1st Samuel chapter 9. This is one of those chapters that the teaching of it doesn't just
jump right out at you. So pay attention and think about
what Saul represents. Saul is the king that the people
demanded when God said they rejected me as their king. And they won't
have a king like everybody else does. That's who Saul is. And look at it in that light. And in comparison to God's true
king. 1 Samuel 9. Now there was a man of Benjamin,
whose name was Kish, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the
son of Bekarath, the son of Aphiah, a mighty man of power. And he had a son whose name was
Saul. A choice young man and a goodly.
And there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than
he. From his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the
people. And the asses of Kish, Saul's father, were lost. And
Kish said to Saul, his son, take now one of the servants with
thee and arise and go seek the asses. And he passed through
Mount Ephraim and passed through the land of Shileshah But they
found them not. Then they passed through the
land of Shalem, and there they were not. And he passed through
the land of the Benjamites, but they found them not. And when
they were come to the land of Zoth, Saul said to his servant
that was with him, Come and let us return, lest my father leave
caring for the asses and take thaw for us. And he said unto
him, Behold, now there is in this city a man of God, and he
is an honorable man, All that he saith cometh surely to pass.
Now let us go thither. Peradventure he can show us our
way, that we should go. Then said Saul to his servant,
But behold, if we go, what shall we bring the man? For the bread
is spent in our vessels, and there is not a present to bring
to the man of God. What have we? And the servant
answered Saul again, and said, Behold, I have here at hand the
fourth part of a shekel of silver, that will I give to the man of
God to tell us our way. Before time in Israel, when a
man went to inquire of God, thus he spake, come and let us go
to the seer. For he that is now called a prophet
was before time called a seer. Then said Saul to his servant,
well said, come, let us go. So they went into the city where
the man of God was, and as they went up the hill to the city,
they found young maidens going out to draw water and said unto
them, is the seer here? And they answered him and said,
He is, behold, he is before you. Make haste now for he came today
to the city where there is a sacrifice of the people today in the high
place. As soon as you become into the city, you shall straightway
find him before he go up to the high place to eat for the people
will not eat until he come because he does bless the sacrifice and
afterwards they eat that be bidden. Now, therefore, get you up for
about this time you shall find him. And they went up into the
city, and when they were come into the city, behold, Samuel
came out against them, for to go up to the high place. Now
the Lord had told Samuel in his ear a day before Saul came, saying,
Tomorrow, about this time, I will send thee a man out of the land
of Benjamin, and thou shalt anoint him to be captain over my people
Israel, that he may save my people out of the hand of the Philistines.
For I have looked upon my people, because their cry is come unto
me. And when Samuel saw Saul, the Lord said unto him, Behold,
the man whom I spake to thee of, this same shall reign over
my people. Then Saul drew near to Samuel
in the gate, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, where the seer's
house is. And Samuel answered Saul, and
said, I am the seer. Go up before me into the high
place, for you shall eat with me today, and tomorrow I will
let thee go, and will tell thee all that is in thine heart. And
as for thine asses that were lost three days ago, set not
thy mind on them, for they are found. And on whom is all the
desire of Israel? Is it not on thee, and on all
thy father's house? And Saul answered and said, Am
not I a Benjamite of the smallest of the tribes of Israel, and
my family the least of all the families of the tribe of Benjamin?
Wherefore then speakest thou so to me? And Samuel took Saul
and his servant, and brought them into the parlor, and made
them sit in the cheapest place among them that were bidden,
which were about thirty persons. And Samuel said unto the cook,
Bring the portion which I gave thee, of which I said unto thee,
set it by thee. And the cook took up the shoulder,
and that which was upon it, and set it before Saul. And Samuel
said, Behold, that which is left, I set it before thee, and eat.
that which is left, set it before thee, and eat. For unto this
time hath it been kept for thee, since I said, I have invited
the people. So Saul did eat with Samuel that
day. And when they were come down from the high place into
the city, Samuel communed with Saul upon the top of the house.
