Barnsley Baptist Church,

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1 Barnsley Baptist Church, Sunday: 4 th March 2018 Scripture; 1 st Samuel Chapter 15. Theme: The Cost of Disobedience. Preacher: Rev. Ken Jefferson Introduction. As I sat at my desk this week, with the snow deepening by the minute, I wondered if we would in fact be open today, especially when the weather app was showing snow for Saturday and Sunday. However, in faith I proceeded, and at least there is the facility for those who couldn t make it today, to catch up on the message which is available in the notes and it will also be on line. So we proceed! The first thing we have to say is that the chapter we have before us today is not the easiest chapter in the bible, in fact, given the world we live in, a world of ethnic cleansing, a world of genocide, of mass killing and unremitting violence, we might well wonder what is to be gained by even taking time to work through a passage like this. As the bombs rain down on people in Syria, who wants to be coming to church to hear about a divinely sanctioned wipe-out of an entire people? At a surface reading, this is just the kind of thing that makes people say that the Bible, if it is read correctly has two Gods. There God of the Old Testament, who is really very frightening, distant and angry, who has so much power at His disposal and isn t afraid to use it if anyone crosses His path. This is unacceptable. By contrast there is the God of the New Testament who is loving, generous and altogether different. In fact, God is like Jesus, which led one former Archbishop of Canterbury to say that some people have a creed which says, God is Christlike and in Him is no nastiness at all. Over against this kind of thinking, we have to remember what the Bible itself teaches us. It says All Scripture is God breathed ( given by inspiration of God, and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness... (2 Tim 3.16.) That little word all is so important, because it prevents us thinking that we can have a pick and mix approach to the Bible. We are meant to take it all, because we need it all. The necessity, the sufficiency and the inerrancy of its truth are foundational for the faith we have. And this means when we come to a passage like this one today we do so as those who embrace what Paul says about the scriptures. He writes in Romans 15.v.4. For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance and encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. This gives us both confidence and the conviction that when we open this chapter. There must be something of value in it for us. We need to give it our best attention. There is a law that operates in coal mining. I wonder if you who have live din this coal mining community know of it? It is called Hilt s law, and it statesthe deeper the coal seam, the higher its rank.the deeper we go into the Word of God, the richer our faith will become. ******************* This chapter begins with a no nonsense statement by Samuel to Saul. Samuel affirms his authority, which puts Saul in his place, and calls him to listen to a message that is divine and direct. It is a Thus saith the Lord, type message, and it demands complete attention. The king is not above the Word, he is to be its servant. This is not Samuel s word, it is God s word and has all the weight in the world behind it and within it. What is the content of this urgent and insistent word? It is a declaration of God s purpose and an instruction that it is to be obeyed. Now notice the very first words.. This is what the Lord Almighty says, I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up out of Egypt. Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them. Put to death, men and women, children, infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys NowHow does this sit with us? We have here God s judgment. We have the reason for it, and then we also have the severity of His judgment, which is seen in the demand for the total destruction of this people group. What kind of sense do we make of this, if any sense at all?. Well first up, we have to say, some general things, before we come to the particulars of this situationbefore us in ourchapter today. The first thing to be said,which is fundamental to everything else, is that God is God and God is judge of all the earth. In all His judgments God is perfect, God is just and God is right.his judgments are never flawed. A human judge may have a defendant

2 before him. He will have to look at the evidence brought when an offence is committed, and he will have to make a judgment which may be based on accurate or inaccurate evidence. He may have mostof the facts but he will not necessarily have all the facts in a given case. His judgment is meant to be impartial but is not always so. He may be swayed in his opinion by the cleverness of an advocate, or the brilliance of a barrister, and sometimes of course a judgment may simply be wrong. God s judgments are never like this. His judgments are always right, or more appropriately we should say His judgments are righteous judgments, they bear His character at all times. If and when God Judges, we can be sure that the punishment fits the crime. God s judgments are as wide as the world. He is as the scripture tells us the Judge of the whole earth. The writer of the psalms says this many times. Listen to Psalm 96 verses (read) God is the judge of all men. God judges the nations, and He also judges every individual, each person according to his own ways, as the prophet Ezekiel warns ( ) The Writer of Ecclesiastes says, God will bring to judgment both the righteous and the wicked for there will be a time for every activity, a time for every deed. God judges His own people. The Writer of the book Deuteronomy says, The Lord will judge His people and have compassion