Now please turn, we're going to look at 1 Samuel chapter 13 and it's King Saul's big test here. And it's a big test, he fails. And one of the things we find ourselves sometimes going through these Old Testament characters is sympathizing with people who have disobeyed God. And I think a great example of that is in Genesis 24 with the the stealing that of Esau's blessing And I want to pick up on just part of that you remember the situation Jacob and Esau are twins and earlier in this story Esau was famished coming in from a hunt and Jacob had prepared some stew some red stuff and And Esau wanted that red stuff. And Jacob, shrewd man that he is, a grasper of the heel as he is, said, well, give me your blessing, or give me your inheritance, I think, if you want this stew. And Esau basically said, okay, whatever. As an inheritance, if I'm starving to death, give me that stew. He was just a man of just base passions. He would literally despise inheritance just so he could have a single meal. And then there was also the blessing that came later. And that's the situation we have here. You might recall that at this point in time Isaac is very old. He is blind. He wants to give the blessing before he passes on. And Jacob hears about it through his mother. and Jacob literally dresses up like Esau to the point of even putting wool on top of his hands because Esau was a hairy man and he thought and he also wore Esau's clothes that he would smell like Esau and that he could fool Jacob and he does fool I'm sorry he fools Isaac so he does fool Isaac and he receives the blessing that was intended for his brother and then Esau shows up right after Jacob leaves the scene. There's some tense drama here as you're watching this like oh Jacob's gonna get stumped by Esau and then Esau shows up and he wants to help bring food to to Isaac and so he's coming in with his food and and Isaac asks who are you and Esau says it's me your firstborn then Isaac trembled violently and Now here's an old man who was so disgusted by what's just happened, so angry, he trembled violently and said, who was it then that hunted game and brought that to me? When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great bitter cry and said to his father, who had already blessed Jacob, bless me, even me also, father. And he said your Isaac said your brother came deceitfully has taken away your blessing and so he keeps on going and and and I saw begs him have you not reserved a blessing for me and Isaac says Behold I have made him your master and his descendants to get new wine and new grain and and then Esau begs do you not have only one blessing and Esau lifted up his voice and wept then Isaac his father said to him behold away from the fertility of the earth will be your dwelling and away from the dew of the heaven above by your sword you shall live and your brother and you shall serve but it shall come about as When you become restless, you shall break his yoke from your neck. So Esau bore a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing and decided he was going to kill Jacob. I mean, this is not much of a blessing, right? You're gonna be a slave to your brother, you're gonna be away out in the desert lands, but eventually you're gonna break free. And it's interesting, Esau became the father of the Edomites, and that was true in Israel's history. They basically lived in desert lands, they would be constantly warfare but eventually the Edomites basically were more or less controlled by the Israelites. But as you read this you think, well that's just not fair. And we kind of take Esau's side a little bit, don't we? Well, same kind of situation we're gonna see here. We're gonna see Saul disobeys, but he is pressed in a very, very difficult situation. And all of his senses and all of his training tells him he needs to do what he did, and yet he disobeyed. And yet he will receive punishment for disobeying in that regard. And one of the things I want us to realize as we look at this chapter and we go through the drama of this situation, one reason why we sympathize with sinners like Esau and like Saul is because we're not too concerned with the things of God. And we end up kind of taking the side of the weak sinner as opposed to the holy God. And we don't appreciate just how important obedience is. And really, frankly, how difficult obedience is as well. So I'm hoping this will help teach us a lesson in that regard tonight. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, we do recognize that obedience is difficult. But those of us who have been disobedient also recognize that the consequences of disobedience is even worse. And that is something that needs to ever be before us. How many mistakes we've made, how many foolish errors we've done, how many sins we've committed and paid a heavy, heavy price for them. Lord, let us just be people who choose obedience Even when it just seems insane to do it in a sense in this world. It always is insane Why would you obey a God that you cannot see in a Bible that you have to have faith in? Instead of doing that thing that brings you brings you pleasure or could increase your riches or could make you more popular or But we are not of this world We are of another world and our Constitution is the Bible and we are people who have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us So we should and shall always and we commit ourselves to walking in obedience, even when it's difficult Help us to remember this story tonight and to not fall into the sin of Saul. We pray in Christ's name, amen. All right, we're gonna pick up here with verses one through seven and see the difficulties that Samuel is in. And I would say, I don't know that anybody has ever been in the kind of straights that he is in as we open up on our story here. You remember Saul has, I said Samuel, but I meant Saul. Saul has been crowned king, Samuel has given his goodbye, and