Lessons from 1 Samuel
For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.
Romans 15:4 (NKJV)
Importunate Prayer Shapes the Tide of a Nation's Destiny
The first part of the book shows how prayer can shape the future of a nation. A barren woman, pressed by the circumstances of her marriage, gave birth to a desire so deep that she prostrated herself before the Lord in wordless prayer, the prayer of the heart. It was desire that moved her to pray. This principle is essential, because desire is to prayer what fuel is to fire: the incense of prayer rises most fully when our prayers are infused with desire. Though God heard her, it was the word spoken by the priest of the Lord that guaranteed her answer. Men from whose mouths God's word issues forth are powerful. Nevertheless, the impact of the woman's prayer was far-reaching.
The Last Judge-Prophet and His Training
A year later the last judge-prophet of Israel was born. In a time when the word of God was scarce, Hannah's prayer gave God the opportunity to raise up a prophet for the nation; prayer affects generations. Samuel was born, the one lent to the Lord, and sent from a young age to be trained in the work of the tabernacle by a priest whose days were numbered because of the wickedness of his household. The aged Eli trained Samuel until his teens, and the best training he could give the young lad was to teach him to respond to God's voice. God called the boy three times, and he did not recognise Him. Interestingly, the Lord knew that Samuel did not recognise His voice, yet He did not introduce Himself to the lad. This is the wisdom of God. We might expect that He would introduce Himself to the boy and stop him running in vain to Eli, but that was not the case, because God required Eli to train the lad to respond to the word. We need to be taught to respond to God's voice, whether His audible voice or His written word. How many people have lost, and been deprived of, the blessings of God because they had no man to teach them the word! At last the priest perceived what was happening and taught the lad, and so his prophetic career began. His first test was to deliver a stern word to the one who had led him all those years. That must have been hard, but he passed the Lord's test and graduated to national responsibility. The urgency came from the fact that Israel lacked a prophetic voice.
The Scarcity of the Word
In a land where there is a famine of the word, wickedness of every kind can be expected to sprout, and a degrading and casting away of moral values is inevitable. It was no different for Israel. Wickedness was seen across the board: in the spiritual structure, through the sons of Eli; in the social structure, in how the people lived; and in the military, for they lost almost every battle. That is what happens to a people who have lost the significance of the word and the presence of God in their lives. Two things were essential to their victory as a nation: the word of God, and how well they heeded it, and the presence of God. They had lost both. Even when they brought out the ark they were still defeated, though the same ark, in the presence of their enemies, produced remarkable terror in their camps. The reason is simple: the life of the heart must correspond with the presence of God, or self-deception lurks.
The Lust for a King
When Israel was ambushed and distressed by the nations around them, they thought a king was necessary to match the standard of the times, and in doing so they forgot the Lord, who was their true King. That is human weakness: we would rather depend on a man than have faith in the God who has our best interests at heart. The Lord was grieved, yet He granted their request, though not without revealing its consequences. This impresses on our minds that we must always be careful to know the will of God and to ask within God's plan for our lives, or we will live regrettable lives, as the children of Israel were soon to discover. From theocracy to monarchy: what a degradation. God gave them a king who reflected the nation as it then was. He anointed Saul.
Saul the King
Saul was the son of Kish, a Benjamite, taller than all Israel. Nothing is said of his fear of God, only of his physical stature. That should tell us that God chose him not for his heart but for his stature, for the appeal he would have to the children of Israel. It is a sad story. To begin with, he was not seeking kingship at all; he was given an office from which he fled, the responsibility of being the first king of Israel, with no royal experience. All he had was the book of royal conduct the prophet had written, and the success of his entire anointing as king rested on one thing: how well he obeyed the voice of God.
The word of God is vital to the anointing in our lives. In ministry today, how well a man performs in office depends largely on God's personal word to him and on His written Word. The Word of God undergirds the anointing of an office; this is a lesson Saul's life teaches us. The first thing the anointing did for him was to give him another heart, a heart to function, and for a time he experienced victory in his newly appointed office, until the test was given. When Samuel delayed his arrival, Saul thought his position gave him licence to carry out the priestly order. How surprised he was when Samuel revealed to him the Lord's mind and regret! Sometimes we must simply be faithful to the revealed word, or we may interrupt and change the course of our lives. One act changed the entire destiny of his dynasty, from one planned to last forever to one that would be exchanged.
You would think things would then improve, but they spiralled downward. The anointing remained on him until the true test was given. The Lord will always test our hearts toward His word, especially when He has given us a call. The test is always the test of the word, and it was no different for the king. And how he failed, to the point that God regretted making him king. Ask yourself whether He will ever regret making you who you are today, or giving you a title. God have mercy on you if He ever does. He did with Saul, because Saul made himself the authority, choosing which parts of the word of God were convenient to fulfil. He rejected the word of God, and God rejected him. If we are ever rejected by God, it will be because we have forfeited His word, which is the standard of the Kingdom. Let us never reject the word, for when we do, we lose everything. Saul is our example. Though he kept the office, he lost the anointing to stand in it, the divine enablement. He lost the kingdom. All Saul had was the strength of his army and of himself, for the Lord had departed from him, and after that the Lord never spoke to Saul again. I would rather die than endure the silence of God; would not you?
May we learn from the experiences of men what to do and what not to do in life. Saul became demonised. The dangers of leading without the anointing, and of living without the word, are countless. The end of his life was tragic. He spent most of it fighting everyone, including himself, his family and God, and he opposed God's plans and purposes. Satan was now working through him to assail the king-to-be. There is no vacuum with God; every space must be occupied, and the anointing is never wasted. When the anointing leaves one man, it goes to another. Remember that. The anointing always comes before the office. No man, except Jesus, experienced such pressures and attacks for being anointed as David did. The anointing is hated by Satan, and our protection against him is not the anointing but the word of God. Without the word, Satan can easily corrupt the anointing, as he did in the case of Saul. Protect the anointing by the Word.