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willing to do exactly what God tells them to do, and therefore do not do it and try to cover up their disobedience by making great sacrifices that God has not asked of them or making offerings that He has not requested and will not accept until they obey Him. Before Saul got through he was forced to make a straight-out confes sion, “I have sinned” (v. 24). There is nothing more hateful to God than rebellion against His word (v. 23). v. 23. ‘‘Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.’’ Here we discover the whole root of Saul’s trouble: He hid “rejected the Word of the LORD.” Be cause he had rejected His word, God re jected him from being king. Every man’s destiny turns upon what he does with God’s Word. Sin first entered human history by Eve’s rejecting God’s Word and accepting Satan’s word in its place. Thousands are doing the same thing today in our schools and colleges and universities and in every day life. They do not know that it is Satan’s word that they are accepting; it is called, “New Light,” “Advanced Thought,” “Higher Criticism,” “Philosophy,” “Sci ence” (sometimes with the adjective “Christian” prefixed to the “Science”), “Theosophy,” and other high-sounding terms, but it is always something opposed to or different frqjn “The Word of the LORD.” And rejecting the Word of the Lord to accept it brings ruin and the loss of the kingship, the loss of a higher king- ship than Saul had. Jesus Christ Himself is the incarnate Word (John 1 :1-14) and our eternal destiny turns upon what we do with Him, the incarnate Word of the Lord (John 1:12; 3:16, 36). OUTLINE Saul had ceased to follow the Lord, Ps. 78:54-57. He had disobeyed God’s command, ch. 13:13. Samuel’s heart was filled with sorrow, v. 11; Luke 19:41-44.
showed that he had not done what Jehovah had told him to do. He had done some thing like Jehovah had told him to do but not the very thing, and God demands exact obedience. God had told him to smite Amalek and utterly destroy all that they, had (v. 3), but Saul saw fit, in order to satisfy his own pleasure and that of the people, to pick out some to destroy and others to save. And he had brought back the very one that first of all should have been destroyed, “Agag, the king of Ama lek.” That he was fully conscious that he had not done exactly what he had been told was evident from the fact that while saying he had done it, he tried to shift the .blame for not doing it off onto the people (v. 21) arid then seeks to justify them for not doing what they were told by saying they had saved what they had been told to destroy to sacrifice unto Samuel’s God in Gilgal. He made a strange mixup and mess of matters. It is far better to own up frankly and say, “I have sinned.” v. 22. " And Samuel said, Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD?” Saul evidently expected to be able to lie himself out of his difficulty but he did not succeed: no one ever suc ceeds in that attempt. The one thing that pleases God is obedience, that is all He asks of men but "He demands-exact obe dience. Sacrifices and offerings are all right in their place (and their place is when God asks them), but the first thing God demands of us is that we shall do as we are told. If we do not, our sacrifices and our offerings are an abomination unto him. There are many today who are not LESSON (1) God’s Revelation Concerning Saul, vs. 10 - 12 . God’s Word comes to Samuel, v. 10. God has changed His attitude concerning Saul. v. 11; Gen. 6:6. He had two charges against Saul. v. II.
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