1 Samuel 9-10, Seeking donkey, but found a kingdom

In the first installment of Shrek, the ogre named Shrek was happy living alone in the middle of swamp with no one to bother him. But, things changed quickly when his house was completely surrounded and occupied by the fleeing characters from all kinds of ferry tales. So, he set out to straighten things up to regain his solitary, secluded life in the swamp; to regain peace and quietness shut out from the world, he reluctantly agreed to Lord Farquaad who demanded Shrek to rescue and bring Princes Fiona from the supposedly fearsome dragon, but in reality a lonely creature that found true love with the talking donkey.

Shrek set out single-mindedly to rescue princes Fiona so that he could get his swamp back just the way it was, shut out from the world. But, as we all know that’s not how things turned out for him. A loner, antisocial, selfish creature falls in love with princes Fiona.

That is how our story unfolds for us in today’s Bible passage, 1 Samuel 9. It is a story of a young man seeking for the lost donkeys, but was made a leader over Israel. It is an important story that will inform you today that God is after raising you up to be somebody important in his kingdom for his glory; God is after you to make you someone greater beyond what you think is possible.

1. Searching for donkeys.

The young man’s name is Saul. 1 Samuel 9:1 says that he came from the tribe of Benjamin. If you remember in the book of Judges, the tribe of Benjamin was almost wiped out due to the sins of people. So, in the context of Samuel, the tribe of Benjamin was the smallest tribe out of all the tribes. His father’s name was Kish known to be a man of standing, a man of considerable wealth and status in the community.

Verse 2 characterizes him as “an impressive young man without equal among the Israelites- a head taller than any of the others.” Saul was a son of well known and well regarded man of standing; Saul himself was also a man of standing, well that is literally speaking, a giant among the Israelites.

His father’s donkeys got lost and he wanted his son to go and find them. So, we see Saul along with his servant venturing out to look for the lost donkeys. Consider what Samuel said about their journey in verse 20, they looked for 3 days without finding any of the lost donkeys. They must have covered quite of land in those three days!

After three days of journey to look for the lost donkeys, Saul was ready to call it quit thinking that his father would be worrying about him by now more than the lost donkeys.

But, the servant wanted to try one more thing; he wanted them to go and talk to a man of God, Samuel, who might be able to tell them which way they should go to find the lost donkeys. When seeking a prophet’s intervention, it was a courtesy to bring gift. Their food was no more; they had nothing valuable to offer to the prophet or that is what Saul thought. So, Saul hesitated.

But, it happened that the servant had a quarter of shekel of silver that is about three grams of silver. No longer hesitant, Saul took the charge now and led them to the town where the man of God was.

As they were going up the hill to the town, in verse 11, they met some girls who came out to draw water. The girls told them the seer, the prophet, Samuel, had just come to the town. And, he was heading to the high place to eat with the people he invited. His quests would not begin the meal until Samuel arrived to bless the sacrifice. The girls told them, “Go up now; you should find him about this time.”

The girls were probably thinking how lucky these guys were to come at just the right time to see Samuel. If the dinner started, they would have to wait until the meal was done since they were not invited. Saul and the servant probably thought that they were closer now to find the donkeys.

Now, was it really about luck as the girls might have thought or finding the donkeys? In the greater scheme, behind the scene, beyond their understanding, God was doing something special. Let’s see what it was.

2. Behind the scene, God was raising up a leader.

9:15 tells us that the day before Saul’s arrival the LORD revealed himself to Samuel and told him about a man’s arrival from the land of Benjamin and how he wanted Samuel to anoint this man as the leader over his people Israel.

When finally Saul showed up and Samuel caught sight of Saul, Samuel heard form the LORD, “This is the man I spoke to you about; he will govern my people.” While this was going on in Samuel’s mind, verse 18, Saul asked Samuel, “Would you please tell me where the seer’s house is?” Saul had no idea who he was talking to or what was really going on behind the scene. He thought it was just about finding those lost donkeys, hoping the seer would help.

Samuel told Saul in verse 19, “I am the seer… Go up ahead of me to the high place, for today you are to eat with me, in the morning I will let you go and will tell you all that is in your heart.” And, he told Saul that the donkeys were found and he no longer had to worry about them. He also said to Saul, “And to whom is all the desire of Israel turned, if not to you and all your father’s family?” in verse 20.

Here was Saul seeking after the lost donkeys belonging to his father, but now he no longer needed to seek donkeys. Instead, he was told he would be the leader of Israel.