now it's kind of time for him to get to work. Saul was 30 years old when he began to reign, and he reigned 42 years over Israel. Now Saul chose for himself 3,000 men of Israel, of which 2,000 were with Saul and Michmash in the hill country of Bethel. while 1,000 were with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin. But he sent away the rest of the people, each to his tent. Jonathan smote the garrison of the Philistines that was in Gibeah, and the Philistines heard it. Then Saul blew the trumpet throughout the land, saying, let the Hebrews hear. all Israel heard the news that Saul had spit in the garrison at the Philistines and also that Israel had become odious to the Philistines. The people were then summoned to Saul at Gilgal. Now the Philistines assembled to fight with Israel 30,000 chariots and 2,000 horsemen, I'm sorry, 6,000 horsemen and people like the sand which is on the seashore in abundance. And they came up and camped at Michmash east of Beth-Avon. When the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait, for the people were hard-pressed, then the people hid themselves in caves, and thickets, and cliffs, and cellars, and pits. Also some of the Hebrews crossed the Jordan into the land of Gad and Gilead. But as for Saul, he was still in Gilgal, and all the people followed him, trembling. All right, so militarily, they're in real trouble. I mean, this is kind of a dire situation. Let me break apart some of these things to kind of give you some insight. There is a problem in the texts when it says here that Saul was 30 years old and he reigned 42 years. That's the new American standard. Different versions have different interpretations. The reason why there's a problem is the Messasauric text, which is considered the most reliable text, actually says this, Saul was one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for two years over Israel. So Saul was one year old when he began to reign. All right, that is one incredible baby So obviously it doesn't mean that all right, and we could go through lots of there's different theories about what was meant here It's obviously it's a figurative language or it's a summary language. But basically what it appears to mean is that Saul the events of Saul, of the chapters that we've been looking at here, that Saul was reigned for one year, okay, and then for the two years during this period, but at some point in time Saul's legitimacy was taken away because of this event tonight. He is no longer the king after God's own heart. So his whole reign of coming into power for one years and staying in for two years basically ended when God no longer saw him as the legitimate king of Israel. So that's probably what it means here. But there is some confusion over that. So, you know, kind of keep that in mind. But it doesn't really affect the text of what we have here. The New Testament, I think, says that he reigned for 40 years. So these numbers that you have here are not inaccurate, but it's just not exactly what was in the original text. But you remember when everything started, going all the way back when Saul was hunting for his donkeys? And he ran into Samuel. If you remember that event, Samuel gave Saul two things that he was supposed to do. And he still hasn't done really either one of them technically. He was supposed to deal with the Philistine garrison at Gibeah. And he was supposed to go down to Gilgal and wait for further instructions. Those things haven't actually happened yet. So this is actually What appears that Saul is now trying to put into place those things that he had neglected. It said here that he had 3,000 men, 2,000 with Saul at Michmash and 1,000 with Jonathan at Gibeous. The first we hear of Jonathan, Saul's son, who will become fast friends with David later on. And then he gives the location again. We have faith in the word of God, but it's a faith that's bolstered by human history. These events actually took place at actual times, in actual locations. Archaeological digs confirm the actual truth of what we're reading here. So it's always good to get these map markers here. The Philistines, it said, would have 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen. But remember, the word thousand can often mean something like a regiment. So the Philistines did not probably have 30,000 chariots. I think in the great climactic battle of Persia against Alexandria the Great, the Persians had 200 Sith chariots, and that would have been considered probably the mightiest army at that time. So they had basically 30 chariot regiments or something like that, whatever that involved, and six regiments of people, of horsemen, that kind of thing. Nevertheless, you know, it says here the people are like sand they far outnumbered the Israelites not only in people but in armament and in equipment and tactics they were they were a superior culture they they they actually were more advanced a culture than the Israelites and So what does Jonathan do? Jonathan goes up and he smotes. I love that word, smote. He smotes the garrisons of the Philistines that was his Gibeah. You remember, this is an indicator of just how bad off the people of God were. You literally had, Gibeah is in the middle of the country. It's in the land of Benjamin, which is kind of around Jerusalem and that kind of thing. So way inland, the Philistines occupied the great coastal cities the five Philistine cities, but they've got they've garrisoned all the way inside the interior of Israel so the Israelites have been basically reduced to serfdom and that constant reminder that garrison which was always keeping an eye on them was was kind of a real thorn in the side for them and for God it was a an indication of the judgment on the people of God here so he goes up and he subdues these This garrison here, he smotes them and kills them all. And of course the Philistines hear about it, so they start taking up