And they arose early, and it came to pass about the spring
of the day that Samuel called Saul to the top of the house,
saying, Up, that I may send thee away. And Saul arose, and they
went out, both of them, he and Samuel, abroad. And as they were
going down to the end of the city, Samuel said to Saul, bid
the servant pass on before us. And he passed on, but stand thou
still while. But I may show thee the word
of God. Let's pray. Lord, thank you for gathering
us tonight, Lord, and we pray that you would. As you so graciously promised
that you'd meet with us tonight, Lord, Commune with us and teach
us of thyself. Let us see our Lord Jesus in
these words and rejoice in him alone in his precious name. Amen. Now, as I said, this chapter
is God doing what the people had demanded. God, they said
they wanted God to give them a king. And it seems like God
gave them a good man. Not anything bad personally is
said about Saul. in this chapter. There's a lot
about him that was admirable to the flesh. Saul was the kind
of man that people put a lot of confidence in. He was a man
that the people were glad that the Lord had said he's going
to be your king. But though this is just the very
beginning of Saul's story, we haven't really seen much about
Saul yet. We already have some warning
signs in the language of chapter 8 and chapter 9. Though God's
providence is seen in this, and God does choose Saul, he is God's
chosen king, but God's blessing is not in this, and God made
that clear from the start. Samuel was displeased with the
people for wanting a king to begin with, and wasn't going
to have anything to do with it, and God said, go ahead and give
it to them, but give them a solemn warning and tell them what manner
of king he's going to be. He's going to be somebody that's
just all about himself. He's going to take your men and
make servants of them, take your land for himself, your maidens
is going to cook for him and serve in his house. He's going to be, he's going
to be, he's going to promote his own flesh. He's going to
be the big shot king and you're going to pay the price for it. And first of all, God had characterized
this whole matter in a way that casts a terrible shadow on the
whole thing. And we can't lose sight of the
fact that though God did choose Saul, there's a reason why he
did so. It wasn't because Saul was one
of his servants. It wasn't because he loved Saul.
God chooses Saul in similar fashion as he chose Pharaoh when he said
to Pharaoh for this same cause have I raised you up that I might
show my wrath my judgment in you and God by choosing Saul
here particularly in the way that he chose him the type of
person that he chose and all of the language that we're going
to see in this chapter compared to King David who is God's anointed
king who is typical of our Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to
see why God raised Saul up to show this comparison, this contrast.
But here's how God characterized the whole affair in chapter 8
verse 7. The Lord said to Samuel, hearken
unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto you,
for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me that
I should not reign over them. So clearly this is not God blessing
the people. God doesn't bless people for
rejecting him as king. To reject God's authority, a
bad place to be. And as we've seen all through
the scripture, this is the issue. Who's going to be God? Who's
going to be in control? Who's going to call the shots?
Me or God? Is it going to be my way, his
way, my will, his will? His work, my work. That I should not reign over
them according to all the works which they've done since the
day that I brought them up out of Egypt. Even under this day,
it hadn't changed. They've always been about themselves.
They've always murmured against me and rejected me. The nation
of Israel has never loved and served God. Ever. Ever. They are not God's people. The
remnant The elect among the elect, the sheep, the Israel of God,
the spiritual Israel of God is his people, beloved and elect
and chosen. But they said they served other
gods, and so that's what they're doing now. Now, therefore, hearken
unto their voice, albeit yet protest solemnly unto them. God
doesn't trick anybody. This thing's not done in a corner.
It's not some secret thing. God's not going to catch you
on a technicality. You are going to blatantly shake your fist
in his face and he's going to put you in hell for it. Or he's
going to save you. That's just the truth of it.
You show him the manner of the king that you ran over. Tell
him what's going to happen before it ever happened. He told Pharaoh.
He told Moses, he's not going to let you go. And then when
he was going to let him go, he said he's going to let you go.