He asked Samuel in verse 21, “But am I not a Benjamite, from the smallest tribe of Israel, and is not my clan the least of all the clans of the tribe of Benjamin? Why do you say such a thing to me?” What he thought of himself and could be didn’t match with what God wanted him to become and do.

Isn’t this how Christian life is? We have pretty good understanding about ourselves, or at least we think we do just like Saul did. Without Christ, life is about seeking donkeys, but with Christ, we are the children of the living God.

Christian maturity is about becoming the person God wants us to be and doing the things that he wants us to do.

Samuel brought Saul and the servant into the hall where the invited guests were waiting for Samuel. Samuel had Saul and the servant seated at the head of the gathering. And he had the cook bring out the piece of meat he told earlier to set aside. And, he told Saul in verse 24, “Here is what has been kept for you. Eat, because it was set aside for you for this occasion.”

Behind the scene, Samuel called the quests of honor to a very special dinner. It was a dinner fit for the coronation of a king. The special dinner portion was set aside for the arrival of the God’s anointed. And, Saul had no idea.

Next morning, Samuel had Saul sent the servant ahead of them while Saul stayed with him awhile so that he may give him a message from God, 9:27.

And, we see in chapter 10:1-8, we see Samuel anointing him with the special sacred oil of consecration (Exodus 30:23-33; Ps. 89:20). Samuel said in verse 1, “Ha not the LORD anointed you leader over his inheritance?” And, he told Saul to anticipate three signs that would confirm indeed God was raising him up to be the leader of the Israelites.

· Meeting two men near Rachel’s tomb who will inform him that the donkeys were found and his father was worrying about Saul.

· Meeting three men at the tree of Tabor who will greet Saul and offer him two loaves bread.

· Meeting a procession of prophets and how the Spirit of the Lord would come upon him in power; enable Saul to prophecy along with the prophets and change him into a different person.

· When these signs were fulfilled, Saul was told that he could do whatever his hand found to do for God was with him; he was to act according to the strength given him by the Holy Spirit to accomplish God’s will.

Applications

1. What are you seeking after? Do you know what God is doing behind the scene? Do you know how God wants to raise you up? Do you know who you are in Christ?

2. How do you know who you are in Christ? ----Do you wait for the message from God?

3. Are you helping others to discover who they are in Christ like Samuel did with Saul?

1 Samuel 8, God's smater plan!

It was a long journey together to finish off the book of Judges. And, we’ve finished the first seven chapters of 1 Samuel. Yet, it is not until now in 1 Samuel 8 that we are going to see the end of the Judges period and the new season in the history of Israel, when kings would rule.

1 Samuel 7:17 closed the chapter 7 with a comment on how Samuel always went on to judge Israel from his home town of Ramah. And, 1 Samuel 8:1 begins with another comment about Samuel. He was now an aging figure in Israel; he appointed his two sons, Joel and Abijah, to serve the Lord at Beersheba, some fifty seven miles away from Ramah where he ministered. His sons had biblical and godly names: Joel “The Lord is God” and Abijah “My Father is the Lord.” And, you would think that a godly leader like Samuel would have perfectly godly children fitting their godly names. We see that this was not the case.

1. You are responsible for your own spiritual walk.

Their reputable and biblical names meant just that, names only. Verse 3 tells us that they did not walk in their father’s ways. Instead, they were after dishonest gain by accepting bribes and perverting justice. Deuteronomy 10:17 says this about God, “For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes.” And, his commandment was to be like him according to Deuteronomy 16:19-20, “not pervert justice or show partiality… not to accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous. Follow justice and justice alone, so that you may live and possess the land the LORD your God is giving you.” Proverbs 17:23 says, “A wicked man accepts a bribe in secret to pervert the course of justice.”

The fact that godly Samuel had wicked children teaches us this truth. We are all responsible for our own spiritual walk. Samuel’s sons could blame no one but themselves for their moral failures. Seeing the big picture of Samuel’s life, there is no doubt that Samuel instructed and trained his boys according to Proverbs 23:6, “Train a child in the way he should go.” The sons were called to walk in father’s ways. But, they didn’t. Each of us must account for our actions. You cannot blame your parents for where you are spiritually. You cannot blame the church for where you are spiritually. You cannot blame the world for where you are spiritually with God. Romans 14:10-12 says this, “… For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. It is written: ‘As surely as I live,’ says the LORD, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.’ So, then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.” You are responsible for your spiritual condition.