arms. That's just not the kind of thing that you were supposed to do. So the Philistines decide they're going to go and punish Israel for what they did. So Saul blows the trumpet, he summons everybody at Gilgal. and however, the situation was it looked like there was ten times as many chariots as Saul had in men if you look at the numbers, but a bunch of people showed up, but then as they showed up and they saw how things were set against them, they started to leave. And they started to go across the Jordan River to hide. They were hiding in caves and things like that. So this is not making for a real powerful scene and stance against the Philistines. So it's kind of a grim situation. So now we see Saul's disobedience verses 8 through 15. Now he waited seven days according to the appointed time set by Samuel. So Samuel told him to go to Gilgal and wait for seven days and Samuel would come, okay? But Samuel did not come to Gilgal. The people were scattering from him. So Saul said, bring to me the burnt offering and the peace offerings. And he offered the burnt offering. As soon as he finished offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came. And Saul went out to meet him and to greet him. But Samuel said, what have you done? And Saul said, because I saw the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come in the appointed days, and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash, therefore I said, now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not asked the favor of the Lord. So I forced myself and offered the burnt offering. Samuel said to Saul, you have acted foolishly. you have not kept the commandment of the Lord your God which he commanded you for now the Lord will not well would have established your kingdom over Israel forever but now your kingdom shall not endure the Lord has sought out for himself a man after his own heart and the Lord has appointed him as a ruler over the people because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you then Samuel rose and went up from Gilgal to Gibeah of Benjamin Saul numbered the people who were present with them about 600 men so think about this situation think of yourself in Saul's Circumstances you got this you've already starting off with kind of a puny army But what you did have you're starting to lose and in that and the Philistines are just getting stronger and stronger and stronger and stronger the rebels are just getting weaker and weaker and weaker and he begins to panic so day one goes by and Samuel hadn't shown up on the scene day two goes by Samuel hadn't shown up on the scene day four goes by people are fleeing they're going the the morale is abysmal day five goes by Samuel still hadn't shown up and Day six goes by they're starting to get kind of worried. They're going to run out of supplies and everything The philistines are moving more and more day seven comes by and samuel is like this is the day This is the dummy saws. This is the day and you know 10 o'clock in the morning comes by One o'clock in the afternoon comes by three o'clock and there's no samuel. There's no samuel. What's happened to samuel? So maybe it's later on, the sun's starting to go down and everything, and Saul just decides, you know what we need to do, we need to go ahead and offer this offering. We gotta quit waiting on Samuel. And sure enough, if this has ever happened to you, as soon as he makes the offering, Samuel shows up, right? Now Saul thinks he's done a good thing. What a noble thing it is to seek the Lord on this, but he gets this severe rebuke from Samuel. And Samuel says, what have you done? It's kind of reminiscent of when Adam and Eve sinned, and they're hiding from God in the garden, and God's inquiring of them, what have you done? Where are you? You know who told you uh that that you were naked these kind of things so obviously he's in trouble you ever had a boss You know that the boss wants to see you and your heart just kind of stops You think this is kind of the situation with uh with samuel. What have you done? and uh, and then Again, saul and trying to defend himself says this I forced myself and offered the the burnt offering He's kind of sounding like a victim, isn't he? kind of a martyr. I didn't want to do this but I sort of had to because everybody's leaving and it's your fault Samuel for being so late. But the fact was that he was supposed to wait and he didn't wait. He waited up to 95% But he didn't wait completely. It seems like just a small disobedience to us. But to God it was a huge disobedience. So Samuel rebukes him. You have acted foolishly. Those are harsh words. And you know it's interesting. The other thing about the characters here is you kind of got this young tall good looking King's trying to rally the country together and lead them against the oppression of the Philistines and obedience to God everything and he got this Cried to the old man showing up late on the scene. He said what have you done? You know, you've acted foolishly and we tend to we tend to kind of go for Saul in that situation It's like with Jacob and Esau Jacob was described as a man of the tents kind of a soft man a mama's boy even Esau was a manly man, you know, he would He would work at Grady's Gride Outdoors. He would have animal heads all over his den, this kind of thing. We kind of like that kind of thing about Esau. But God is always turning our categories upside down. And he wants you to see that obedience is unnatural. It is difficult. So we kind of sympathize here with Saul, but the two big sins he committed, first of all, he was to wait for Samuel. And he couldn't wait. Isn't that what most of obedience involves, waiting on God in some way? He didn't wait for Samuel. The other thing is, he did not have a right to offer sacrifices. If one of you were to get up and start serving the Lord's Supper from here, and you were not an ordained minister, that