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Max Lucado – Finding Your Place: There’s a Spot for You on God’s Team · Max Lucado Daily Sermons

• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Hi friends, I'm Max Licato. Welcome to Fresh Hope. I'm
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: so glad you've joined me. Today we're continuing our series
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: called Facing Your Giants. Perhaps like David, you feel as
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: though you aren't smart enough, strong enough, equipped enough, or
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: holy enough to overcome the challenges in your life. You're
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: about to hear some good news. The same God who
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: helped David will help you. I don't remember much from
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  Speaker 1: sixth grade. I don't remember my grades. I don't remember
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: family holiday plans. I can't tell you the name of
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  Speaker 1: the brown-haired girl I liked or the principal of the
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  Speaker 1: school I But a spring evening in 1967 is crystal
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: clear in my memory. I'm seated in my parents' bedroom.
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  Speaker 1: Dinner conversation floats down the hallway. We have guests. But
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  Speaker 1: I asked to leave the table. Mom has made pie.
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  Speaker 1: But I passed on dessert. Not sociable. No appetite. Who
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: has time for chit-chat or pastry at such a time?
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  Speaker 1: I need to focus on the phone now. I'd expected
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: the call before the meal. It hadn't come. I'd listened
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: for the ring during the meal. It hadn't rung. Now
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  Speaker 1: I'm staring at the phone like a dog at a bone,
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  Speaker 1: hoping a little league coach will tell me I've made
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  Speaker 1: his baseball team. I'm sitting on the edge of the bed,
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  Speaker 1: my glove at my side. I can hear my buddies
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  Speaker 1: playing out in the street. I don't care. All that
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  Speaker 1: matters is the phone. I want it to ring, but
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  Speaker 1: it doesn't. The guests leave. I help clean the dishes.
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  Speaker 1: I finish my homework. Dad pats me on the back.
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  Speaker 1: Mom says kind words. Bedtime draws near, and the phone
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  Speaker 1: never rings. It sits in silence, painful silence. In the
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  Speaker 1: great scheme of things, not making a baseball team matters little,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: but 12-year-olds can't see the great scheme of things. And
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  Speaker 1: it was a big deal. And all I could think
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  Speaker 1: about was what I would say when schoolmates asked me
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  Speaker 1: which team had picked me. You know the feeling. The
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  Speaker 1: phone didn't ring for you either. In a much grander
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  Speaker 1: scheme of things, it didn't. When you applied for the
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: job or for the club, when you tried to make
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  Speaker 1: up or get help, the call never came. You know
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  Speaker 1: the pain of a no call.
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  Speaker 2: We all do.
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  Speaker 1: We've coined phrases for the moment. He was left holding
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  Speaker 1: the bag. She was left standing at the altar. They
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  Speaker 1: were left out in the cold. Or, my favorite, he's
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  Speaker 1: out taking care of the sheep. Such was the case
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  Speaker 1: with David. His story begins not on the battlefield with Goliath,
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  Speaker 1: but on the ancient hillsides of Israel as a silver-bearded
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  Speaker 1: priest ambles down a narrow trail. A heifer lumbers behind
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  Speaker 1: the priest and Bethlehem lies before him and anxiety brews
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  Speaker 1: within him. Farmers in their fields notice his presence. And
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  Speaker 1: those who know his face whisper his name. And those
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  Speaker 1: who hear the name turn to stare at his face. Samuel,
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  Speaker 1: God's chosen priest. Mothered by Hannah, mentored by Eli, called
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  Speaker 1: by God. When the sons of Eli turned sour, young
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  Speaker 1: Samuel stepped forward. When Israel needed spiritual focus, Samuel provided it.
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  Speaker 1: When Israel wanted a king, Samuel anointed one, Saul. Oh,
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  Speaker 1: the very name causes Samuel to groan. Saul, tall Saul,
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  Speaker 1: strong Saul. The Israelites wanted a king, so we have
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  Speaker 1: a king. They wanted a leader, so we have a louse.
