Call to Worship

Hymn 715 Great God, we sing that guiding hand

Opening Prayer

Bible Reading 1 Samuel 16:1-13

Prayer and Reflection

Hymn 722 Summer Suns are Glowing (tune 199)

Devotion The Importance of Wrapping

Hymn 657 Almighty Father, Who Dost Give (tune 136)

Benediction High Mountains Deep Valleys, p 302

ILLN – Christmas – New Year period as a national sabbatical – thank God for the gift of rest. Rubbish bins out last night, full of wrapping paper. The national Christmas left-over.

APPLICN – Wrapping paper is an important part of the Christmas process: it delays the revelation of the present, it gives little kids something to play with! BUT do we need it?

Want to reflect on the place of wrapping in our lives and in the gospel.

ILLN – When we had given away a number of boxes of wrapped chocolates to friends and neighbours in the lead-up to Christmas. When we went looking for the box of chocolates we had bought for our dog (don’t ask), we couldn’t find them. We began retracing our steps, gently asking whether anyone had received them by mistake. The response of the paper boy was priceless: “If they were dog chocolates, I would’ve given them to my sister.” Finally tracked them down to some gracious neighbours.

APPLICN – FIRST POINT: Wrapping can confuse.

Wrapping can confuse

ILLN – Can never judge a book by its cover! Samuel seeking to choose Saul’s replacement. “The Lord does not look at the things that man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (16:7b)

APPLICN – Every time we evaluate someone on the basis of their dress, or their job, or their family, or their church affiliation, we are looking at the wrapping, and not at the person.

ILLN – The Pharisee and the tax collector praying (Luke 18:10-14) – the parable was a surprise to the Jewish hearers – who would have expected a tax collector to be heard over a Pharisee? They had been taught to look a the outside, not the heart.

APPLICN – Our society revolves around appearances – look at advertising, at what teenagers wear (and adults too!). It is so easy to be caught up in the wrapping that we may throw away the best part!

Jesus looked through the wrapping when he looked at the woman caught in adultery, when he saw Zaccheus up a tree, when he saw Nathaniel; each time he looked he saw the real person in their search for God, and so must we learn that same look.

Wrapping sends a message

ILLN – Very few of us would give presents wrapped in newspaper, or in something so basic. We want to show someone how special they are.

APPLICN – When God sent His Son to earth, He chose the lowliest of places, a manger in a stable. He did so to send a message.

Imagine the response of the shepherds if the angel had announced the birth in the Bethlehem Hilton: would they have bothered going to see, knowing the response they would get? Kenneth Bailey tells us that they would have not gone without the announcement of the location.

Why was Jesus from Nazareth – a no-place? Unless it was to tell people that God was not interested in status, but able to reach and understand the heart of the ordinary nobodies from nowhere?

Why was Jesus from a poor family? Why did he die a criminal’s death? Why did he choose ordinary non-educated no-hopers as the basis of His mission and ministry unless there was something powerful to say about the work of God?

Next time you rip the wrapping off a present, remember that the wrapping in which the King of Kings came was the most ordinary of all human wrappings – the place of encounter with God Himself. That God can be encountered in the most ordinary of all human wrappings: doesn’t that challenge you to reach out to the ordinary persons around you?

Conclusion:

Wrapping is important, but for different reasons.