He knew in advance what was going to happen. Doesn't hide any of this. And
then the type of man that Saul was causes us to worry a little
bit about this too. What I'm trying to get at here
is we need to understand what Saul represents and we can see
in the language already warning signs. We're going to see as
we go through this book, 1st Samuel and 2nd Samuel. But here
in 1st Samuel about Saul and then the contrast in the rest
of the chapters between him and David. Saul was impressive to
the flesh, but that's not ever the man that God uses. Not ever. When God chose and anointed David,
it was a very different scene, as I'm sure you'll remember.
David was just the opposite. He was the one that everybody
overlooked. Nothing impressive about him at all. He was small
of stature. There was nothing that made anybody think that
he was God's anointed king. Saul, on the other hand, boy,
he's head and shoulders above everybody. He was goodly. In
other words, he was a handsome man. I mean, he's the big shot. He's the favorite son. And we know this about God now
that he chooses the things that are not to bring to naught the
things that are. And so when God chooses Saul
here, we can see already some hints that this is not in order
to bless the nation of Israel. Because God chooses who everybody
else overlooks, that no flesh should glory in his presence. Even concerning our Lord Jesus
Christ, the one who is altogether lovely. And yet as a man, it
says concerning him, there's no beauty about him. that we
should desire him. Nobody was attracted to the Lord
Jesus because of the way he looked in the flesh. And it's bothersome to what the
people said in chapter 8 verse 19 listen to this it says nevertheless
when though Samuel by God's command gave them a solemn warning
about what they were getting into here It says, nevertheless,
the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel. And they said,
nay, but we will have a king over us. And here, the reason
that they give is troublesome. That we also may be like all
the nations. And that our king may judge us
and go out before us and fight our battles. Anything that you
do in order to be like everybody else, not good. Not good. And so we can pretty easily read
between the lines here that this is not going to be good for Israel,
for Saul, for anybody concerned. God's providence is at work here
though. God has not utterly abandoned the nation of Israel as a type
of his elect and as he was pleased to give them all the outward
advantages of the law and what true profits he did have. He
does speak in our chapter of saving them from the Philistines,
and that is in his purpose to do that. But we know that God's
blessing is not upon King Saul. Saul is just a pawn in the hand
of God in dealing with the nation of Israel and with his elect
within that nation. And all of us are the same. God
uses us in whatever way he sees fit. He accomplishes his purposes
of grace toward his people in this world by every person, by
every king that's raised up and everyone that's put down, by
every circumstance, by every contingency, every person, everything. God uses in his providence, you
saw how that God arranged all of this. Saul went out to find
his father's assets, the livestock that had gotten away and gotten
lost. But wound up being a king. He
wasn't going to be king. He didn't have that on his mind
when he left the house that day. And he's going to work, and we
see in God working in this, in these few days of Saul's life,
how that God's providence is going to be sovereign and worked
out in meticulous detail in every Aspect of Saul's life and David's And we see here that God's providence
is unpredictable as I said, he didn't go out to he didn't set
out to become a king that day He set out on a much more humble
task God's Providence is unpredictable
Saul never even found those donkeys That wasn't the point of it That
is going to teach us something But that wasn't the point of
it. It was never about that. Saul just thought it was. And
God's providence we see in this is undeniable. God made it very
clear to Samuel who his chosen one was. God chose somebody who
would be agreeable to the people. He chose somebody that would
impress the people. God didn't just influence events.
Whisper in people's ear to to influence, you know, the religion
will admit that well God influences people and he does this and that
but he don't force anybody. Oh, yeah, he does. He causes
it to happen. He makes it happen. He didn't
whisper in Samuel's ear to influence him. He told him what was up
is what he did. He told him how it's going to
be. This is who he is. This is what's going to happen.
