Prayer: God of our hearts, you are holy, you are worthy of our worship. May we realize our worth in your presence because of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Dominating our news these days are the election campaigns. Many of our conversations have the names of Hillary Clinton, Mike Huckabee, John McCain, and Barack Obama in them. Of course, all four are wooing the American public for votes. All four believe they are the one to be the next United States President. The outcome is by no means settled, and here in Pennsylvania, we can make a difference in our primary coming up in April, especially since the Democratic race is too close to call, and the Republican race seems to have a spoiler candidate still in it. We Pennsylvanians could tip the scales. So, who knows who will lead us for the next four years?

Wouldn’t it easier if we just lined up the four candidates and have sort of a revue? We could offer a prayer or a gift to God, and then look upon each candidate and wait for a word from the Lord. Wouldn’t that be simple? We might look at the one with the most experience and say, “Surely this is whom the Lord has chosen.” We might look on the one with the most amount of change to offer and say, “Surely this is the one who has God’s favor.” Or the one with the best overall plan regarding the issues. “Ah! This must be the one whom God desires!” Or, the one candidate who is the most electable, or who will have the greatest impact on history, or who is the best speech-maker, or is the best economist… “Surely, the Lord’s anointed is now before the Lord.”

But then the Lord speaks: “Don’t you know that I see differently than the way you human beings see? You look at all these outward things. But, I look on the heart. You see through your eyes without the ability to see what I see,” says the Lord.

Of course, I’m teasing about the whole revue thing, but the truth is that God does see us differently than the way we see ourselves and others. God sees us as we really are and what we really are.

That is why God reminded Samuel that the divine perception of reality differs significantly from our limited human view. When Samuel stopped using just his eyes and relied instead on the spirit of God, he immediately “saw” that the “ruddy,” harp-playing, dancing shepherd-son of Jesse offered the spiritual strength and leadership that Israel would need from its next king.

We might think that we have to put together a good résumé of our good deeds in order to have good credentials with God. Not so. We might believe we have to be religious in order to have good credentials in God’s sight. Uh, uh. We might think that we have to be successful, or popular, or attractive in order to have good credentials. Nope. Maybe from the cultural standards, but not so, from God’s point of view.

So, what, from God’s point of view, do we need to do, in order to be chosen by God, to be desired by God, to be in God’s favor? What is pleasing to the Lord? What are God’s holy credentials for us?

Entitlement to God’s favor is not so much about doing things as it is about being things. It isn’t about what we want others to see in us, it is about what we want God to see in us.

For one, I think God wants to see in us deep trust. We struggle here, friends, I think. Like when Samuel was grieving over Saul, sometimes we are grieved over our mistakes. We get sad that things didn’t turn out as we had planned. We feel the disappointment when what we worked hard for didn’t work out. Sometimes we lament about the pain we go through, and we cry out, “God, I need your help!” It is difficult for us to trust and believe that God is at work in the crisis we are enduring, whether it be physical, or emotional, or financial, even political, or whatever.

People who have regrets, people who fall back to drugs or alcohol, people who go through busted relationships, people who lose their jobs, people who have sickness, people dealing with this crisis and that problem, and on and on… Yes, it is important to take time to grieve ,and heal, and to learn. But, there does come a time to stop grieving. There does come a time to let it go and trust.

God asks, “How long will you grieve over Saul? I have a new plan. Time to move on. Let’s go somewhere else. Let it go, and turn it over to me,” says the Lord. “Trust me,” says God. Let God see us filled with trust.

A second holy credential I think God would like to see in us is a willingness to pay attention to what God chooses to do. Sounds crazy to pick this young red-headed lad as the next king of Israel, doesn’t it? Can you imagine what Eliab, Abinadab, Shammah, and all the rest of the sons were thinking and feeling? Their little brother, this little shepherd boy was anointed as their next king in their presence! By all accounts, God’s choice seems way out of bounds.

However, we worship and extraordinary God who chooses some of the least likely among us, the least popular options available to us in which to work. If we trust that God’s foolishness is wiser than our best wisdom (1 Corinthians 1:25), then why not honor what God is doing?

Trouble is, all too often we miss what God is doing because we often think we have a better idea of what God should do, or we are too busy doing something else to notice what God is doing, C.S. Lewis, in his book The Screwtape Letters, captures a bit of this idea. Screwtape is a master devil and has been writing letters to his protégé, a devil in training named Wormwood. Screwtape is teaching Wormwood the finer points of distracting the human beings away from “the Enemy” (who is God). Of course, C.S. Lewis’ intention is to have the reader understand how easy it is to be distracted from God. Listen to this part of Screwtape's letter to Wormwood:

As long as [your human patient] retains externally the habits of a Christian life, he can still be made to think of himself as one who had adopted a few new friends, but whose spiritual state is much the same as it was six weeks ago. And while he thinks that, [we can encourage] the vague, though uneasy feeling that he hasn’t been doing very well [in his faith] lately. [This] increases your patient’s reluctance to think about the Enemy. As this condition becomes more fully established,… you will find that anything is sufficient to attract his wandering attention. You no longer need a good book to keep him from his prayers [to the Enemy]—advertisements in yesterday’s paper will do. Do remember, the only thing that matters is the extent to which you separate [your patient] from the Enemy (C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters, 62-64, 1961). For the Enemy loves the human vermin (96).

So, the first holy credential for us is to be trusting of God. The second credential is that God sees in us our attentiveness to what God is doing in our lives and in our world. The third holy credential I think is that God wants to see us be love. I think God wants to see Christ’s light as a part of us, blended in with us, infused in us. There’s no separation between who we are as human beings and who we are as children of love and light.

And as such, our whole demeanor changes. We get a change of heart. We no longer have a persistent need to carry mean-spiritedness in us. We no longer need to seek revenge or one-upmanship when wronged. We no longer have our faith be a self-centered faith. I believe God loves it when we are love to God and each other.

Many of you send me e-mail, some of which I can use in sermons. Well, yesterday afternoon, I received the following e-mail from one of our members. Listen to this prose about a change of focus when God is in our hearts:

I asked God to take away my bad habit. God said, ‘No. It is not for me to take away, but for you to give it up.’ I asked God to make my handicapped child whole. God said, ‘No. His spirit is whole; his body is only temporary.’ I asked God to grant me patience. God said, ‘No. Patience is a byproduct of tribulations; it isn’t granted, it is learned.’ I asked God to give me happiness. God said, ‘No. I give you blessings; happiness is up to you.’ I asked God to spare me pain. God said, ‘No. Suffering draws you apart from worldly cares and brings you closer to me.’ I asked God to make my spirit grow. God said, ‘No. You must grow on your own, but I will prune you to make you fruitful.’ I asked God for all things that I might enjoy life. God said, ‘No. I will give you life, so that you may enjoy all things.’ I asked God to help me LOVE others, as much as I am loved by God. God said, ‘Ahhhh, finally you have the idea’ (personal correspondence, retrieved, March 1, 2008).

Be love. God loves it when love is seen in us. Be attentive to what God is doing in our lives. Honor it. Bless it. Thank God for it. And, be trusting of God. Let God see these holy credentials. And, let all three be in our hearts, for that is where God will look for them. Amen.