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  Speaker 1: Samuel glances from side to side, fearful that he may
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  Speaker 1: have spoken aloud what he intended only to think. No
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  Speaker 1: one hears him. He's safe. as safe as you can
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  Speaker 1: be during the reign of a king gone manic. Saul's
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  Speaker 1: heart is growing harder, his eyes even wilder. He isn't
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  Speaker 1: the king he used to be. In God's eyes, he
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  Speaker 1: isn't even king anymore. The Lord says to Samuel, How
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  Speaker 1: long will you continue to feel sorry for Saul? I
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  Speaker 1: have rejected him as king of Israel. Fill your container
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  Speaker 1: with olive oil and go. I am sending you to
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  Speaker 1: Jesse who lives in Bethlehem because I have chosen one
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  Speaker 1: of his sons to be king. That's in 1 Samuel
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  Speaker 1: 16 and verse 1. And so Samuel walks the trail
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  Speaker 1: toward Bethlehem. His stomach churns, his thoughts race. It's a
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  Speaker 1: hazardous thing to anoint a king when Israel already has one.
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  Speaker 1: Yet it's more hazardous to live with no leader in
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  Speaker 1: in such explosive times. 1000 BC was a bad era
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  Speaker 1: for this ramshackle collection of tribes called Israel. Joshua and
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  Speaker 1: Moses were history class heroes, but three centuries of spiritual
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  Speaker 1: winter had frozen people's faith. One writer described the days
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  Speaker 1: between Joshua and Samuel with this terse sentence. In those days,
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  Speaker 1: Israel did not have a king, and everyone did what
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  Speaker 1: seemed right. Judges 21 and verse 25. Corruption fueled disruption.
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  Speaker 1: Immorality soured brutality. The people had demanded a king, but
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  Speaker 1: rather than save the ship, Saul had nearly sunk it.
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  Speaker 1: Israel's first monarch turned out to be a psychotic blunderer.
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  Speaker 1: And then there were the Philistines, a warring, bloodthirsty, giant
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  Speaker 1: breeding people who monopolized iron and blacksmithing. They were grizzlies
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  Speaker 1: and the Hebrews were salmon. Philistines built cities and the
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  Speaker 1: Hebrews huddled in tribes and tents. Philistines forged iron weapons
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  Speaker 1: and Hebrews fought with crude slings and arrows. Philistines thundered
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  Speaker 1: in flashing chariots. Israelites retaliated with farm tools and knives. Why,
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  Speaker 1: in one battle, the entire Hebrew army owned only two swords,
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  Speaker 1: one for Saul and one for his son, Jonathan. Corruption
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  Speaker 1: from within, danger from without. Saul was weak, the nation weaker.
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  Speaker 1: What should Samuel have done? What did God do? Well,
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  Speaker 1: God did what no one imagined. He issued a surprise
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  Speaker 1: invitation to the nobody from nowheresville. He dispatched Samuel to
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  Speaker 1: Red Eye, Minnesota.
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  Speaker 2: Not really.
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  Speaker 1: He sent the priest to Sawgrass, Mississippi. Not exactly. He
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  Speaker 1: gave Samuel a bus ticket to Muleshoe, Texas. Okay, he
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  Speaker 1: didn't do that either, but he might as well have.
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  Speaker 1: The Bethlehem of Samuel's day equaled the Red Eye, Sawgrass,
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  Speaker 1: or Muleshoe of ours. A sleepy village that time had forgotten,
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  Speaker 1: nestled in the foothills some six miles south of Jerusalem.
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  Speaker 1: Bethlehem sat 2,000 feet above the Mediterranean, looking down on
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  Speaker 1: gentle green hills that flattened into gaunt, rugged pasture land.
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  Speaker 1: Ruth would know this hamlet. Jesus would issue his first
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  Speaker 1: cry beneath Bethlehem's sky. But a thousand years before there
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  Speaker 1: will be a babe in a manger, Samuel enters the
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  Speaker 1: village pulling a heifer. His arrival turns the heads of
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  Speaker 1: the citizens. Prophets don't visit Bethlehem. Has he come to
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  Speaker 1: chastise someone or hide somewhere? Neither, the stoop-shouldered priest assures.
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  Speaker 1: He has come to sacrifice the animal to God. And
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  Speaker 1: he invites the elders and Jesse and his sons to
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  Speaker 1: join him. The scene has a dog show feel to it.
