Our Old Testament reading this morning comes from 1 Samuel, chapter 11. We'll read the entire chapter, verses 1 through 15. 1 Samuel, chapter 11, verses 1 through 15. Then Nahash, the Ammonite, went up and besieged Jabesh-Gilead. And all the men of Jabesh said to Nahash, make a treaty with us, and we will serve you. But Nahash the Ammonite said to them, on this condition, I will make a treaty with you that I gouge out all your right eyes and thus bring disgrace on all Israel. The elders of Jabesh said to him, give us seven days respite that we may send messengers through all the territories. We will give ourselves up to you. When the messengers came to Gibeah of Saul, they reported the matter in the ears of the people. and all the people wept aloud. Now behold, Saul was coming from the field behind the oxen and Saul said, what is wrong with the people that they are weeping? So they told him the news of the men of Jabesh. And the spirit of God rushed upon Saul when he heard these words and his anger was greatly kindled. He took a yoke of oxen and cut them in pieces and sent them throughout all the territory of Israel by the hand of messengers saying, whoever does not come out after Saul and Samuel, so shall it be done to his oxen. Then the dread of the Lord fell upon the people, and they came out as one man. When he mustered them at Bezek, the people of Israel were 300,000, and the men of Judah, 30,000. And they said to the messengers who had come, thus shall you say to the men of Jabesh-Gilead, tomorrow, by the time the sun is hot, you shall have deliverance. When the messengers came and told the men of Jabesh, they were glad. Therefore, the men of Jabesh said, tomorrow we will give ourselves up to you, and you may do to us whatever seems good to you. And the next day Saul put the people in three companies, and they came into the midst of the camp in the morning, watch, and struck down the Ammonites until the heat of the day. And those who survived were scattered, so that no two of them were left together. Then the people said to Samuel, who is it that said, shall Saul reign over us? Bring the men that we may put them to death. But Saul said, not a man shall be put to death this day, for today the Lord has worked salvation in Israel. Then Samuel said to the people, come, let us go to Gilgal, and there renew the kingdom. So all the people went to Gilgal, and there they made Saul king before the Lord in Gilgal. There they sacrificed peace offerings before the Lord, and there Saul and all the men of Israel rejoiced greatly. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Our reading is Matthew 19, 23-30. Matthew 19, 23-30. And Jesus said to His disciples, Truly I say to you, Only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, who then can be saved? But Jesus looked at them and said, with man, this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. Then Peter said in reply, see, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have? Jesus said to them, truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the son of man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on 12 thrones, judging the 12 tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let's pray together. Lord, as we come to this narrative portion again in 1 Samuel, we pray that you'll help us to look back in the history of Israel and see your hand at work and understand what you were unfolding, what you were telling the people at that time. And may we also apprehend the things you tell us and the things you promised to us. We pray this through Christ our Lord. Amen. Well, we need a little bit of review first. We're going to look at 1 Samuel 11. But in order to grasp that, we're going to go back just a little bit to 1 Samuel 10 and 17 through 27. I'm going to read 17 through 27 because it's the time when Samuel is made king, the first time, kind of the first out he has on being a king. Verse 17 says, now Samuel called the people together of the Lord at Mizpah, and he said to the people of Israel, thus says the Lord God of Israel, he gives them a little history lesson, he says, I brought you up out of Egypt, and I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians, and from the hand of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you. But today you have rejected your God who saves you from all your calamities and distresses, and have said to him, set a king over us. Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by the thousands. And then it goes on. Then Samuel brought all the tribes of Israel near, and the tribe of Benjamin was taken by Lot. There was this system of finding out who's going to be the winner. And by the tribe of Benjamin near its clans, and the clan of Matrites was taken by Lot, narrowing it down. And Saul, the son of Kish, was taken by Lot. But when they sought him, Saul, he could not be found. So they inquired again of the Lord, is there still a man to come? And the Lord said, behold, he has taken and hidden himself among the baggage. And they ran and took him from there. And when he stood among the people, he was taller than any of the people from his shoulders upward. And Samuel said to all the people, do you see him whom the Lord has chosen? There is none like him among all