2. When you feel rejected, turn to God who can clarify you what’s really going on and what you need to do.

Verse 4 and 5, we see the all the elders of Israel confronting the aging leader Samuel at Ramah. They reasoned with Samuel. “You are old… Your sons do not walk in your ways.” On these reasons, they demanded Samuel to “appoint a king to lead” them, just like “all other nations have.”

Verse 6 shows how Samuel thought of this demand from the Israelites and how he dealt with it. Now, let’s remember that this was Samuel who secured a great victory over the Philistines for them, a lasting peace through his life time with God’s help. Now, here they were telling Samuel basically, “Samuel, you are good as dead and your sons are no good. So, let us tell you what we think is best for us. Now, we are not asking, but we are telling you, we are demanding you to give us what we want. Give us a king to lead us just like the nations around us.”

We don’t know exactly how personally Samuel took this. All we are told is that he was displeased with what they were saying to him. Perhaps, he was annoyed, upset, attacked, unappreciated, felt taken for granted, cheated, pushed aside… Perhaps, he felt that God’s honor was at stake.

Could we fault Samuel if he took things personally? How would you feel if you were Samuel? What would you do? Wouldn’t you take what they were saying personally and get upset about it? When you feel displeased by what others say to you, what do you do?

Verse 6 tells us, feeling displeased Samuel “prayed to the LORD.” Instead of exploding in anger, unleashing his wrath against the people of Israel, or arguing, defending, fighting back… he brought the matter before the LORD. The feeling of displeasure was real and strong, but what was more important for Samuel was to know how God thought of the situation and what God wanted him to do.

Verse 7-9 shows what God thought of the Israelites wanting a king for themselves. He said: “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. As they have done from the day I brought them out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will do.” Let’s break down what God was saying to Samuel.

• Their rejection was ultimately the rejection of God as their king.
• This rejection of God as their king was equivalent to their forsaking him and serving other gods.
• People’s rejection of God meant the rejection of his servant, Samuel, as well.
• God’s practical solution was to grant them their demand, but only after warning them what the earthly king on the throne will do.

God clarified for Samuel what was really going on. If Samuel acted out of his impulse, he would not have gotten the big picture. The big picture was that Samuel was being rejected by people not because it was personally against him, but because people had rejected God as their king. So what was at stake was God’s honor.

God also clarified for Samuel what he had to do. There was a situation in Luke 9. Jesus sent messengers ahead of him into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him. But, the people there did not welcome him. Luke 9:54 recorded how James and John reacted to their rejection of Jesus. “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” They felt right to feel this way. But, “Jesus turned and rebuked them.” Jesus rebuked them because he instructed them earlier in Luke 9:5; “if people do not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave their town, as a testimony against them.” Shaking off dust off feet isn’t exactly the same thing as calling down fire from heaven to destroy, right? If Samuel acted without seeking God first, he would have acted upon his sinful impulse. He would have massed things up. Here is the truth; when we bring difficult matters to God he clarifies things for us and reveals to us what he wants us to do.

3. Sin makes you dumb.

Before the LORD agrees to give them a king, God solemnly warned them what the king they wanted would do in 1 Samuel 8:10-18; the king would make the sons of Israel serve him in his army, daughters of Israel as his perfumers, cooks and bakers, take the best of the best from the people; the king would reduce them to his slaves. This is what the kings of other nations did. And, this is what the king in Israel would do. This sounds like a bad deal! When they finally come to realize how oppressive it is to have a human king over them and ask God relief from their king they have chosen, God warned them he would not answer them. But, verse 19 tells us that this is what the people wanted!

What was better, to be ruled by the righteous, just, kind, loving, gracious and merciful God, the King of the universe or be ruled by a imperfect human king who might be after his own gain and become oppressive? The people chose latter. This points to how stupid we can become. It doesn’t make sense that the Israelites would choose the system of human kingship that would be oppressive to their daily existence over God’s rule that promises the life in the green pasture under his protection.

Sin does this… sin makes us dumb; we go after the substandard, temporary gain that we can create over the extraordinary and eternal gain God can give us.

4. God redeems you from your stupidity.

Humanly speaking, it would have been logical for God to reject people who reject him. People wanted a human king to lead them with a standing army that could defend the nation against any powerful invader. This relying on a human earthly king was to reject God’s rule, God’s protection over them, God’s kingship over them. So, why not reject those who reject him? What we learn about our God is God is the redeemer. He can redeem us from being dumb to be smart.