God doesn't influence anybody. He makes things happen. And God
didn't try to tell anybody anything. You know, people say, I feel
like God's trying to tell me something. No, He's not. No. Forget it. God don't ever
try to tell you anything. God's either telling you something
or He's not. If you think He's trying to, just ignore that. Because if it's God speaking,
it'll be clear. It'll be loud and clear. And
so although he was a very impressive person in every imaginable way,
yet he was a complete failure. He was an absolute failure. He
was given one job in the text. He had one job. Donkeys are not
hard to spot. They're pretty good size and
they make a lot of noise. And yet, It's not a random thing
now. It's not a random thing in God's
word that Saul's job was to seek and to find that which was lost. And he was unable to do it. He
was a failure in it. He gave up. Saul quit. He was
a quitter. And notice again the great contrast
between Saul and God's true anointed king. We find David right away. Where's the first place we find
David? Don't you have any more sons? Well, there's one out there
keeping the sheep. Keeping the sheep. Between God's anointed king and
the one that God gave the people for rejecting him as king, there's
a great contrast. God's anointed king killed a
lion and a bear to protect his father's sheep. He was very successful
in that typical and very providentially revealing undertaking. In 1 Samuel 17 33, let me read
you this part. And Saul said to David, you're
not able to go against this Philistine to fight against him to fight
with him. For thou art but a youth and he a man of war from his
youth. And David said unto Saul, thy servant kept his father's
sheep. And there came a lion and a bear. and took a lamb out
of the flock. And I went out after him, and
I smote him, and delivered it out of his mouth. And when he
arose against me, I caught him by his beard and smote him and
slew him. Thy servant slew both the lion
and the bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be as one of
them, seeing he hath defied the armies of the living God. David
said moreover the Lord that delivered me out of the paw of the lion
out of the paw of the bear He will deliver me out of the hand
of this Philistine so David we not only see was faithful and
Determined and didn't quit. I mean he didn't give up. He
didn't just say oh, well that sheep's a goner. No He went after
it Because he's a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ and Saul's
just the opposite. He's Antichrist. He's the power
of the flesh and He's the goodliness and the wisdom
of the flesh and he's not going to get the job done. He's a quitter. He's a failure. He's impressive.
Boy, he talks a good game. And he looks the part. But he's
not going to get it done. And King David, there's little
David, just a little scrawny fella. But not only was he successful
in that very, as I said, very revealing, typical job that he
had of keeping his father's sheep, picturing our Lord Jesus Christ.
But he gave God all the glory for it. He said, I killed a lion
and a bear, but you know what it was? It was God protecting
me. It was God. God delivered me out of their
hand, and he'll deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine
too. And so our Lord Jesus Christ,
he's successful. He's faithful. He don't give
up. He don't quit. He shall not be discouraged.
He shall not fail. He leaves the 90 in the night
and he goes after that one shape. And you remember what it says
in John? Let's see, is it John 6? That's a different one. I
want to read you quite a bit of scripture in the New Testament
here. I'm getting ahead of myself. But David clearly pictures Christ.
And Saul, we can't see Saul rightly and thus we see him as contrasted
with David. Who is Saul? He's the king that
the people wanted. Who's David? He's the king that
God raised up and anointed. and gives as a type of his son
the Lord Jesus Christ. The people's king, God's king. And you see the difference. Saul's
a picture of what happens when the people reject God as their
king. God's King is the Lord Jesus
Christ, Psalm 2. I've set my King upon my holy
hill. And everybody, the kings of the earth and all the rulers
and everybody that was anybody stood up and said, we don't need
him to reign over us. We're not going to have his cords
upon us. But God said, nevertheless, he's
my King. And I've set him up on my holy
hill of Zion and all of your opposition and all of your hatred
against him, I will laugh at that and then I'll put you in
hell when I've had a good laugh. And he tells us at the end of
Psalm 2, kiss my son, lest he be angry and you be consumed
in a moment. Kiss the son. And so Saul is what happens when
we hate God's king, God as king in the person of his son, And
that's, again, we crucified the king. We spit on the king. We mocked the king. And we will appoint our own king. We appoint ourselves as king.
It's our will. It's our way. And so we get somebody
impressive and self-important. You know, he's going to make
a servant out of everybody. His servants are going to have servants.