the people. And all the people shouted, long live the king. And Samuel told the people the rights and duties of the kingship. And he wrote them in a book and laid them up before the Lord. Then Samuel said, all the people away, each to his own home. Saul, the king, also went to his home at Gibeah and went with him men of valor whose hearts God had touched. He's got some people with him. But some worthless fellows, and you'll get this a little later, some worthless fellows said, how can this man save us? And they despised him and brought no present, but he held his peace." So here we see the new king, he's already been anointed in the previous chapter in a secret way, and now he's been kind of discovered again by Lot, by casting lots and discovering where he is and who he is, and they find him hiding in the bags. And I can imagine him like a modern airport worker sorting out baggage, trying to keep his head down and keep from being discovered, hoping to be ignored because he doesn't really seem to want to be king very much. What happened earlier when he was anointed, right after that, the spirit of God rushed on him. And he felt really powerful. And he danced. And he prophesied. He really felt the spirit for a little while. But evidently, that experience of the Spirit had faded, and it was a temporary thing that faded away. And he went home. Saul just went home. He didn't go to some palace somewhere and set up a kingdom. He went home and didn't even tell anybody about the fact that he had been anointed by the prophet Samuel. And he didn't tell anybody about the ecstatic experience that he had. He went back to farming. until Prophet Samuel came looking for him, which we just read. Even with this guy who was taller than anybody else from the shoulders up and very handsome, it says, these things failed to impress some of the people. And that's what we've got in that verse 27. Some worthless fellow said, how can this man save us? They despised him and brought him no present. So we get now to 1 Samuel chapter 11, where there's a great threat to God's people. And we heard it read earlier in verses one through four, then Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged the city of Jabesh-Gilead. And all the men of Nabesh said to Nahash, Jabesh said to Nahash, make a treaty with us and we will serve you. But Nahash the Ammonite said to them, on this condition I will make a treaty with you that I gouge out all your right eyes and thus bring disgrace on all Israel. The elders said, give us seven days to see if we can find somebody to save us. And they let him go out into the land to see if they could find some way, somebody that could save them from this threat. Now, who were these Ammonites? Let's do a little Bible history for a moment. Who were these Ammonites? These Ammonites are descendants of Lot, who was Abraham's nephew. That's a lot earlier. He is the father of the Ammonites. After Abraham and Lot had separated back in Genesis 13, Lot settled in the city of Sodom. You know that story. And when God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah because of their wickedness, Lot and his daughters fled to the hill country on the southern end of the Dead Sea, probably thinking they were the only people left on earth. And Lot's daughters got him drunk. and had relations with him to produce children. That's recorded in Genesis 19. The older daughter had a son named Moab. We've heard of them, haven't we? And the younger daughter gave birth to Ben-Ammi, and that is the Ammonites. Descendants of Ben-Ammi are the Ammonites that are threatening the people of Israel at this particular time. These people are nomadic people who lived in the territory of modern day Jordan, And the name of the capital city, Amman, which is still the capital, reflects the name of those ancient inhabitants, Ammonites, you see. The Ammonites were pagan people who worshiped the gods of Milcom and Molech. You've heard of them if you've read the Bible. God commanded the Israelites never to marry with these pagan people because intermarriage would lead the Israelites to worship those false gods too. Like their god, the Ammonites were cruel people. So when Nahash, the Ammonite, was asking for terms of treaty, he proposed gouging out their right eyes of each Israelite man. Now, the Dead Sea Scrolls add a little bit to this when the Dead Sea Scroll of Samuel comes along. It says, now, Nahash, king of Ammonites, oppressed the Gadites and Reubenites severely. He gouged out all their right eyes and struck terror, and dread in Israel. And not a man remained among the Israelites beyond the Jordan." So in other words, on the other side of the Jordan, on the east side of the Jordan, this guy had already done this stuff. He had already attacked those tribes over there and gouged out all their right eyes, and a bunch of them had fled across the river to this place, to Jabesh Gilead. Now, one commentator says, the men of Jabesh Gilead thought that this was their only hope. We've already been surrounded by the armies. They're threatening us. They're going to kill us. Unless we make a treaty with them, and the treaty is we get to gouge out all your right eyes. Not a very nice treaty. Instead of humbling themselves before God, Israel, who's