that Christians cannot accept postmodernism.

God's Word has absolute validity. Therefore, not every point of view is equally valid.

2. Be encouraged because God sees you. If you are here today and you think God doesn't see you, he does.

Number three. Be encouraged because he has chosen you, not because of who you are, but because of who he is. If you think that God can't see you, can't use you because of who you are or the things that you've done. God uses sinful, broken people for his glory. It's the only kind he has to work with.

He doesn't disqualify you because of what you've done. He adopts you because of what he's done.

Number four.

Be encouraged because as you respond to his call, growing in obedience, he uses even your smallest acts of thinking faithfulness in his grand story for his glory. We are totally depraved through Christ, totally saved and freed to serve Him.

Charles Wesley penned these words in 1738.

And can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior's blood? Died he for me, who caused his pain, for me who him to death pursued amazing love. How can it be that Thou, my God, should die for me? Let's pray.

Father, this morning we thank you for who you are.

We thank you for your sight. We thank you that you see completely, that you see according to your own will, your own sovereignty, your own story. Father, you have called us not because of who we are, but because of who you are. Because if you called us according to who we are, none of us could qualify. But because of your son, Jesus, we are adopted into your story, into your family, by your grace and mercy.

Help us respond to that with faithfulness, with obedience.

Father. Thank you for your word, Lord. May it guide us not only this morning, but each morning as we go forward. We pray these things in Jesus name, Amen.