“Then the word of the Lord came to Samuel: “I regret that I have made Saul king, because he has turned away from me and has not carried out my instructions.” Samuel was angry, and he cried out to the Lord all that night.
Early in the morning Samuel got up and went to meet Saul, but he was told, “Saul has gone to Carmel. There he has set up a monument in his own honor and has turned and gone on down to Gilgal.”
When Samuel reached him, Saul said, “The Lord bless you! I have carried out the Lord’s instructions.”
But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?”
Saul answered, “The soldiers brought them from the Amalekites; they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the Lord your God, but we totally destroyed the rest.”
“Enough!” Samuel said to Saul. “Let me tell you what the Lord said to me last night.”
“Tell me,” Saul replied.
Samuel said, “Although you were once small in your own eyes, did you not become the head of the tribes of Israel? The Lord anointed you king over Israel. And he sent you on a mission, saying, ‘Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; wage war against them until you have wiped them out.’ Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the Lord?”
“But I did obey the Lord,” Saul said. “I went on the mission the Lord assigned me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king. 21 The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal.”
But Samuel replied:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord?To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
For rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has rejected you as king.”
24 Then Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned. I violated the Lord’s command and your instructions. I was afraid of the men and so I gave in to them. 25 Now I beg you, forgive my sin and come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord.”
But Samuel said to him, “I will not go back with you. You have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you as king over Israel!”
God chose Saul to be the first King of Israel, and then God regretted that he made Saul King just a few years later. Can God make mistakes?
How could God have been “unknowing” or “misinformed” about Saul? Obviously God cannot make a mistake, He is all knowing, and He is in total control of His creation. So why then did this happen? Why would God publicly choose Saul with great acclaim and then, shortly thereafter, abandon Saul? And more important to you and me existentially, will God one day “regret” that He chose or redeemed us?!
I would suggest that disobedience is a much bigger spiritual matter—for you and me—-regardless of if we have been born again or not— than we imagine. It always seems to be the little, seemingly insignificant acts of rebellion that bring about tumultuous consequences in our lives! God said, “Go to Nineveh and preach, (Jonah 1:2, NIV).…strike this rock and water will come” (Exodus 17:6, NIV).… “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (NIV, Genesis 2:16-17, NIV). What’s wrong with us? Do we really think that we can hide the acts of disobedience we commit from God? Do you think He does not know, not only know our secret sins, but even the true intents of the ostensibly virtuous things we do? It’s not the evil folks that scare me so much as the religious folks that act holy but are full of deceit.
Saul was disobedient, just like Jonah, Moses, Ananias and Saphirra, Adam and Eve—and you and me. But he did something very common that all my sons also do: when confronted with blatant disobedience he made excuses, belittled the extent of his waywardness and out-and-out lied. He did his best to minimalize his insubordination by playing with words and arguing the point. That really irked the prophet Samuel…. and God even more! Beware of trying to excuse your sins and dishonesty to God. Bad idea.
God expects obedience, not excuses or whining, and as I attempt to teach that to the young men in my home, I understand why. My boys’ lives would be infinitely more pleasant and far less painful if they trusted me and obeyed. But they typically don’t obey the first time around and suffer because of it. Why are we so stubborn and rebellious to those that love us the most?
What is it that we don’t understand about obedience? Why are we so bent on breaking laws—both of man and of God? Why are we so wayward? Why is it that when a sign says, “wet paint, don’t touch”, we instinctively touch it! What if God had never said “don’t eat from this tree”? I wonder if Eve would ever have touched it!
Now, I realize that my boys think I am moron, I suppose, and they therefor ignore me when I give them advice, counsel and wisdom, but neither they, nor you and I have excuses when it comes to what God tells us to do. He understands texting, messaging, emails, the dark web, deceit, dishonesty, lust, perversion, mumbling and bumbling better than any of us. So when it comes to ignoring God’s commands in our lives, these four things come into play if we disobey Him.
1. Despite what we say, we really don’t trust God. We think that He might not be the best one to turn to and we therefore question His rules. Perhaps we’re not sure, at all, about the efficacy of the Bible, the reality of the resurrection or the existence of God. There’s really no other way to explain or disdain for God’s commands and ordinances. We live and act, even at church and in church work, as if God does not matter—if He exists at all.
2. Although we don’t tell Him, we don’t think that He really understands our need/situation. Incredible as it may sound, we think God’s stupid! Isn’t that hilarious and utterly outrageous?! It’s as if we think that God is for children and their fears and needs, not an adult’s needs and wants. We arrogantly assume that when we have the time, perhaps in heaven, we can educate God!
3. In our naive way, we think that somehow we are above His rules: “I don’t need to obey, His rules don’t apply to me.…”. He was giving those rules for those ignorant shepherds in Palestine——or for those unable to make wise choices. He was not talking to me when His Spirit inspired those 66 books we call the Bible. I can manage my own affairs on my own.
4. We fool ourselves into mistaking His long-suffering patience with our waywardness as His apparent blindness or disinterest in our obedience. He’s giving us a chance to repent and change our ways—never assume that He’s too busy to keep up with you or that you’re able to fool Him or deceive Him. People all lot more clever than you and I have been cut off from eternal life for being boastful, prideful and full of deceit.
Think about the tragedies in the Bible of people that sinned and would not repent, but made escapes or tried to hide their sins from God, versus those that quickly displayed heartfelt remorse and blamed themselves and no one else.
Adam did not show remorse when God confronted his disobedience—-he blamed someone else for tricking him. Saul lied, spoke half-truths, denied fault, and eventually admitted that his sin was based upon his fear that his soldiers might not respect him—or approve of him, if he obeyed God completelty—to the letter of the law. Judas knew that he made a horrible decision in betraying Christ, but rather than take admit his sin to his savior and allow Christ to forgive him and restore him, he took judgment into his own hands and executed himself!
But besides this lost lives, consider those that sinned horribly, but were transformed by confessing their sins, repenting of the actions, and believing in the goodness of God to redeem them! David committed adultery and murder—-but his heart was stricken with remorse and personal disgust for his sins, and God restored him. Peter denied his closest friend, repented and wailed in horror of how he had failed—and Jesus loved him, forgave him, and selected him to be the head of the early church! The list goes on and on in the Bible, but there are thousands of lives that were redeemed just like David and Peter—-or lost for eternity like King Saul and Israelites that perished in the desert. Which group are you identified with?
We need to become children in heart again and turn back towards trusting and obeying—regardless of whether we like or agree with His direction. Pity Saul for not having a heart set upon pleasing God. Any one of us can start out committed and find ourselves drifting from our first love.
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