supposed to know God, It says, okay, alright, we'll make a treaty with you. You can gouge out our wide eyes. It's okay. But hey, wait a minute. Could you let us send out some messengers first and see if anybody might be able to come and help us with this? One commentator says, here we see the sad effect of sin and careless living in lowering men's spirits, sapping their courage, discouraging noble effort, Oh, it is a pitiable sight to see men tamely submitting to a vile master. Yet how often is the sight repeated? How often men virtually say to the devil, make a covenant with us and we will serve you. What's the reason for putting out their right eyes? Well, I kind of alluded to it in the children's introduction. Nahash the Ammonite made this demand for many reasons. First, it was to glorify himself by humiliating the men of the city of Israel, half blinding them. And it would also bring a reproach on all Israel, making Israel look weak and unable to prevent such an atrocity. Second, it would make the men of Jabesh-Gilead unable to fight effectively in battle. In hand-to-hand combat, the man with one eye has less depth perception, and it is a disadvantage to the man who has two eyes. And then this is the one I alluded to. Theodoros says, he who lifts his shield to the enemy with his left hand thereby hides his left eye and looks at the enemy with his right eye. He therefore who plucks out the right eye makes men useless in war. You can't hold a shield and fight if your right eye has been plucked out. So we get to verse three. The elders of Jabesh said to him, give us seven days respite that we may send messengers throughout all the territory of Israel. Then if there's no one to save us, we will give ourselves up to you. Now, why in the world would Nahash let them send out messengers. Why would he do that? Well, he let them do it for two reasons. First, he was confident. He was confident in Israel's disunity. There was no one to unify them and he was sure that there would be no one that would pop up and be willing to help. They couldn't find anyone to save them. Second, by allowing the messengers to go out into all Israel, he would make his name big and famous. His reputation would be everywhere and he would be feared throughout the whole nation because of this threat would be spread everywhere. So now we get to number three in my outline. God's king is empowered to rally a defense, verses five through 10. And it says in verse five, now behold, Saul was coming from the field behind the oxen. I said he's back out farming again. And Saul said, what is wrong with the people if they're weeping? So they told him the news of the men of Jabesh. This is the humility of the king of Israel. He was anointed and he was recognized as king by some and yet in a sense there was nothing for him to do. He didn't really know where to begin when it came to setting up a royal court because they'd never had a king before. So he just went back to farming in the field. And I guess he figured that maybe if there was anything that he really needed to do as king, God would tell him later. And then we get to verse six and it says this, and the spirit of God rushed like a wind, I guess. rushed upon Saul when he heard these words. And his anger was greatly kindled. Verse 7, He took a yoke of oxen and cut them in pieces and sent them throughout all the territory of Israel by the hand of messengers, saying, whoever does not come out after Saul and Samuel, so shall it be done to his oxen. It was time for Saul to act God was with him, the Spirit of God rushed upon Saul. But it didn't come to entertain him or to thrill him. The Spirit came to equip him for service so that he could do something for the Lord to save Israel. And it says, his anger was greatly kindled when he heard of this threat. This was a good spirit led anger within Saul. Saul's anger was not out of personal sense of hurt or offense, but out of a right concern for the cause of Israel. And then what did he do? He took a yoke of oxen and cut them into pieces. Wow. That is crazy, isn't it? In doing this, Saul clearly delivered a message to all Israel, kind of like the message that the mafia used to deliver to their enemies, you know, send them a dead fish or a horse head or something like that. And he's saying, anyone who doesn't rally to the defense of Israel, their oxen are gonna end up like these oxen. So you better get out here and help. And then it says, the dread of the Lord fell upon the people and they came out as one man. Everybody was united. Verse eight, when he mustered them at Bezek, the people of Israel were 300,000 and the men of Judah, 30,000. And they said to the messengers who had come, thus shall you say to the men of Jabesh-Gilead, tomorrow by the time the sun is hot, you shall have salvation. Stick together, men, and you'll win by tomorrow at noon. And when the messengers came and told the men of Jabesh, they were glad. Therefore, the men of Jabesh said, tomorrow we will give ourselves up to you. Now, this is a deception. The men of Jabesh said, tomorrow we'll give ourselves up to you. And you may do to us whatever seems good to you. It's a deception. Saul's bloody work, his bloody threat, I should say, worked. Those hunks of ox flesh came special