would be a violation of what we believe in this church. You just don't have the right just to go and do something like that. Well, how much more so the whole sacrificial system? Kings didn't offer sacrifices. Priests did. And there was very careful delineation. And you might remember further in Israel's history, when a king did offer sacrifice, he'd got too big for his britches, God gave him leprosy to remind him not to fool around, that the word of God is not to be monked around with, even by a king. So he goes and offers this sacrifice in disobedience. He tries to make himself sound religious. Right? And very often our worst vices are those that we try to make sound like virtues. One commentator said this, the sacrificial offerings of the priesthood were more important than the king's pursuit of the war. What we do in worship reveals our beliefs about who God is and what he wants. So that our obedience and worship should receive priority in our lives. The sacrifices Saul desecrated were holy. And they dealt with holy things, such as God's wrath against our sin and his atoning work in Christ for our forgiveness. Objectively, it was more important for God to be worshipped properly than for Israel to survive its war." Now that's kind of harsh, isn't it? But that's really what God expects. That's why I think the Church of Jesus Christ, at least in America, is in a lot of trouble. Because we find obedience inconvenient. And there are thousands, if not tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of born-again Christians who will choose a soccer match over Sunday worship. Just for example, they will choose not tithing so they could buy a new car That's a little bit more squishy because tithing doesn't appear to be a direct command and New Testament be careful not to add to scripture It's a principle They will they will choose a doctrinal compromise to go to a place that's more popular and You know, it's amazing. We're constantly doing that kind of thing. Because we just don't regard worship the way God does. We don't put a priority on worship. So literally, what Samuel was apparently saying was, it would have been better for you to have lost the war than for you to break God's commandments. Now, that's a heavy statement, but that's kind of the principle we're saying. Now God ends up coming through. He came through. They had a battle before where God brought hailstones down and defeated the Philistines. That can happen again. But it's presumptive to think it's going to happen while we're disobeying, right? So, anyway, he goes on to do this thing. He is disobeying God. But it seems like he's doing the right thing. How many people do you think actually try to stop Saul? How many of his commanders that are sitting there looking at all these Philistines starting to gather around, all these people? How many of you think that, you know, you really just need to wait for Samuel? I bet none of them. They were probably relieved when they brought that ox out or that sheep out and then Saul picks up that knife. Don't you think, oh, thank you. We're ready to move on with this thing. Let's do something, right? And they would have been wrong. There is such pressure, even with right motives, to do the wrong thing. So he had, God was calling Saul, this was a test of him being king, to go against his instinct, every bit of evidence that was around him, everything that he could see said he did the right thing. But God was dishonored and worship was violated. He didn't have a right to touch those sacred vessels. He he he violated committed blasphemy by taking the role of a priest So another commentator says this the foolishness of disobeying God Cannot be seen by weighing the circumstances in most circumstances It looks foolish to trust and obey God the foolishness of disobedience and the wisdom of obedience can only be seen when he take when we take into account something other than circumstances, so you gotta We are people who are driven by circumstances. You gotta be above the circumstances. You gotta be above the circumstances. It doesn't make a sense to devote one day out of seven to the Lord's worship and the Lord's day. People in your neighborhood may scoff at you and laugh at you when they see you. They're going out with their golf clubs or their lawnmowers. They see you dressed up and going to church. That just doesn't make any sense to them. But it makes perfect sense to God, right? Then there's this prophetic warning your kingdom will not endure Paul's saws actions of almost obedience was basically worthy of the whole his dynasty dying with him and his and Jonathan not taking the crown and that sort of thing so he is This is kind of a forethought in regards to David coming in and being a man after his own heart, and that's what he was supposed to be. This can mean a couple of things. First of all, it can mean that a man who is interested in following God, who has God's heart on the matter, and it also can mean a man of God's choosing. In a sense, Israel chose Saul, God chose David. And there's a real difference in those two dynasties. So he ends up with the chapter and it's kind of rough here He's got about 600 men. They're evidently held up in that garrison fortress there and then you you get this the Commentary here that will continue on here was the first thing of 13 Yeah, we'll continue on here with the dire straits that they were in now Saul and Jonathan picking up here with verse 16 now Saul and his son Jonathan the people who were present with them were staying at Gibeah of Benjamin while the Philistines camped at Michmash and the Raiders came from the camp of the Philistines in three companies one company turned toward Oprah and Orphra, sorry, Orphra, not Oprah, not the TV star, to the land of Sheol. The other company turned towards Beth-Horon, and the other company turned toward the border, which overlooks the valley of Zeboim, toward the