Continuing my study of 1 Samuel today, I was particularly struck by this passage:
And all the people said to Samuel, “Pray for your servants to the Lord your God, that we may not die, for we have added to our sins all this evil, to ask for ourselves a king.” And Samuel said to the people, “Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil. Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart. And do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty. For the Lord will not forsake his people, for his great name’s sake, because it has pleased the Lord to make you a people for himself. Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you, and I will instruct you in the good and right way. Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you. But if you still do wickedly, you shall be swept away, both you and your king.”
Let me set the stage for this. You probably know the story already. The people of Israel were facing an imminent invasion from a particularly brutal Ammonite army that threatened to gouge out their eyes and make them slaves. Since they were used to doing what was right in their own eyes, they certainly didn’t want to lose them! They wanted an earthly king that would muster an effective defense and be like the other nations, particularly the ones who wanted to destroy them!
So the people asked Samuel, the last in a tumultuous line of judges, to anoint a king over them and so he did with Saul. But of course we know that this was an act of rebellion against God, the rightful king of Israel, the very one who had already delivered them from Egypt and given them their own country through a host of divine and miraculous interventions. Samuel told them all of this, but they wouldn’t listen.
I totally get this. I like my freedom and eyesight. And besides that, the generation that was delivered by all the miraculous stuff had long since died out and the reign of the judges wasn’t exactly a time of dependence on, and submission to, the Lord. Bad habits form and they are hard to break.
However, God was gracious to the people and did indeed deliver them through their newly anointed king, Saul. After the battle, when Saul’s kingship was solidified and Samuel knew his time was drawing to a close, he called the people of Israel together and delivered a “state of the union” speech that was a stern warning to the people. And in what was becoming an increasingly rare act of humility and repentance, the people responded, “Pray for your servants to the Lord your God, that we may not die, for we have added to our sins all this evil, to ask for ourselves a king.”
It’s a prayer I should pray. Have you ever made decisions that have permanent consequences? And even after realizing they were wrong, continue to pile sin upon sin trying to undo the mess you’ve made? I know I have and it’s a hopeless feeling; the weight of my own foolishness and the feeling of God’s abandonment or worse, his judgement. Honest introspection is an important, but often neglected discipline! It gets me in the right frame of mind.
And our decisions as a culture and the choices we’ve collectively made, choices of either commission or omission, are just a screen or newspaper away. We are in a precarious position, one it’s not hard to see if we look.
I love Samuel’s honest reply, “Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil.” I need to hear that. The verdict is out. I am guilty. But there is hope. In the midst of the consequences of my own foolish decisions, however great they are, is the call to faithfulness and fearlessness. There is a God who is able to reach into chaos and weave a thread of order and redemption that we could never see in the midst of it.
But the cost is high. A complete ‘about face’ and a sold-out, wholehearted commitment. At the bottom of the pit, there’s no room for compromise.
“Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart. And do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty.”
I am thankful for the testimony of how God’s grace is delivered collectively to the people. This is a national declaration. Of course the application is to the individual and to the church, but don’t jump there too quickly. This is a people that have sinned nationally and culturally. The effects and instruments of sin are inherent in the cultural infrastructure. Policy has been written, judgements pronounced, laws ratified, economies impacted. Sin is big business.
And still God calls his people to wholeheartedly serve the Lord. And to demonstrate his long suffering patience, he just used their king they weren’t supposed to have to deliver them.
“Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you, and I will instruct you in the good and right way.”
I am thankful for Samuel’s example to pastors, leaders and fathers. And I’m convicted! How often do I fail to consider the responsibility I have to pray for others. Pastors, pray for your flocks. Husbands, pray for your wives. Fathers, pray for your children. I know I need to be instructed and encouraged in the way I should go. The current of culture is strong and most of the time it’s flowing the wrong way, easily carrying me along with it, unaware of it’s effect.
And I have a responsibility to instruct and encourage others. Do I take the time to instruct my own family in the good and right way? I’m thankful for the playbook that lays out that good and right way, if I simply take the time to read it.
“But if you still do wickedly, you shall be swept away, both you and your king.”
I don’t like warnings. They feel very “un-grace-like,” but the law of entropy holds true over the heart as much as the physical world and I need to hear it. The bible is as full of warnings as it is of grace. They are two sides of the same coin. The danger is real and grace is not cheap. But I am so thankful for God’s patient character. I don’t have to look any further than my own life & heart to see the evidence of God’s patience and grace!
“Consider what great things he has done for you.”
A timely challenge on the eve of Thanksgiving! Sure, there are the blessings and prosperity of all of our “stuff,” and it’s right to bless and thank God for material blessings. They’re easy to see. But the thankfulness I really want to cultivate is the greater blessing of the grace that gives me life and hope. I know all too well that left to myself, I would quickly descend into the gravitational pull of sinful self destruction and it is God’s hand of preservation and redemption that I am ultimately grateful for this season!