delivery to all of Israel, and they knew that finally there was a leader in Israel, someone who was rallying them to a cause. And that brings us to my point number four, God's King saves and unifies God's people, verses 11 through 15. Verse 11, the next day Saul put the people in three companies. I don't know where he learned this military strategy, maybe from hearing the stories of Joshua in the past. But he put the people in three companies, and they came into the midst of the camp in the morning, watch, and struck down the Ammonites until the heat of the day. And those who survived were scattered so that no two of them were left together. Here, they deceived old Nahash. They faked surrender to Nahash so that his army would be unprepared for battle. And Saul was given this good military strategy by God so that Saul's action was blessed and victory was total. Nahash and his army were utterly routed and the city of Jabesh Gilead was saved. Now what happens? Verse 12, then the people said to Samuel, who is it that said, shall Saul reign over us? Bring the men that we may put them to death. But Saul said, not a man shall we put to death this day, for today the Lord has worked salvation in Israel. So at this moment, the great supporters of Saul wanted to expose those men who had earlier said, he ain't nobody, he can't do us any good. Saul wisely knew that this was no time to take revenge upon his opponents. Instead, he was into unity, into unifying the nation. And so he didn't take revenge. Here's what one commentator says about this thing going on here. He says, Satan, having failed in the attack through Nahash, the Ammonite, now tried to attack Israel, dividing the nation against themselves. And he says, Satan will attack us any way he can. And he often uses times of victory to attack. And I'll just say this in my personal commentary on this. Christians, who are supposed to be united in our King, our Savior, Christians, all who love Jesus Christ, are sometimes prone to attack each other over minor differences and spend vast energies while doing so, while people all around us in our neighborhoods, in our workplaces, and everywhere are without the gospel, don't know the truth of God's love in Jesus Christ. We spend our energies fighting each other instead of preaching and telling the good news of Christ. Now I'll move on. The men of Jabesh-Gilead had wondered if there was anyone to save them. Saul was the man the Lord raised up to bring victory. Yet Saul himself knew that this was something that the Lord had done. God had done salvation in Israel. And it was the Lord who made Saul humble in this victory. It was all the more tempting for him to take credit, but he did not. So then we get to the final few verses. Listen to these again. Verse 14. Then Samuel said to the people, after all that, he said to the people, come, let us go to Gilgal and there renew the kingdom. So all the people went to Gilgal. There they made Saul king before the Lord in Gilgal. And they sacrificed peace offerings before the Lord. And there Saul and all the men of Israel rejoiced greatly. Samuel knew that the people were not entirely behind Saul, their king, yet. He had been proclaimed as king, but now he needed to be proclaimed again. Samuel wisely sees this time of victory as a strategic opportunity to renew the kingdom at Gilgal. Why Gilgal? Why Gilgal? Well, again, if you've studied this or know something about this history, Gilgal's a very significant place. Gilgal was the place between the Jordan and Jericho where the Israelites first encamped after coming through the Jordan River, which was temporarily stopped by the Lord during a height of flood season. That was a miracle. And here they had kept the first Passover in the land of promise, the land of Canaan. And here they had renewed the right of circumcision and so rolled away the reproach. of their Egyptian slavery in the past. In fact, the word Gilgal means to roll. At Gilgal, the 12 memorial stones that had been placed in the middle of the Jordan River at flood time were taken from the bed of Jordan and set up at Gilgal. And here also, the tabernacle remained until it was removed later to Shiloh. Gilgal continued to be the headquarter for the Israelites for several years while Joshua occupied and subdued the land. Samuel offered sacrifices and held court at Gilgal as a judge in Israel. So it's a very, very significant place. It's the place where Israel comes back to remember its history, to understand who it is, to renew the covenant that God made to make them his own people and give them the promised land. And it says then they made Saul king before the Lord here at Gilgal. Now it wasn't that he wasn't king already, he had been anointed in secret long before. And then we read about how he had been brought out of the hiding and made known as king again. But here they finally recognize him and everybody is united around him as their first king. And then it says at the very end, there Saul and all the men of Israel rejoiced greatly. They rejoiced greatly. Good government is indeed a blessing. When civil government fulfills its God-given functions, defense and temporal security, that's its functions, defense and temporal security, when that happens, the citizens