wilderness. Now no blacksmith could be found in all the land of Israel, for the Philistines said, otherwise the Hebrews will make swords or spears. So all Israel went down to the Philistines, each to sharpen his plowshare, his mattock, his axe, and his hoe. The charge was two-thirds of a shekel for a plowshare and mattocks and forks and axes to fix the hose. So it came about on the day of battle, neither sword nor spear was found on the hands of any of the people who were with Saul and Jonathan, but they were found with Saul and his son Jonathan. And the garrison of the Philistines went out to the pass of Michmash. So you got the situation here with these raiders. The Philistines are so numerous they can split up. You know, that's one of those rules of warfare. You don't divide your forces in the face of the enemy. The Philistines thought that was a joke. They just split up in three different companies because the Israelites are a joke. They're not really too concerned about them. But you get this interesting thing that there were just no swords around. Now, you know, this ought to be used by some NRA Second Amendment speech at some point in time, but the Philistines, the Israelites, they were, again, in a serfdom kind of situation. It's interesting, if you go back to the history of warfare between France and England, you see these amazing victories of the English over the French at the Battle of Crecy, at the Battle of Agincourt, and it usually, the hopes of the English were pinned on their longbowmen. The English welch longbow and just had an incredible talent They used steel-tipped armor-piercing arrows and they could take out a mounted knight at something like 200 yards And that was always seemed to win the battle and it would continue to do that because the French had a surf system the English didn't and And the French didn't trust their serfs with weapons like a longbow. So they would use a less powerful, the distance was a lot less, crossbow because it didn't require all the skill. A longbow took an enormous amount of skill. So you see this idea that an oppressive government is gonna disarm the people and they're not gonna let them have arms. And that's the situation that you have here to the point they didn't even have a blacksmith. So you've got this army and it's not only does it have they only have 600 people they ain't got no weapons Now part of me says what happened to all the weapons of the amorites of the people that you just defeated Because they just defeated a large army on the other side of the Jordan over there. Whatever happened to all those weapons? And it makes you think maybe they got those and they turned them into farm implements or something like that. Or they couldn't have access to them or whatever it might be. But I don't know that you could have a more grim situation. I would not want to be an Israelite soldier here. You got to give kudos to the 600 that actually stuck around because it looked like a pretty hopeless situations And then these the the Philistines are coming in we don't know what we're going to do so we tend to sympathize with Saul And we kind of don't blame him for kind of hurrying up this thing and kind of trying to work it out in his own strength instead of trusting God. But again, that's because we often don't have God's heart on the matter. We sympathize with him because we too find to obey God fully and to trust God fully is really beyond us in the circumstances that we find ourselves in. To go back to our illustration with Esau, you know, the New Testament is a commentary on the Old Testament. It helps us to understand just how bad Esau's situation was in the book of Hebrews in chapter 12. There's a warning here. See to it that no one's come short of the grace of God, that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by many are defiled, that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau who sold his birthright for a single meal. But it goes on. For you know that afterwards, while he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected. For he found no place for repentance, though he sought for it with tears. For you have not come to a mountain that can be touched, and to a blazing fire, and to darkness, and the gloom of the whirlwind." He's talking about Sinai here. "...and to the blast of the trumpet, and the sound of words, which sound was such that those who heard it begged that no further would be spoken to them. for they could not bear the commandment if even a beast touches the mountain it will be stoned and So terrible was the sight that Moses said I am full of fear and trembling But you have come to Mount Zion and the city of the Living God the heavenly Jerusalem into myriads of angels to the general assembly of the church of the firstborn who enrolled in heaven and to God the judges of all That's the perspective that we as believers that we we serve an almighty all-seeing all-powerful god and he is majestic and he is good so matter what obedience costs us it's worth the cost and it will always work out even though our circumstances are screaming out for compromise and for disobedience saw lost the dynasty because of it we have given up other things because of it we need to understand that we come to god with fear and trembling uh... he is gracious to us and he will help us to endure the trial and that obedience is always the right course father we do pray that you would help us to remember uh... the men of faith in the men of on faith uh... as we look at holy scripture and help us to be willing to obey no matter And so many times we're tempted and no one would ever even see the disobedience. But obedience is always worth it. It's always worth it. Even if we don't see the worth of it now in this life, we will in the next. So help us to be those people who love you enough to wait until the eighth day and never to offer the sacrifice ourselves. In Christ's name, amen.