Few hundred years ago before Samuel’s time, God already told Moses that the elders and people would demand a king over them in Deuteronomy 17:14. When this happen, God instructed Moses to be sure to appoint over them the king the LORD their God chooses.

Here is the deeper truth. It was the will of the people of Samuel’s generation to have a human king over them for all the wrong reasons. But, it was also God’s will that there be a human king over them as well. So, God’s will and human will seem to the same. Of course, the difference is the kind of king God wanted for the Israelites to the kings the Israelites wanted for themselves. God answers to their demand to have a king because it was his will to do so even though it was not for the right reason on their part.

The king that the Israelites wanted was like the rest of the nations around Israel. Other nations had their kings as their supreme leaders. These kings of other nations considered themselves as gods who hold the ultimate power over them. The kings they wanted would be oppressive to their daily existence as pointed out already. Their desire to have a king like other nations had was really about forsaking God and serving other gods. It was a form of idolatry.

But, God’s plan was to redeem their idolatrous heart, by granting them kings who would be all about the kingdom of God. While the people wanted to have a king like other nations had, God wanted a king unlike other nations, but cut out for him.

Going back to Deuteronomy 17 passage, God gave Moses specific instruction as to what king of king they were to appoint over Israel. Here are some qualifications

• The king must be chosen by God (v. 15)
• The king must not acquire large numbers of horses; the king must not return his people to Egypt to get more horses (v. 16)
• The king must not take many wives or accumulate large amounts of silver or gold for this will head his heart astray (v. 17b).
• The king was to have his own copy of the scripture to read all the days of his life, so that he might learn to revere the LROD his God and follow carefully all the words of the scripture (v. 18-19).
• The king was not to consider himself better than his brothers (v. 20).
• God promise that he and his descendants will reign over a long time over his kingdom in Israel.

As we will learn soon, none of the kings in Israel fulfilled God’s desire completely; even the great godly king David failed to meet God’s standard of king. The only true person who was met God’s requirement to be the true king was none other than Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Jesus was rich, yet became poor on our behalf. He didn’t go after the earthly power during his ministry; he didn’t raise up a standing army for himself; he acquired no gold or silver; he built no place for himself; he acquired no wives for himself; what he did was to carry our sins, the rebellious hearts that reject God, allowed himself to be nailed on the cross to shed his blood and die. And, God raised him up from the dead to be the only king who truly fit for God to rule over the kingdom of God.

So, what we see is God redeeming wrongly motivated sinful will of people to fulfill his righteous will.

Applications

1. What are you doing to ensure your spiritual walk is on the solid ground? How are you taking responsibility for your own spiritual walk?
2. Do you turn to God for his counsel when you are in difficult relational situations?
3. What dumb things do you do in sin?
4. Do you believe God is smarter than you are?

1 Samuel 8, Revive us!

When the Ark of the Lord finally returned back to Israel after over 7 months of captivity in the hands of Philistines, 1 Samuel 7:1 says that the ark of the LORD remained in Kiriath Jearim and verse 2 says that it remained there for twenty years. And, verse 2 says, “All the people of Israel mourned and sought after the LORD. What were they mourning about? They were mourning because the ark of the LORD, the symbol of God’s presence was no longer housed in the temple in Shiloh. But, this took place after some twenty years later. What happened? Let me tell you what happened here. The Israelites felt content as things were; they were content to see the ark of the LORD displaced from the temple of God. They were content for twenty years as things were.

1. Unholy contentment suffocates your spiritual life.

“THE COMPLACENCY of CHRISTIANS is the scandal of Christianity,” said A. W. Tozer in his book, Man, the Dwelling Place of God. We know in our head that Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life, Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, Redemption and that he is the Resurrection and the Life for eternity to come.

Apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 3:7-12, “But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of the Christ. What is more, I considered everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him… I want to Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his suffering… Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

And, he said in 1 Corinthians 11:1, “Follow my examples, as I follow the example of Christ.”

Our God is God who does extraordinary things. In twenty nine days, we are going to celebrate the greatest and mot extraordinary moment in the history when Jesus was raised from the dead. We serve God who is extraordinary who is after transforming our ordinary daily moments into the extraordinary moments set apart, holy given unto him. Yet, we insist on “the contentment with inadequate and imperfect progress in the life of holiness,” says Tozer. This he calls it again, “a scandal in the Church of the Firstborn.”

I am first to confess that I have bought into this scandal of abnormal, unholy contentment, complacency, as things are just plain ordinary or even worse substandard so called Christian life.