And it's all going to be about him. And you're going to pay
the price for it, God said. He's impressive and self-important
and he's a big shot, but he's utterly unable to do anybody
any good. He can't do anything right. Everything
he does is a disaster, as we'll see. David is clearly a picture of
our Lord Jesus Christ, God's true eternal King. When God sent
his son to seek and to save that which was lost, he didn't never
give up. He didn't fail. He wasn't discouraged. He set
his face like a flint. Until it was accomplished. John
6, 37, All that the Father giveth me shall come to me. And him
that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. For I came down
from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that
sent me. And this is the Father's will
which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should
lose nothing, but raise it up again at the last. He sent with the express purpose
of finding that which is lost. And he did so every last one
of them without fail. And this is the significance
now of this chapter in our text. This is seen all through the
books of 1st and 2nd Samuel. Everyone either has King Saul
reigning over them or King David. Everybody. Saul is the flesh. Saul is man-made religion. As
we see a perfect illustration of that in the context in chapter
13. When Saul offered a burnt offering,
I think we've already read this in context of this study. When
Saul offered a burnt offering, which did not pertain unto him
to do, he had no business doing that. So he was religious outwardly,
he's making an offering unto God, but he's not doing it God's
way. The religion of this world talking
about Jesus, heaven, hell, God, and all, using a lot of the same
words we are. But they're ignorant of God's
way, and they reject God's way. They have a zeal of God, but
it's not according to knowledge. Saul, he would have said, I'm
zealous for God, I'm offering a burnt offering. But that's
not according to knowledge. You bypass the Lord Jesus Christ.
No man cometh under the Father, but by him. You can't bypass God's priest. So Saul is the false king. He's
religious, but not according to knowledge. And listen to this,
Saul is the false Christ who depends upon somebody else to
do his work for him. Saul couldn't find the asses
and Samuel said just forget about it. Somebody's already found
them. That's the false Christ of religion. He can't do it unless
somebody cooperates. He has no hands but your hands.
He has no feet but your feet. Somebody else found the asses.
And this is the Jesus of religion who tries to save but depends
upon the will and the work of others to get the job done. You see, it's the same all through
the Word of God. It's Christ and Antichrist. It's
man or God. Man's work, man's will, man's
way, God's work, God's will, God's way. What does it say of
the Lord Jesus Christ? Regarding the sheep He leaveth
the ninety and nine and he goes after that one sheep And he looks
for that sheep until when how long does he look? Luke 15 for
until he find it Saul looked for a while and got discouraged
and said, you know dad's probably worried more about us than he
is these asses now. Let's just go home No, it's not
about you Saul It's not about you, it's about getting the job
done. Our Lord Jesus Christ seeks it
until he find it, Luke 15, four, and he puts it on his shoulder
and brings it home rejoicing and says, rejoice with me. I
found my sheep, which was lost. And in the life of David, God's
anointed king. We see the glories and the success,
victory that's in the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to what it says about
King David in Acts 13 20. This is the apostle preaching
concerning David and David's son, the Lord Jesus. And he said,
after that, God gave unto them, speaking of the children of Israel,
gave unto them judges about the space of 450 years until Samuel
the prophet and afterward, They desired a king, and God gave
unto them Saul, the son of Cis, a man of the tribe of Benjamin,
by the space of 40 years. And when he had removed him,
he raised up unto them David to be their king. All that's
mentioned about Saul is God gave them what they wanted and then
removed him. He just raised him up to show the difference. between
what we want, between our way and his way, between our king,
which ultimately is ourselves, and God's king. When he had removed
him, he raised up unto them David to be their king, to whom also
he gave testimony and said, I have found David the son of Jesse,
a man after mine own heart. which shall fulfill all my will. What a difference between Saul
and David. And of this man's seed hath God,
according to this promise, raised unto Israel a Savior, Jesus. So David, picturing our Lord
Jesus Christ fulfilled all the will of God, was a man after
God's own heart. Our Lord Jesus Christ had the
very heart of God beaten in his human chest as he walked among
us. And God sent him to seek and
to save that which was lost, and he did, every last one. God's king shall not fail nor
be discouraged until he has established judgment. Not one of his sheep
will be lost. He said, I give unto them eternal
life and they shall never perish. I know my sheep, they know me.
