#1-Kings & Kingdoms
Notes
Transcript
Kings and Kingdoms
Kings and Kingdoms
Rejecting the Lord
Rejecting the Lord
probably 20 or 25 years elapsed between the events recorded in chapter 7 in those in chapter 8
Samuel was now an old man, about to pass from the scene, and a new generation had emerge in Israel with new leaders who had new ideas.
Life Goes On, circumstances change, and God's people must have wisdom to adapt to new changes without abandoning old convictions.
like more than one great leader, Samuel and his old age faced some painful situations and had to make some difficult decisions. Left the scene convinced that he had been rejected by the people he had served so Faithfully.
Samuel obeyed the Lord, but he was a man with a broken heart.
God had chosen Moses to lead the nation of Israel and Joshua to succeed him oh, but Joshua wasn't commended to lay hands on any successor. he left behind Elders whom he had trained to serve God, but when they died, then the new generation turned away from the Lord and followed the idols of the land.
Asking for a king V1-9
Asking for a king V1-9
1 When Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as Israel’s leaders.
2 The name of his firstborn was Joel and the name of his second was Abijah, and they served at Beersheba.
3 But his sons did not follow his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice.
4 So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah.
5 They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have.”
6 But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord.
7 And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.
8 As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you.
9 Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”
knowing that Israel needed a strong central government, the elders presented their request to Samuel and backed it up with several arguments.
The first two must have cut Samuel to the core: 1) he was now old and had no successor, and his two sons were not Godly men but took bribes. (V3)
How tragic that both Eli and Samuel had sons who failed to follow the Lord.
Eli was too easy on his Wayward Sons, and perhaps Samuel was away from home too much as he made his ministry circuit to the cities.
Samuel Sons were miles away in Beersheba where their father couldn't monitor their works, but if the Elder knew about their sins, surely their father must have known also.
Application
An alert to the father's: don't be so harsh but don't be so easy on your kids, until you can you correct, rebuke, instruct your kids.
be present: kids need their fathers next to them, looking over their shoulders, be there when they fall.
When the elders asked to have a king “like all the nations” , they were forgetting that Israel's strength was to be unlike the other nations.
The Israelites were God's covenant people and He was their King.
The glory of God dwelt in their minds and the law of God was their wisdom.
but the elders were concerned about National Security and protection from the enemies around them. The Philistines were still a powerful nation, and the Ammonites were also a threat.
Israel had no standing army and no King to lead it.
The elders forgot that it was the Lord who was Israel's King and who gave her army the ability to defeat the enemy.
Samuel was a man of spiritual insight and he knew that this demand of a king was evidence of Spiritual decay among the leaders.
They weren't rejecting him; they were rejecting God, and this grieved Samuels heart as he prayed to the Lord for wisdom.
This wasn't the first time the people had rejected their lord. At Sinai, their request was “make us gods” Ex 32:1,
1 When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.”
And after their humiliating failure at Kadesh Barnea they said, “let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt”, Num. 14:4
4 And they said to each other, “We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”
Application
Whenever leadership in a church decays spiritually, that church becomes more like the world and uses the world's method and resources to try to do God's work.
The Jewish leaders in Samuel's day had no faith that God could defeat their enemies and protect his people, so they chose to lean on the arm of Flesh.
God is never surprised by what his people do, nor is He at a loss to know what He should do.
God’s timing is perfect
God’s timing is perfect
There is every evidence in the pentateuch that Israel would one day have a king.
God promised Abraham, Sarah, and Jacob that Kings would be among their descendants, and Jacob had named Judah as the kingly tribe. Moses prepared the nation for a King when he spoke to the new generation preparing to enter the Promised Land Deuteronomy 17: 14-15
14 When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,”
15 be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite.
It wasn't his request for a king that was their greatest sin: it was their insisting that God gave them a king immediately.
The Lord had a king in mind for them, David the son of Jesse, but the time wasn't ripe for him to appear. So, the Lord gave them their request by appointing Saul to be king, and He used to punish the nation and prepare them for David, the men of His choice.
The fact that Saul was from The Tribe of Benjamin and not from Judah is evidence enough that he was never expected to establish a dynasty in Israel,.”
So in my anger I gave you a king, and in my wrath I took him away” Hosea 13:11. the greatest judgement God can give us is to let us have our own way.
11 So in my anger I gave you a king, and in my wrath I took him away.
“and he gave them their request, but send leanness into their soul” Psalm 106: 15
15 So he gave them what they asked for, but sent a wasting disease among them.
However The Lord wanted his people to go into this new Venture with their eyes open, so he commended Samuel to tell them what it would cost them to have a king.
Praying for a king V10-22
Praying for a king V10-22
10 Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking him for a king.
11 He said, “This is what the king who will reign over you will claim as his rights: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots.
12 Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots.
13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers.
14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants.
15 He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants.
16 Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use.
17 He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves.
18 When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.”
19 But the people refused to listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want a king over us.
20 Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”
21 When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the Lord.
22 The Lord answered, “Listen to them and give them a king.” Then Samuel said to the Israelites, “Everyone go back to your own town.”
What's true of individuals is true of Nations: you take what you want from life and you pay for it.
Under the kingship of Jehovah God, the nation had security and sufficiency as long as they obeyed him, and his demands were not unreasonable. To make God's covenant means to live a happy life as the Lord give you all that you needed and more.
But the key word in Samuel speech is take, not give. The king and his court had to be supported, so he would take their sons and daughters their property, their Harvest, and their flocks and herds.
Their choice young man would serve in their army as well as in the king's fields. The daughters would cook and bake for the king.
He would take their property and part of their harvest in order to feed the officials and servants in the Royal household.
While these things weren't too evident under Saul and David, they were certainly obvious under Solomon 1st Kings 4: 7- 28.
The day came when the people cried out for relief from the heavy yoke Solomon had put on them just to maintain the glory of his kingdom.
Pleasing the Lord wasn't the thing uppermost in their minds; what they wanted was guaranteed protection against their enemies.
They wanted someone to judge them and fight their battles, someone they could see and follow.
They found it too demanding to trust an invisible God and obey his wonderful Commandments.
In spite of all the Lord had been for Israel from the call of Abraham to the conquest of the Promised Land, they turned their backs on Almighty God and chose to have a frail man to rule over them.
Application