1 SAMUEL 13
Read 1 Samuel 13:1-22
The old problems with the Philistines continued and Saul, as king, had the duty of defeating them. But what actually happened was that Jonathan, his son, led the attack (v3) and won a victory. All well and good, but does this leave us a little bit uneasy? When Israel asked Samuel for a king back in Chapter 8, they said that they wanted ‘to be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and go out before us and fight our battles’. So as king, Saul should have led them into battle. And to make matters worse Saul issued a press release claiming ‘Saul has attacked the Philistines’ (v4). This perhaps suggests that Saul is not going to be a great king.
In vv11-14 we see again that Saul doesn’t do what is right. What lies behind this incident is Samuel’s instruction to Saul in Chapter 10 Verse 8: ‘Go down ahead of me to Gilgal. I will surely come down to you to sacrifice burnt offerings, but you must wait seven days until I come to you and tell you what you are to do’. Saul is at Gilgal with the Philistines not far away and with his own army dwindling. Eventually Saul lost patience – or perhaps more accurately, lost his nerve – and carried out the sacrifice himself. At which point, with immaculate timing, Samuel appeared and was horrified at what Saul had done. Saul had failed to follow Samuel’s explicit instructions to wait the full seven days, but what was worse was that he had carried out the sacrifice himself. It was clear in the Old Testament law that priests carried out the sacrifice, not lay people. Saul may have been king, but he was not a priest, and he was not entitled to carry out the sacrifice.
We might have some sympathy for Saul, worried about an attack from the Philistines at any moment with his own troops drifting away. But he disobeyed God’s prophet Samuel. And, as we know, God’s prophet speaks on behalf of God himself, so Saul was disobeying God’s word. Another black mark for Saul was that he tried to blame Samuel saying. ‘you did not come at the appointed time’ (v11). Samuel may have left it late but he did arrive before the deadline, verse 13 implies. All in all Saul does not come out of this incident with much credit at all.
There is a lack of trust in God’s word here and a desire to take things into his own hands. We must learn to read God’s word and to trust it, even if it does not accord with our own way of doing things. And also not to dismiss God’s word and do things our way because we think it is better. There was pride and a touch of arrogance in Saul’s actions; we must be on our guard not to be like him and we must learn to submit to God’s word and will.