I hold them in my hand and none shall pluck them out. I lay down
my life for my sheep and I give them eternal life and they shall
never perish. So in this chapter we have the
theme of the whole word of God. Man's will or God's will. Man's
reign or God's reign. Who's going to be sovereign?
Who's going to be on the throne? Man's heart or God's heart? The flesh or the spirit? The
broad way or the narrow way? Man's religion or God's word?
And this started way back. We've seen this all through the
book of 1 Samuel, haven't we? When the sacrifice was defiled
and Christ as he was presented in God, the way God established
to worship him through the offering of the burnt sacrifice, the burnt
offering, which is Christ, and all that was perverted by man. And all through the lives of
Saul and David, we'll see this same contrast. And may God give
us grace to never lean upon the arm of the flesh, because that's
what Saul is here. Our tendency is to want to be
like everybody else. That's a mistake. God's people
are not everybody else. They're not to be like everybody
else. We're separate and peculiar and
chosen and sanctified unto God. But the difference is to look
to God's King alone. When God sets up His authority,
we bow to it. We don't murmur, we don't complain.
We bow. By His grace, may that be true.
And think about the things, just a couple of things in closing.
Why did they want a king in 1 Samuel chapter 8? Listen to this because
This is key because Saul never fulfilled this. Even in the fight against the Philistines,
David was the champion, not Saul. Even though God said that Saul
would be instrumental in saving his people from the Philistines,
he was a figurehead. David was the true champion in
it. God's anointed. Listen to 1st Samuel 8 19 nevertheless
the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel and they said
nay but we will have a king over us that we may be like all the
nations and That our king may judge us And go out before us
and fight our battles two things Here's why we want a king to
judge us first of all In other words, he's the one that's going
to decide everything I His word is the final word on things.
We're going to come to him with problems and issues and debates
and controversies, and he's going to settle them. His word is going
to settle the matter, whatever the matter is. Saul never had
any judgment. He didn't have enough sense not
to offer sacrifice to God. When that was plainly revealed,
that wasn't some secret thing. Remember when God told him to
go in and kill everybody and everything and then the prophet
heard some sheep Bleeding and he said what is this? And Saul
said well, I thought we ought to save a few sheep so we could
sacrifice them to the Lord Is that what God told you to do?
He said kill everybody and everything It wasn't complicated Saul's
judgment was pathetic It was religious But it was wrong But this is our Lord Jesus Christ
to us. When God raises up a king now,
there'll be judgment. He judges. That is, His will
is law. The law is not some rules written
on stone. The law is Christ. What He said, everything He says,
His will expressed. What He says goes. He determines
right or wrong. Satan said in the garden, you'll
determine good and evil No, you won't That's always been Christ's
business and it still is He discerns and he dispenses truth and justice
And secondly, he said this that we want him to go out before
us and fight our battles for us Saul died in battle Saul was
a failure in that too It took little David watching
his daddy sheep to come and bail him out. Saul was a coward. He was scared to face Goliath.
So that's man's way. Here's what we want him to do.
Man can't accomplish that. The flesh can't do it. What we
call wisdom is foolishness. But our Lord Jesus Christ, he
fights our battles for us, doesn't he? What he says to his people
is, don't worry, the battle's not yours, it's mine. I'm gonna
give you victory, just because I want you to have it. He leads us, he represents us,
he goes before us. He entered the very presence
of God for us. Our forerunner has entered, our
high priest has entered, and he fought our battle there. The
battle of all battles, the enmity between God and the sinner. And
he won the victory with his own precious blood. Through the death
that he accomplished on Calvary. He wins for us the victory over
all our enemies. In the battle for my soul, I
don't have anybody to fight for me. I need a king. I need the king, I need God's
king. to go before me and fight my battle for me. I can't win. I don't have anybody but him
to fight for me. I don't need anybody else. He's my champion. He's my savior. He's my mighty
conqueror. Only he can work the works that
God requires. Only he can accomplish what God
requires. Only he can open the book. and fulfill all of the purposes
of God in saving the people. Only He can pay the price that
God requires. God's King, by His grace, is
my King. The one who this world wholesale
rejected as King. I bow with Thomas and say, my
Lord and my God. With all my heart Notice at the very end of the
chapter now what needs to happen there's a final solemn warning
here At the very end of our chapter and there's a lot in this we
could See, but this is just kind of an overview. I wanted to look
at this chapter together all at one time and Because it's really an introduction
of the life of Saul. Which we'll see in much more
detail. But look at the very last part. I think this was...
