Listen/Obey
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I learned something this week. I learn something every week as I study God’s Word. There’s no mastery here, only new levels of learning.
I learned that the Hebrew word for “listen” is the same word as “obey”. That’s significant it seems in 1 Samuel 15. That word—listen/obey—is repeated several times here (hence the title I gave the sermon).
1 Samuel 15 is a difficult chapter. It’s bugged me since Bible College (you’ll see why as we get into it). Keep in mind as we go through this chapter, however, as tricky as some of this is the stress of the text seems to be on listening to and obeying the Lord.
If you have your Bible (and I hope you do), please turn with me to 1 Samuel 15. Keep your Bible open there this morning as we work our way through, bit by bit.
1 Samuel said to Saul, “I am the one the Lord sent to anoint you king over his people Israel; so listen now to the message from the Lord. 2 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 from Egypt. 3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’ ”
To Listen/Obey Means Submitting to the Lord’s Will
To Listen/Obey Means Submitting to the Lord’s Will
Samuel, with all the authority he has, begs Saul to listen to what the Lord is saying through him.
Samuel wants Saul to listen. This “thus says the Lord” is a big one; it’s a tough one to swallow.
The Lord wants Saul to destroy the Amalekites.
The Amelekites were a wandering tribe who lived in the desert of Judah (that is, the southern part of Israel).
After the Israelites were brought out of slavery in Egypt, the Amalekites attacked Israel. The Lord declared war on the Amalekites at that point, saying: “I will completely blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven...” Moses affirmed: “The Lord will be at war against the Amalekites from generation to generation.”
So, now, some 300 years after their wandering in the wilderness, the Lord intends for Saul to go and attack the Amalekites. Talk about the patience of the Lord!
The Lord tells Saul to totally destroy the Amalekites—put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys. That should about cover it.
Samuel tells Saul to listen to the message from the Lord. Saul’s instructions are clear. He needs to listen/obey; he needs to submit to the Lord’s will.
Even if he doesn’t like it. Even if he doesn’t agree with it. Even if he doesn’t understand it, his is to listen and obey. It’s the same for us.
Our listening and obedience to the Word of the Lord will naturally lead to our submission—just doing what He’s asked. It’s more than hearing. It’s hearing and doing. Listen/obey.
Jesus taught: Matthew 7:24 “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock.”
Hearing and doing. Listening/obeying.
Submission to the Word of God is absolutely paramount. The beginning of verse 4 has a positive start. It begins with “So Saul summoned the men...”
It gives the appearance that Saul might just listen/obey.
4 So Saul summoned the men and mustered them at Telaim—two hundred thousand foot soldiers and ten thousand from Judah. 5 Saul went to the city of Amalek and set an ambush in the ravine. 6 Then he said to the Kenites, “Go away, leave the Amalekites so that I do not destroy you along with them; for you showed kindness to all the Israelites when they came up out of Egypt.” So the Kenites moved away from the Amalekites.
7 Then Saul attacked the Amalekites all the way from Havilah to Shur, near the eastern border of Egypt. 8 He took Agag king of the Amalekites alive, and all his people he totally destroyed with the sword. 9 But Saul and the army spared Agag and the best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves and lambs—everything that was good. These they were unwilling to destroy completely, but everything that was despised and weak they totally destroyed.
Partial Obedience is Disobedience
Partial Obedience is Disobedience
Sadly, what we have here is a failure on Saul’s part to actually listen to and obey what the Lord said to him. What Saul decides to do is clearly not good.
Saul might be able to color his partial obedience as a good thing or the better option; he could try to gloss over it.
But, the truth is: partial obedience is simply disobedience.
Like when your parents told you to clean your room and instead of cleaning you just shoved everything under the bed or in the closet. Not that any of you would do such a thing...
Partial obedience is disobedience. Saul’s partial obedience reveals his heart and character.
It looks good for a few verses. And then we get to verse 8; that’s when the wheels start to come off. Saul, we read, took Agag king of the Amalekites alive. That wasn’t part of what the Lord told Saul to do.
God’s Word to Saul was clear; it said nothing about taking the Amalekite king alive. The Lord commanded total destruction.
Saul might not have agreed with it or liked it very much, but there’s no denying it was clear.
Saul couldn’t say, “Oh, I didn’t realize that’s what you meant. Sorry about that, man. I didn’t quite understand...”
No. God’s Word to Saul was clear:
1 Samuel 15:3 (NIV)
3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’ ”
We don’t have to like it. We don’t have to understand it. We don’t have to agree with it. But there is on denying it’s clear.
Saul got close, but didn’t totally destroy the Amalekites.
This is what they did instead: Saul and the army spared Agag and the best of the sheep and the cattle, the fat calves and lambs—everything that was good. These they were unwilling to destroy completely.
This partial obedience is blatant disobedience. The Lord told them not to spare them. They went ahead and spared Agag and the best livestock. The Lord told them to totally destroy; they were unwilling to completely destroy some of it.
Partial obedience is disobedience.