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  Speaker 1: Jesse parades his boys one at a time like canines
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  Speaker 1: on leashes. Samuel examines them from several angles, more than
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  Speaker 1: once ready to give the blue ribbon, but each time
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  Speaker 1: God stops him. Eliab, the oldest, seems to be the
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  Speaker 1: logical choice. Envision him as the village Casanova, wavy haired,
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  Speaker 1: strong jawed. He wears tight wranglers and has a piano
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  Speaker 1: keyboard smile. This is the guy, Samuel thinks. Wrong, God says.
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  Speaker 1: Abinadab enters as brother and contestant number two. You'd think
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  Speaker 1: a GQ model had just walked in, Italian suit and
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  Speaker 1: alligator shoes, jet black oiled back hair. Want a classy king? Well,
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  Speaker 1: Abinadab has the bling bling, but God's not into classy.
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  Speaker 1: Samuel asks for brother number three, Shammah. He's bookish, studious.
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  Speaker 1: could use a charisma transplant, but busting with brains, has
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  Speaker 1: a degree from State University and his eyes on a
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  Speaker 1: postgraduate program in Egypt. Jesse whispers to Samuel, valedictorian of
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  Speaker 1: Bethlehem High. Samuel is impressed, but God isn't, and he
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  Speaker 1: reminds the priest, God does not see the same way
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  Speaker 1: people see. People look at the outside of a person,
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  Speaker 1: but the Lord looks at the heart. 1 Samuel 16, 7.
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  Speaker 1: Seven sons pass. Seven sons fail. The procession comes to
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  Speaker 1: a halt. Samuel counts the siblings. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Jesse,
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  Speaker 1: don't you have eight sons? A similar question caused Cinderella's
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  Speaker 1: stepmother to squirm. Jesse likely did the same. Well, I
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  Speaker 1: still have the youngest son. He's out taking care of
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  Speaker 1: the sheep. That's chapter 16, verse 11. The Hebrew word
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  Speaker 1: for youngest son is hakaton. It implies more than age.
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  Speaker 1: It suggests rank. The hakaton was more than the youngest brother.
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  Speaker 1: He was the little brother, the runt, the hobbit, the baby.
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  Speaker 1: Cheap watching fits the family hakaton. Put the boy where
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  Speaker 1: he can't cause trouble. Leave him with the woolly heads
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  Speaker 1: and open skies. And that's where we find David. In
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  Speaker 1: the pasture with the flock. Scripture dedicates 66 days chapters
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  Speaker 1: to his story, more than anyone else in the Bible
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  Speaker 1: outside of Jesus. The New Testament mentions his name 59 times.
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  Speaker 1: He will establish and inhabit the world's most famous city, Jerusalem.
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  Speaker 1: The Son of God will be called the Son of David.
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  Speaker 1: The greatest psalms will flow from his pen. We'll call
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  Speaker 1: him king and warrior and minstrel and giant killer. But
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  Speaker 1: today he's not even included in the family meeting. He's
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  Speaker 1: just a forgotten, uncredentialed kid forming a menial task in
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  Speaker 1: a map dot town. What caused God to pick David?
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  Speaker 1: We want to know. I mean, we really want to know.
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  Speaker 1: After all, we've walked David's pasture, the pasture of exclusion.
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  Speaker 1: And we weary of society's surface level system of being
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  Speaker 1: graded according to the inches of our waist, the square
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  Speaker 1: footage of our house, the color of our skin, the
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  Speaker 1: make of our car, the label of our clothes, the
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  Speaker 1: size of our office, the presence of diplomas, the absence
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  Speaker 1: of pimples. Don't we weary of such games? Hard work ignored,
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  Speaker 1: devotion unrewarded. The boss chooses cleavage over character. The teacher
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  Speaker 1: picks pet students instead of prepared ones. Parents show off
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  Speaker 1: their favorite sons and leave their runts out in the field. Oh,
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  Speaker 1: the Goliath of exclusion. Are you sick of him? Then
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  Speaker 1: it's time to quit staring at him. Who cares what
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  Speaker 1: he or they think? What matters is what your maker thinks.
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  Speaker 1: The Lord does not see as a man sees. For
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  Speaker 1: man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks
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  Speaker 1: at the heart. Those words were written for the hackathons
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  Speaker 1: of society, for misfits and outcasts. God uses them all.