This is not something to ignore. Saul is the flesh. That's clear,
isn't it? Saul is the wisdom and the arm
of the flesh, the attractiveness, the impressiveness of the flesh.
Religion is impressive, isn't it? Let's face it. Beautiful
and impressive. And everybody thinks the world
of it. It's not God's king, it's not
God's way, it's not God's will, not God's blessing. All of God's blessing is in Christ. But look, as they were going
down, verse 27, to the end of the city, Samuel said to Saul,
did the servant pass on before us? And he passed on, but stand
thou still a while. What does the flesh need to do?
What do we by nature need to do? If we're all about the flesh,
if we're caught up in the religion of this world, and when I say
this world, I mean of our own wicked hearts, and we are, everybody
is by nature. If we have that zeal, you know,
that's not according to knowledge, we're all about religion and what passes for religion in this
world, what passes for worship. What needs to happen? Samuel
said, just stand still. Saul, just stop. Let's stop right
here and let me tell you what God said. Let me tell you what
God said. Boy, this is a pivotal moment
right here in the life of Saul and in the life of every sinner.
God says, hold on a second. Stop. Get all the ideas of how
great it's going to be for you to be king out of your head for
a minute. And let's talk about what God
said. And this is when we're in the
strength and wisdom of our flesh, this picture just by nature,
doesn't it? What hope is there for Saul? Then is it just hopeless? Well, here's the here's the warning. Here's the message. stand still
a while and hear what God said. Saul's not going to listen to
God. We see soon in the text and as
I mentioned already in that chapter 13 Saul offered sacrifice and listened
to what Samuel said to him when he came along. Samuel was off
somewhere, you know and Saul thought well, I'll just handle
this myself Samuel said to Saul in 1st Samuel 13 13 thou has
done foolishly Thou has not kept the commandment of the Lord thy
God which he commanded thee Saul stood there right there on that
day and our text said hold on so I need to teach you what God
said I need to teach you the truth. I need to teach you the
way God does things and You don't you don't bypass Christ.
You don't go to God without a representative without a mediator without a
priest And saying he knew all this Samuel
said God told you and you didn't listen to him And now you've
messed up And here's what he said for now would the Lord have
established that kingdom upon Israel forever, but now that
kingdom shall not continue The Lord hath sought him a man after
his own heart, and the Lord hath commanded him to be captain over
his people, because thou hast not kept that which the Lord
commanded you. There's a couple of ways to look
at this. This is the failure of our flesh, but you know, all
of us are failures in our flesh. This is not just Saul. This is
us. Our flesh is going to fail. Our wisdom is foolishness. Thou
hast done foolishly. We always do. Our flesh is going
to fail. Our will is not going to cut
it. But God has sent somebody after his own heart. Somebody
who is faithful. Somebody who is worthy to rule
and reign. Somebody who does please him.
Somebody who's wise and capable. And somebody who will not quit
until the job is done. And so this is our story and
that we fail, we lose, but God wins for us anyway. He wins for
us and gives the victory to us through our Lord Jesus Christ. Bless God. And we play this out
every day. Every time we lean on the arm
of the flag, we're going to fail. Every time we look to the flag,
we're going to be discouraged. We're going to be confused. We're
going to be full of fear. And if we look, as we said, Psalm
2, God has set his king on his holy hill. Look to Zion. Look
to the throne. Look who's sitting on it. Look
to him. And be ye saved, all the ends
of the earth. For he's God, and there is none
else. May God give us grace to look
to him. Read Psalm 2 tonight if you want to, before you go
to bed. And may God give you grace to
Obey it. Kiss the sun. Kiss the sun. Let's pray.