10 Then the word of the Lord came to Samuel: 11 “I regret that I have made Saul king, because he has turned away from me and has not carried out my instructions.” Samuel was angry, and he cried out to the Lord all that night.
Obedience and following the Lord are essential requirements for a king’s reign to be successful.
The Lord Yahweh is sorry that He made Saul king. Saul has turned back from following the Lord. This is the Lord’s assessment of Saul. Saul hasn’t carried out the Lord’s instructions. Saul has done what Saul wanted to do.
Saul’s disobedience has led to divine regret: “I regret that I have made Saul king.”
This regret or repentance, this sorrow from the Lord is what has bugged me since college.
We saw it in Genesis 6:6 “The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled.”
The regretting or repenting which God does is not like the repenting man does. In fact, it is so different, it’s not really repenting at all. This statement of regret has to be taken alongside verse 29 of 1 Samuel 15.
29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.”
God is not ignorant of what’s going on; He is not unaware of what’s going to happen with Saul. This is the turning of God’s heart in a new direction, but not a direction that was unforeseen to Him.
God does not repent because He is caught off-guard by some turn of events. That would indeed be like man. But the Glory of Israel is not a man that He should repent.
When the Bible says that God repents of or regrets something, it means that He expresses a different attitude than He expressed before. Not because any turn of events was unexpected, but because the attitude is more fitting for the event at hand.
Obedience and following the Lord are essential requirements for a king’s reign to be successful.
When Saul opts to do his own thing his own way, he forfeits any success in the eyes of the Lord; he foregoes the right to be king.
Obedience and following the Lord are the essential posture of the disciple. What was required of Saul is required of us. Jesus makes this plain:
15 “If you love me, keep my commands.
23 Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.
14 You are my friends if you do what I command.
We don’t have to like, understand, or agree with what the Lord commands. Ours is to obey. Ours is to follow Him. And why wouldn’t we?
We wouldn’t obey Him and we don’t obey Him for several reasons Saul is about to illustrate for us.
12 Early in the morning Samuel got up and went to meet Saul, but he was told, “Saul has gone to Carmel. There he has set up a monument in his own honor and has turned and gone on down to Gilgal.”
13 When Samuel reached him, Saul said, “The Lord bless you! I have carried out the Lord’s instructions.”
Obedience loses out to pride and delusion.
Saul sets up a monument to himself! He’s just leaning into this thing. It’s unreal and yet somehow entirely believable.
In Joshua 7, Achan took some of the plunder for himself because he was greedy. Here, Saul does it his way because he’s got the big head.
The book tells us he was a full head taller than anyone else; what it doesn’t say is that his head was 3 sizes too big.
He’s full of himself and just plain full of it: “I have carried out the Lord’s instructions.”
“Oh, really?!? Nah, man…you haven’t.”
Saul has carried out his interpretation of the Lord’s instructions. He’s done his version of the Lord’s instructions. He’s “Thomas Jeffersoned” it, cutting out the parts of God’s Word he didn’t like.
The pride and delusion of Saul outweighs any desire to listen/obey. Disobedience is revealing, it really is.
14 But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?”
15 Saul answered, “The soldiers brought them from the Amalekites; they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the Lord your God, but we totally destroyed the rest.”
16 “Enough!” Samuel said to Saul. “Let me tell you what the Lord said to me last night.”
“Tell me,” Saul replied.
17 Samuel said, “Although you were once small in your own eyes, did you not become the head of the tribes of Israel? The Lord anointed you king over Israel. 18 And he sent you on a mission, saying, ‘Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; wage war against them until you have wiped them out.’ 19 Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the Lord?”
20 “But I did obey the Lord,” Saul said. “I went on the mission the Lord assigned me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king. 21 The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal.”
22 But Samuel replied:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
23 For rebellion is like the sin of divination,
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has rejected you as king.”
Disobedience is Revealing
Disobedience is Revealing
Saul’s pretty good at shifting the blame: the soldiers did it.
We like to believe our disobedience isn’t always our fault. “My friends were doing it.” “He started it.” “The devil made me do it.”
Blame-shifting is all the rage. It’s the most popular excuse around.
When Saul isn’t pointing the finger at someone else, he employs the next best strategy: nuance. Saul’s gifted at nuance: they spared [the animals] to sacrifice to the Lord.
When he was a kid, my uncle Joe got caught throwing rocks at a car stopped at the corner by their house. My Grandma (his mom) saw him, stopped him, probably paddled him, and then asked him, “Joe, why were you throwing rocks at that car?”
“I wasn’t.”
“I saw you! Why were you throwing rocks at that car?”
“I wasn’t.”
“Yes, you were. I saw you with my own two eyes. Tell me why you were throwing rocks at that car. Now!”
“I wasn’t throwing rocks at the car; I was throwing rocks at the man in the car.”
Blame-shifting and nuance doesn’t excuse the disobedience. The disobedience itself is revealing.
Disobedience reveals what we trust. The Lord’s word through Samuel tells us disobedience/rebellion is like the sin of divination.