can rejoice. Here Saul rises to the occasion and does well. He fulfills what it says in Proverbs 29, verse 2, when the righteous increase, people rejoice, but when the wicked rule, people groan. And he is fulfilling what the Apostle Paul said in Romans 13, about civil government. He says there, let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except God and those who resist have been instituted by God. Those who exist, excuse me, have been instituted by God. Whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed. and they will incur judgment. He goes on to talk about that. Good government, which is finally seen here in this rallying around their first king, is a blessing to all of God's people. While we are citizens here, folks, while we are citizens here, we do what we can to see good government established. We vote. I hope you vote. We pray for the government every Sunday in this church. We respect the human institution as citizens of this land. We are patriots in that sense. But the best government in the world at any time is the government that acts in accord with God and does what God in his moral will says to do, that's the best government. At his best, Saul here faintly points to the king that you and I all need, a king who saves and delivers his people and unites them. But the best governments in this world is a mere faint shadow of the fulfillment of the kingdom of God and its great king. the son of David. Jesus, the anointed. Isaiah sees what his kingdom will be like in Isaiah 35, 5 through 10. Here's the kingdom of Jesus when it's in its fullness. Here's what it will be like. Listen and see if this doesn't resonate in your heart for the kingdom you want to live in. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened. Wouldn't that be great if there was no blindness? And the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap like a deer. My father was paralyzed from the waist down for 40 some years. The lame man shall leap like a deer and the tongue of the mute shall sing for joy. Waters break forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. The burning sand shall become a pool and the thirsty ground springs of water. In the haunts of jackals, where they lay down, that's a wilderness, grasses and rushes shall come. And, listen to this, and a highway shall be there. It shall be called the way of holiness. Wouldn't you like to have a holy government? The unclean shall not pass over it. It shall belong to those who walk on the way. Even if they're fools, they shall not go astray. No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast come upon it. It's a kingdom without danger. They shall not be found there, but the redeemed shall walk there and the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing. Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain gladness and joy and sorrow and sighing. Do you ever get tired of sighing? Shall flee away. That is the kingdom that we long for. We see a faint shadow of it here in this wonderful victory and in this united gathering at this place. But we long for the great kingdom that's coming in Jesus, the anointed one, the truly anointed King. Our hearts long for this King as we live in the crisis of a fallen world. This world isn't the way it's supposed to be. It's broken. As we live under a death threat, each one of us must die because of sin. That's why we are here today, I hope, waiting, praying, believing, serving, because we believe in a different kingdom, a better kingdom. And I want to finish with this little illustration. When I was in college, I saw a film called The Train. It featured a group of people gathered in an old train station, waiting for the train as darkness fell. Inside, they spoke together about the train and where it would take them. They said it would take them home. They encouraged one another. They served one another. They were young and old. They waited together. At one point, a stranger walked in. He said he had heard that this was the place to wait for the train that he had heard about. Everyone in the station welcomed him. He went to the ticket window and asked to purchase a fare. The ticket master handed him a ticket and said it was free. So there's no charge at all, but you have to wait patiently. He asked, when is the train coming? The ticket master said, soon. Be patient. Don't leave the station. The film ended with the sound of the train coming and a bright light of its engine shining toward the station. And those who were waiting rejoiced. Someday, our king will come. His reign will bring paradise to those who are waiting. We will be home and at perfect peace and security when our King comes and is finally recognized by all and crowned. And so I ask you, are you waiting patiently? Are you serving? Are you encouraging others? Amen. what happened long ago in Israel when you raised up a king to deliver your people. We thank you for good government. We thank you for our time here on earth. We pray that you'll make us good citizens, but we thank you most of all for the great promise we have of a kingdom, the paradise restored. There's no harm or danger, no trouble, no sorrow or no sighing anymore. when Christ's kingdom is fully realized. We pray and thank you for that. In His name.