on his servants when he sees their strength is gone and no one is left slave or free. (Deut ) And Peter reminds us that when judgment comes it begins not with those who are far out on the world s side, but with the church of God.. (lst Peter 4.17.) God doesn t just judge the appearance of things. He doesn t just look at actions. He judges the reality. The prophet Jeremiah records the words of the Lord, I the Lord search the heart and examine the mind to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve. And the Apostle Paul reminds us that there is a day of judgment coming when God will judge men s secrets through Jesus Christ. (Roman 2.16.) And when God s judgments are revealed they will be righteous judgments. God will give to each person according to what he has done. (Romans 2.6.) And God will never show any favouritism. (Romans 2.ll.) Even now God judges the thoughts and intents of the heart, but there is a coming day of judgment. Scripture says Christ will be the agent of Judgment. He will come to judge the living and the dead, and of this there is no doubt, as Paul says in 2.corinthian 4. We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive what is due him for the things done in the body, whether good or bad. And there is to be a general judgment at the end of the world, when history as we know it is brought to an end, and God judges the world. Scripture says that God commands men everywhere to repent because He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice, by the man ( Christ Jesus) whom He has appointed. He has given proof of this by raising Him from the dead, (Acts 17.v. 31.) This is just a very small fraction of the truth of what the Scripture has to say on the subject on the subject of judgment, enough to show that it is an essential, indeed a central part of biblical revelation. God is our judge, an active Judge, whose judgments are to be understood as holy and just. We must never forget it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. And this brings us to the particular issue of our passage todaybecause the Amalekites were about to experience just how fearful thing it was to experience the judgment, indeed the wrath of God. This tells us something. God s judgments are never arbitrary. They are never outbursts of Divine temper, or ill considered acts of vengeance. God s judgment deals with specific actions. They are directed against real evil. And the Amalekites were guilty of great evil, against God s people, attacking them when they were especially vulnerable. There is a record of this given to us in Exodus 17.v (read.) But look what follows in verse 14. An then in the book of Deuteronomy right in the middle of His giving domestic instructions, perhaps miscellaneous laws to Israel, Moses suddenly says. Remember what the Amalekites did to you along the way, when you came out of Egypt. When you were weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and cut of all who were lagging behind. They had no fear of God. When the Lord your God gives you rest, from all the enemies around you in the land He is giving you to possess as an inheritance, you shall blot out the memory of the Amalek under heaven. Do not forget. ( 25.v )The behavior of the Amalekites was so bad, it was inhuman and merciless. It was against natural law and would be punished.god had unfinished business with these people and Israel would be the appointed agent carrying out His judgment. In case she forgot this duty it was written down as an aid to memory.

3 Now here is a truth that is simple and one you know very well. If you ignore a problem it does not usually go away. In fact, most times it grows, assuming proportions that it should never have had? Have you noticed this? I am sure you have, in many spheres. This is what Israel had done! long before the time of Saul, Israel had been told to move into the promised land and to vanquish the nations that were already there in Canaan. She should move forward knowing that God was with her, fighting against her enemies and giving them victory. She was to deal with the surrounding nations overwhelming them, driving them away and getting rid of them because if she did not,the Writer of Deuteronomy says, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshipping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God. Time and time again Israel is told to advance knowing God is fighting for her, victory is assured. God has chosen His people and will establish His people. That s is His part, and for her part Israel must clear out the land, ridding it of all opposition to her God. And all that was taken in her advance was to be given over was to be devoted to God. The fruits of victory were never hers, it was all His. Everything seized was placed under a ban,it was separated as belonging to God, since everything belonged to God in the first place and it would be devoted to destruction All of this was to be done not because Israel was fighting to spread her faith which is what the Islaamic Jihad is all about. Israel was not fighting for her faith, God was fighting for His people, establishing her life in the world, and she had to be a separate people in the world, especially separate from any contamination caused by the worship false gods. But Israel failed to do what she was told to do. She never did clear out all the tribes in Canaan and as a result they remained a source of strife and trouble to her, corrupting her faith, encouraging idolatry and earning God s judgment. The problem of the Amalekites, who peristently troubled Israel as far back as the time of Abraham should have been dealt with but it wasn t- not for hundreds of years. She became a curse to Israel and God had promised to Abraham that just as he would bless those who blessed Israel, so he would curse those who cursed Israel. And now we see, in this