“Divination” is the practice of seeking knowledge of the future or the unknown by supernatural means (think: Ouija board, fortune teller, psychic, any of that crap).
Divination is seeking to know what to do in a way that ignores the Word and counsel of God.
People would rather pay $29.99 to someone pretending to know the future than to pray and patiently wait for the Lord to answer.
Disobedience reveals what we trust. God says one thing and we say, “Eh, I think I’ll go somewhere else for my wisdom.”
Often we trust “our gut” or we “follow our heart” all the while disobeying God who is the only reliable and sure source of wisdom.
Disobedience reveals what we worship. Saul sets up a monument in his honor after attacks the Amalekites and takes what he wants. Is he celebrating? Is this pride? I believe it’s worship of self also known as idolatry.
In verse 23, disobedience is connected to idolatry.
Disobedience does, in a way, amount to worship of self. Saul thought his way was higher and better and brighter than God’s. Saul has placed himself above God.
Our disobedience reveals the same in us. At the point of disobedience, we’re serving ourselves instead of God.
Disobedience seeks a name for itself instead of a name for God. It consults the wisdom of self instead of being satisfied with the will of God.
Disobedience is always very revealing.
24 Then Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned. I violated the Lord’s command and your instructions. I was afraid of the men and so I gave in to them. 25 Now I beg you, forgive my sin and come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord.”
26 But Samuel said to him, “I will not go back with you. You have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you as king over Israel!”
27 As Samuel turned to leave, Saul caught hold of the hem of his robe, and it tore. 28 Samuel said to him, “The Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has given it to one of your neighbors—to one better than you. 29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.”
30 Saul replied, “I have sinned. But please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel; come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord your God.” 31 So Samuel went back with Saul, and Saul worshiped the Lord.
32 Then Samuel said, “Bring me Agag king of the Amalekites.”
Agag came to him in chains. And he thought, “Surely the bitterness of death is past.”
33 But Samuel said,
“As your sword has made women childless,
so will your mother be childless among women.”
And Samuel put Agag to death before the Lord at Gilgal.
34 Then Samuel left for Ramah, but Saul went up to his home in Gibeah of Saul. 35 Until the day Samuel died, he did not go to see Saul again, though Samuel mourned for him. And the Lord regretted that he had made Saul king over Israel.
The Lord Delights in Obedience
The Lord Delights in Obedience
The Lord wants obedience more than He wants sacrifice. Verse 22 is key for our understanding.
1 Samuel 15:22 (NIV)
22 But Samuel replied:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
Ritual performance without a sincere and submissive spirit is worthless to the Lord.
Saul was all prepared to offer some sacrifices, so he said. What he wasn’t willing to do was obey.
The Lord delights, He takes pleasure in the obedience of His people.
The disobedience of Saul led to his rejection as king, personally. He had already been told that his dynasty would end; but now he loses the right to be king personally. One better than him (David who is better, though not perfect) will be the recipient of the kingdom.
Saul apologizes, even confesses, but Samuel isn’t satisfied with the sincerity of Saul’s confession. It’s something to say but it’s not truly meant. Saul actually is more concerned with his standing before his people than before the Lord.
In verse 30, notice Saul can’t refer to the Lord as “my God”.
30 Saul replied, “I have sinned. But please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel; come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord your God.”
How tragic it is, the story of Saul. Saul is disappointing and disobedient. And the Lord regrets making Saul king. That’s some heavy, heavy stuff.
But we’re not without hope.
Samuel is obedient where Saul is not. Samuel takes care of Agag, putting him to death (ESV: hacked Agag to pieces) before the Lord at Gilgal.
Samuel is obedient where Saul is not (doing what Saul should have done to begin with). Samuel is obedient where the Lord requires.
Sadly, Saul doesn’t benefit from this. Samuel has to take on the task Saul failed to finish.
In a way, what Samuel does is a hint of what Jesus does.
Jesus is obedient where we are not. Jesus is obedient—fully, faithfully, completely.
Where we fall short, Jesus succeeds. Jesus is obedient where we are disobedient. He does what we cannot. And Jesus’ perfect obedience to will of His Father extends to us. It benefits us.
In Christ, it’s as if we have been perfectly obedient to the Lord.
This is the Good News, the gospel of Jesus Christ: all Jesus has done has been transferred to us. Jesus’ perfection imputed to us. Jesus’ obedience credited to us.
“There are two things to do about the gospel. Believe it and behave it.” -Susanna Wesley
Friends, believe the glorious and unearned truth: Jesus was obedient where you and I are not. This is the basis of our hope and the foundation of our faith.
Our obedience won’t save us; Jesus saves us. Jesus’ obedience, His sinless and perfect life, His atoning death and resurrection assures us.
Believe.
Believe and behave the gospel way. “The obedience God loves is the obedience of faith.” Your obedience doesn’t have to be perfect, but the Christian’s desire needs to be doing what the Lord has commanded.
Believe and behave.
Listen and obey.