God's Selection Criteria

Theme: God's Selection Criteria

Matthew 1:18-25

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus because he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet:  "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us." When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

Some while ago, Songs of Praise on the television featured a young woman with a very powerful story to tell. Her father had committed suicide when she was quite young, and she had grown up believing he preferred to be dead rather than to be with the family. This had damaged her to such an extent that she had got into all sorts of trouble, finally ending up as a drug addict in prison.

All she had taken into prison with her was a Bible, as some sort of nostalgic link with happier days. She had never read the Bible and believed she was the sort of awful person whom God would instantly throw on the scrap heap. But because time was hanging heavily on her hands, she opened the Bible at random and this is what she read :

Come now, let us set things right,says the LORD:though your sins are like scarlet,they shall be like snow;though they are red like crimson,they shall become like wool. (Isaiah 1:18)

That verse leaped out of the page and hit her between the eyes. She began to read the Bible avidly, devouring what she read, and her life was changed. She's now an evangelist working amongst drop-outs and drug addicts, telling them the good news that they are not rejected by God, that he doesn't throw anyone on the scrap heap.

If the birth of Jesus had been left to human beings to arrange, I wonder what we would have come up with? Probably a committee to decide on the best parents, then a selection process and a short list until we arrived at the ideal couple.

I don't suppose an unmarried mother and her carpenter fiancé would have stood a chance. In many ways, Mary represents much that has been rejected by human beings throughout the ages. She was young, unmarried, and pregnant, and that not even by her fiancé. At this early stage in the story, Joseph seems to represent the conventional. He was as shocked as anyone else at Mary's pregnancy, and his instant reaction was to ditch her.

And that's exactly what would have been expected by good, decent people. Although Joseph was too gentle a person to demand the stoning of Mary, as was his right by law, nonetheless it was his duty to get rid of her. He decided to quietly drop her.

When you take it at surface value, this story surrounding the birth of Jesus is pretty sordid. But that's because the God ingredient has been left out. Once the God ingredient is added to the story, everything changes. The circumstances are seen in a completely different light, and Mary far from being of the villain of the piece is seen as the heroine. Once the God ingredient is added, there's a total change in perceptions.

I wonder how many people at the time were aware of this change in perceptions? Fortunately, Joseph, although a righteous man, was also a man who was open to God. He could hear God above the roaring of conventions, and so was able to respond when God suggested he move in an unconventional direction.

After his dream about the angel, Joseph was sure enough in his own mind to continue his relationship with Mary. Nothing in the circumstances had changed, only Joseph's perceptions. But on the strength of a dream, he was prepared to accept a wife who on the face of things, may have been unfaithful to him, and to bring up a baby who on the face of things, might have been another man's child.

This unconventional couple is unlikely to have been chosen by the Church to be the parents of the Saviour of the world. But God often chooses unlikely people to work for him. Back in the days of the Old Testament, he chose Joseph the arrogant and insensitive teller of dreams. Then there was Jacob, who cheated his own brother by deceiving his own father. Moses, who killed a man in anger and then ran away. Ruth, who hoodwinked an unknown relative to marry her. And even David the greatest king of all time had a man killed in order to sleep with that man's wife.

So the pages of the Bible are littered with people chosen by God, but who are most unlikely ever to have been considered by human beings, and especially not by the Church. And it doesn't stop with the Old Testament. In the New Testament, Jesus chose a most unlikely group of people to be his special friends and to carry the message of Christianity throughout the world. Many of them were virtually uneducated. At least one of them was a fanatic guerilla. One turned out to be a traitor. They were all cowards. And one particular friend was probably a prostitute.

After the death and resurrection of Jesus, it wasn't so much these friends who carried the message of Christianity to the rest of the world. God chose a newcomer - a man who had a reputation as being rigorous in his persecution of Christians!

The people chosen by God to carry on his work seem most unlikely. Clearly, the selection criteria used by God are totally different to the selection criteria used by human beings. Somehow, God is able to see the potential within human beings long before it's been realized, and to work with that potential.

Most human beings would find that approach far too risky. Most human beings are looking for proven qualities before they select. Many human beings are rejected because they don't yet have those proven qualities. Many youngsters are rejected for jobs because the employers are looking for "experienced applicants". The employers don't care about potential, because nurturing potential is a difficult and time-consuming task.

Fortunately for us, God was able to see the potential for good parenting within an unmarried mother and her carpenter fiancé and was prepared to invest time and energy in nurturing that potential. At that early stage, Mary and Joseph had no proven qualities. But both of them were open to God, and it seems that that's all that really mattered.

God never rejects anyone. He uses the most unlikely people for his purposes and works with them and through them so that their potential is realized and they change out of all recognition. It can be very scary being used by God, for he sometimes asks of us difficult things. How much easier it would have been for Mary if God had asked her to be the mother of his son after her marriage to Joseph!

But anyone who is prepared to face the scariness, and wants to be used by God, only has to open their heart and mind and soul to him. God knows their potential and will do the rest. All we human beings have to do is to trust him and to dare to follow him.