something we should always realise. God being God, must have a perfect memory. memory. We tend to forget what God remembers. For example,we gloss over our transgressions but God remembers, We put them out of our minds, but God doesn t put then out of His mind.. God only forgets forgiven sin.sin for which there has been genuine repentance. That s the only sin He puts into the sea of His forgetfulness. God remembers every unconfessed sin, and there is always a judgment lying against that, and an accountability for it. God has total recall, which is something we would do well to remember if we are tempted to take our wrongs too lightly. Sin is an offence against God and it incurs His wrath God did not forget the treachery of the Amalekites,and they were paid in full when Saul with a massive army advanced, warning the Kennites away from the action because of their past kindness to Israel and possibly because Moses had married a Kennite woman. When this was done, the sentence of death was carried out as God had determined it would be. But not quite! Because we are told that Saul and his men took King Agag alive, along with the best of the sheep and cattle and calves and lambs. These they were unwilling to destroy completely, but everything that was despised, and weak they totally destroyed. This brings us to the second point of this passage. The first deals with the difficult subject of the severity of God, but now we learn of the disobedience of a man. We now learn something about the power of sin. It is the same sin that had previously brought Israel to a stand still. It was the sin that Achan committed when he kept some of the treasure of Jericho for himself in defiance of Gods command that everything in the city should be destroyed, an action for which he, and all his family, paid for with their lives, when they were stoned to death and their bodies burned. The place where it happened was called the valley of Achor the valley of trouble. Now we have the same action taking place again. Sin causes sorrow even in the heart of God. Did you hear that? Sin is no small matter of little consequence, sin causes pain in the heart of God. God tells Samuel that He is grieved that He has made Saul King, because Saul has turned away from Him and failed to carry out His instruction. God says to Samuel, I regret that I have made Saul king.god is not saying I think I made the wrong choicewith that one. He is saying He feels real

4 grief, genuine sorrow that Saul despite all His grace and gifts shown toward Him. Has failed and fallen. How has he failed and fallen? He has turned away from God. He has failed and fallen because he has tried tooffered to God, something that is an offense to God. He has tried to offer God flexible obedience. Saul has taken a take it or leave it attitude to obedience. Some things are worth doing and other things are inconvenient, and he chooses to be selective,to be flexible in his obedience. When Samuel hears, what God has to say, he is angry. Actually the text doesn t tell us where his anger is directed. Is he angry with God? Is he angry with himself for ever being involved in the anointing of Saul, in ever being part of the whole Kingship business,which he never really agreed with in the first place. Does he have that kind of anger that can t wait to give vent to itself, being quick to say I told you this is the way things would work out? Or his anger the anger of deep frustration that this man, with so much opportunity to do something wonderful for the nation, for the honour of God, with every opportunity to become a great leader, to make a name for himself in the best sense, has thrown it all away? Samuel is spurred into action. He goes to meet Saul only to find that Saul, intoxicated with his success against the Amalekites, has gone to southern Judah to Carmel to make the people of that area aware of his victory. He set up a monument in his own honour This is a picture of pride, and we see Saul kneeling where most proud people kneel? Where do most proud people kneel. At the shrine of their own ego Saul returns to Gilgal. And what is the signifancxe of this? It was at Gilgal he gained the kingdom, and now at Gilgal he will lose the kingdom. Can t you just picture this meeting between Samuel and Saul? Saul tries to take the initiative, presenting himself in the best possible light. I have carried out the Lord s instruction. But Samuel effectively sets up a judicial enquiry. A question and answer session gets underway. What is the sound of this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear? Saul responds by playing the blame game. The cattle are the spoils of war taken by the men, but they only did this in order that they might make a sacrifice to the Lord. What was done was not for us, it was. for Him. Samuel intervenes and puts Saul in his place.your were once a nobody but God made you a somebody. He have you a position just as He gave you this mission, and made clear its terms. It could not have been clearer. And you blew it! You failed to carry out the mission. Instead of looking after God s interests you looked after your own. Why did you do it? Why did you decide to grab some goods and involve your self in this evil. Why? And in response Saul does what so many a guilty man has done and does. In spite of the evidence to the contrary, he insists that he is innocent of all charges. I did what I was asked to do. I fulfilled what was set out before me to the letter of the law. I wiped out the enemy and captured their king- It is true that some of the goods were taken- but that wasn t me. You can t lay any charge against me for that. The men did what they did, but even their motives weren t so bad. They did what they did so that they would have food to present at a victory celebration and sacrifice. This is Saul. We might say running of at the mouth, trying