“I’d rather interview fifty people and not hire anyone than hire the wrong person.”

So said Jeff Bezos, and I’d say he knows a thing or two about putting together an effective team.

Recruitment is a big deal in the workplace. There are numerous tests and levels of culling that occur in various jobs. There’s the psych test. The interview. The other interview. And so on.

This is all with good reason as you want to make sure you get the right person for the job. Particularly if it’s one with a high degree of responsibility. The larger the responsibility and impact, the more important to make the right decision.

When someone who really shouldn’t even have been shortlisted gets the job, then you’ve got a major problem on your hands.

Jesus took recruitment seriously too.

He also took it differently to what was expected by the religious elites of the day. Those that they would dismiss at best and scorn at worst, were the people that Jesus picked for his team.

At least four of the twelve were fishermen. Critical for society but not particularly well educated. One was a tax collector, a profession despised in Jesus’ day. As for the others, there isn’t too much more information except for Judas, who may have been a more worldly-wise, city slicker type. That didn’t end well though.

At any rate, the twelve men that Jesus picked for his team seem a rather rag-tag group.

Yet, they’re who Jesus picked. And he knew what he was doing. Did not the gospel go out into the entire ancient world through them and those they taught?

God always knows what he’s doing and who to pick.

This is because God knows his mission more than we do. So he knows who is best suited for it, even if it’s the last person we’d pick.

They’re only the last person we’d pick, because we’re not looking with God’s eyes, but the world’s eyes.

When King David was anointed, he wasn’t Samuel’s pick:

When they arrived, Samuel saw Eliab and thought, “Surely the Lord’s anointed stands here before the Lord.”

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 people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

David was God’s pick.

Then the Lord said, “Rise and anoint him; this is the one.”

So Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers, and from that day on the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David. 

These reflections bring both a challenge and a comfort.

The challenge is to ask myself whether I am considering people the same way God considers them. To ask myself whether I discard someone from a role or task because they don’t measure up to the characteristics I assume are needed for the job.

Am I looking with the same eyes that God is looking with when he calls people to a mission? That’s a definite challenge.

Yet there’s also a comfort.

I don’t have to measure up to anyone’s definition of suitability, other than God’s.

At the end of the day, he’s the one orchestrating the mission and calling people on team.

Some people might overlook me, but God does not. My rag-tag nature is no deterrent to Him. I might feel passed by, but Jesus is not like this. He calls the rag-tag types.

Churches can be funny places with recruitment.

You might have been ignored when you wanted to serve. You might have been passed by because you weren’t considered the right fit. That’s not necessarily the end of the line though.

God may still have a huge calling on your life.

Because he’s looking with different eyes.

Yours aiming to see the same,

Alison