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  Speaker 1: Moses ran from justice, but God used him. Jonah ran
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  Speaker 1: from God, but God used him. Rahab ran a brothel.
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  Speaker 1: Samson ran to the wrong woman. Jacob ran in circles.
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  Speaker 1: Elijah ran to the mountain. Sarah ran out of hope.
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  Speaker 1: Lot ran with the wrong crowd. But God used them all.
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  Speaker 1: And David, God saw a teenage boy serving him in
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  Speaker 1: the backwoods of Bethlehem at the intersection of boredom and anonymity.
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  Speaker 1: And through the voice of a brother, God called, David,
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  Speaker 1: come in. Someone wants to see you. Human eyes saw
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  Speaker 1: a gangly teenager enter the house, smelling like sheep and
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  Speaker 1: looking like he needed a bath. Yet the Lord said, arise,
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  Speaker 1: anoint him, for this is the one. Chapter 16 and
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  Speaker 1: verse 12. God saw what no one else saw, a
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  Speaker 1: God-seeking heart. David, for all his foibles, sought God like
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  Speaker 1: a lark seeks sunrise. He took after God's heart because
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  Speaker 1: he stayed after God's heart. And in the end, that's
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  Speaker 1: all God wanted or needed, wants or needs. Others measure
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  Speaker 1: your waist size or your wallet. Not God. He examines hearts.
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  Speaker 1: And when he finds one set on him, he calls
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  Speaker 1: it and claims it. By the way, Remember how I
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  Speaker 1: waited for the phone to ring that night? It never did.
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  Speaker 1: But the doorbell did. Long after my hopes were gone
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  Speaker 1: and my glove was hung, the doorbell rang. It was
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  Speaker 1: the coach. He made it sound as if I were
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  Speaker 1: a top choice, and he thought an assistant had phoned me.
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  Speaker 1: Only later did I learn the truth. I was the
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  Speaker 1: last pick. And save a call from my dad, I
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  Speaker 1: might have been left off the team. But dad called
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  Speaker 1: and the coach came and I was glad to play.
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  Speaker 1: The story of young David assures us of this. Your
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  Speaker 1: father knows your heart. And because he does, he has
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  Speaker 1: a place reserved just for you. Yes, our God not
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  Speaker 1: only does the improbable, he specializes in doing the impossible.
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  Speaker 2: You don't have to stay close, as long as you're
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  Speaker 2: somewhere out there, that's enough for me.
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  Speaker 3: I don't need to hold you near me, don't need
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  Speaker 3: promises to keep.
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  Speaker 4: Just the thought that you are breathing Somewhere in this
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  Speaker 4: world I see Even if I'm not beside you Even
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  Speaker 4: if you never know There's a quiet kind of comfort
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  Speaker 4: Just in knowing you still glow.
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  Speaker 2: I don't need forever.
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  Speaker 4: I just need you to exist.
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  Speaker 3: You don't have to stay with me. You don't have
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  Speaker 3: to feel the same.
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  Speaker 1: Just as long as.
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  Speaker 3: You're still out there calling softly through my days. You
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  Speaker 3: don't have to look my way. You don't have to
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  Speaker 3: be my home. It's enough to know you're living in
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  Speaker 3: a world I'm not alone. I won't chase you through
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  Speaker 3: the distance. Won't disturb your chosen life. I'll just keep
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  Speaker 3: you in my silence like a star that shines at night.
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  Speaker 4: Through the dark and through the blue.
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  Speaker 3: I still think of you. You don't have to feel
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  Speaker 3: the same Just as long as you're still out there
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  Speaker 3: Calling softly through my days You don't have to look
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  Speaker 3: my way You don't have to be my home It's
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  Speaker 3: enough to know you're living In a world I'm not
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  Speaker 3: alone I don't need to.
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  Speaker 4: I don't need to be your light I don't need
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  Speaker 4: to cross your mind All I need is just the
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  Speaker 4: truth That you're somewhere Still alive.
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  Speaker 3: You don't have to stay with me You don't have
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  Speaker 3: to feel the same Just as long as you're still
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  Speaker 3: out there Calling softly through my days You don't have
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  Speaker 3: to look my way You don't have to be my
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  Speaker 3: home It's enough to know you're living In a world
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  Speaker 3: I'm not alone.