to dig himself out of a hole as best he can. And how does Samuel respond? He responds with one of the shortest and yet most profound statements in the whole of the Bible. To obey is better than sacrifice. Clearly sacrifices were, as they are, an integral part of an offering that is made to God, and they can be highly valued, but sacrifice that is not accompanied by obedience is really no sacrifice at all. There is an acid test that lies behind every offering made to God. Is it accompanied by an obedient spirit? Obedience which is a matter of the will and of the heart must motivate any and every offering, and without this no matter what is offered, no matter what is sacrificed it will have no effect because it cannot please God who looks beyond the gift to the heart of the giver. Obedience is the evidence and the action of love. What did Jesus say? If you love me, give me your cash. If you love me give me your support. If you love me, give me your ability. If you love me give me your influence, give me your time? No! He said, If you love me keep my commandments. Without obedience, you have nothing to offer God. There is nothing else He needs from you but obedience that comes from the heart. And this of course is why each one of us needs the gospel and its power, because we are not by nature ready, eager and willing to offer God obedience. By nature, we are what scripture calls, children of disobedience, and we need to be made children of obedience, through the change that

5 Jesus can and does make in our hearts, turning us from the prodigals we are, into the sons of the Father we ought to be. And even when we have been made children of obedience we remain a work in progress. We need to learn obedience not is some areas of our lives but in every area, so that we truly do offer God our lives as living sacrifices which are holy and acceptable to Him, which is as Scriptures says.our reasonable service. ********************** As Samuel questions and convicts Saul, he moves step by step to pronouncing a sentence. Saul is guilty of disobeying the Lord. He has rebelled. He has rejected the Word of the Lord and the cost and consequence could not be more severe because you have rejected the word of the Lord. He has rejected you as king. *********************** Now we move into the last section of this passage. It has been tough stuff. There is the severity of God s judgment, Saul s flexible obedience and disobedience but now we have the subject of repentance. Remember when God gave Saul the kingdom, He gave it conditionally. Saul would have his kingdom as long as he lived in obedience to God, and if he had done so he would have had his kingdom until his death, but it was being taken away by God, who is grieved. God is not granite. He feels deeply and He regrets that He has ever chosen Saul. now he demonstrates that He never deals in terms of bluffs or empty threats. If Saul has gone wrong the wrong must be dealt with. God is not fickle. He who is the glory of Israel does not lie or change His mind. He is not man who chops and changes His purposes. God does not just go with the flow. What he says He will do, will come to pass and Saul s kingdom will most certainly pass. Samuel with sorrow turns to leave Saul, and as he does so, Saul tried to restrain him reaching out grabbing and tearing Samuel s robe. Samuel tells Saul that this is really a symbol of the kingdom being torn from him and being given to one better than himself. There is no going back on that. And yet even as this door closes, Saul has lost a kingdom but he could still save his soul. But, did he save His soul. Did he know that God is always ready when someone genuinely repents? Saul does admit to his sin He does acknowledge his transgression and admits his guilt and he makes a plea for pardon. All the necessary steps for a person seeking forgiveness, the steps you and I need to take. But if we look more closely Samuel doesn t say, Saul is pardoned because he listens to what Saul says. Yes I have done this. I have sinned, and I need to get right with God, but just for now, honour me before my people and before Israel, come back with me, so that may worship the Lord YOUR God. Now think of this. This is the last time that Samuel and Saul will be together. It is a last chance for Saul to put things right, but what is uppermost in his mind? It is not how he appears before God that really matters but how he appears before men that is on his mind. It is his reputation that will be in tatters if Samuel walks away. Saul pleads for some final support from Samuel and he is willing even to go through some ceremony to show that he is a man of faith when in fact he is nothing of the kind. It is not his soul he wants to save but himself. Samuel, probably for the sake of the nation goes with Saul and goes through a ceremony before dealing with Agag the king. Like Joshua, and Gideon before him, he has to act in a judicial way and take out the king as a sign that the victory over the Amalekites is complete. Samuel goes on his way mourning. Normally when there is regime change there is great celebration, but there is nothing like this here. All Samuel knows for sure is that the nation needs another king, and there is another king- a man after God s own heart being prepared. But listen! This coming king for all his greatness, will turn out to have feet of clay. He will fail very greatly and sin very hugely and beyond the coming David the nation will need another King. And another King will come of David s is line King Jesus, whose kingdom will never fail, because Jesus never fails. He never fails in obedience,. He never fails in carrying out the mission His father gave Him and through Him and of Him it will be said, the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our God and of His Christ, and He will reign for ever and ever. Amen!!!!