24th November

But the Lord said to Samuel: "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16, 7

Masks

What do we know about our fellow men and what do they know about us? Behind the appearances which often are misleading there is a hidden world. In you and in me there is an amount of wishes, feelings, thoughts which we have never expressed to the people around us. We would be astonished if we could see the secret sadness behind the mask of cheerfulness of the living being. We would not be less astonished if we would discover miserable and disgraceful thoughts of a man who is respected and estimated by everybody. It is possible that this man cannot delete these thoughts.

And in the end do the feelings of people which we meet matter? What we expect of a commercial is that he has good goods for the best price; our expectations towards a craftsman are that he is able to respect the delay and the estimate; our expectations towards a statesman is that he is able to measure up to his responsibility and that he knows how to speak in public.

However, God looks at the heart. He desires truth in the inner parts (Psaml 51, 6). He hates tax evation and immorality. We cannot hide ourselves in front of God. He not only knows what we have said and done but also what we have thought and felt since we exist.

He wants us to have an upright heart which recognizes that we are a sinner. He wants us to confess our sins and he wants us to repent. Then this heart can be changed by faith in his Son Jesus Christ, the Saviour.