We recently did an evaluation on the life of our church. As I was going through the answers to these questions, I was stirred with this raw emotion inside of me. I set out five years ago to see a church that would rise up to love God and love people wholeheartedly. What the evaluation showed me was that we are a church that has the appearance of friendless, but live on the superficiality, superficiality with God and with each other. We come together Sundays after Sundays, but the sad thing is we are just content to leave things as they are just like the Israelites were content with the displaced ark of the LORD.

2. The holy discontentment breathes new life for you.

Things were mediocre, substandard for the Israelites for twenty years, but something was happening. They began to mourn and seeking after the LORD. In 1 Samuel 4, their response to the devastating loss against the Philistines was to manipulate God for their gain by taking the ark to the battleground as though it was their insurance for sure victory. We know what happened when they tried to manipulate God for their selfish gain; the glory of the Lord left them as symbolized by the capture of the ark.

But, here in chapter 1 Samuel 7:2, we see a different ting happening. They began to mourn and they began to go after the Lord.

How can you explain what happened here? How did they go from being content with mediocre and substandard life to bemoaning and seeking after the LORD?

Our text doesn’t say specifically what happened. Jesus said about the Holy Spirit in John 3:8, “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” What we see in 1 Samuel 7:2 is the invisible and intangible work of the Holy Spirit. He was awakening people from the deadly trap of unholy contentment, lethal complacency, accepting the displaced ark of the LORD as a norm. The Spirit was moving them from unholy contentment to the holy discontentment.

To mourn is to lament. In Micah 2:4, the same verb is used to describe the Israelites’ lament over loosing the allotted land into the hands of the enemies. It is a raw emotion of deep grief, sorrow, regret for something with audible wailing; in 1 Samuel 7:2, is the lamenting over the displaced ark of the LORD, that is the displaced glory of God.

3. For the holy discontentment to be effective, you need change your direction.

Their lament in deep grief, sorrow, regret, their holy discontentment for the displaced glory of God was accompanied by the direction change.

In NIV, this is translated as “sought after the LORD.” In Hebrew, this is simply an adverb, “after.”

If their mourning simply ended with loud wailing, it would not have been a genuine result of the Holy Spirit touching them. Feeling sorry in itself is not enough to revive us. What we need is to “Strive to get beyond mere pensive longing” according to Tozer. What we need is the radical directional change.

“What are you after?” is the crucial question we need to ask. When you wake up early in the morning? What are you after? Are you in hurry to get ready to go to school or to work? Or, are you in hurry to go after God, to meet him, to hear him, to talk to him? When you get home from school or from work, are you after to fix up something to eat and sit in front of TV or computer to feed yourself with mindless moments of entertainment? Or, are you after something more substantial and meaningful and eternally significant like building relationship with God and with people?

Do you feel sorry that you seem to have only casual relationship in the church, at work, at school and at home? Or, do you go after to build meaningful friendship with people, something real, honest, heart-connecting kind of friendship?

4. The holy discontentment and longing isn’t enough, you must act.

When the people began to mourn and sought after the LORD, Samuel told them in verse 3, “If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the LORD and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the land of the Philistines.”

It is not enough to feel longing, sorrow and good intention to change the direction. Feeling strongly about something but doing nothing about will set you back; it will kill your spirituality. Apostle James spoke about this plain in James 1:22-25:

“Do no merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it-he will be blessed in what he does.”

Samuel said to return to the Lord with all one’s heart involves three actions: 1) ridding ourselves of sins, 2) committing ourselves to the Lord and, 3) serving him only. Then, the promise is the deliverance out of the hand of the enemies, the Philistines in the case of Israel.

When God’s people put the convictions into actions, verse 10 says then the LORD thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites.

When the Lord delivered them the victory against the Philistines, Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far has the LORD helped us.” Ebenezer means “stone of help.” The stone of help, Ebenezer became the memorial for them to remind them what happened when God stirred them into the holy discontentment, direction change, and concrete actions.

Will we have our turn to build the memorial Ebenezer in our church? God wants us to build the Ebenezer for Cornerstone Mission Church, your church, for your life.

5. So, here are some actions plans

I mentioned earlier that we have 29 days to Easter. I want us to have some concrete action plans to put things into actions. I like how Becky Tirabassi put things in the Burning Heart Contract. [i]

There are three elements to this contract.

Ignite your passion

Purify your life

Fulfill your purpose

Prayer Commitment—30 Minutes a day in Prayer and Bible for 21 Days:

The best, most practical, fool-proof method that has worked for me for over two decades is to write (or journal) my PART (praise, admit, request, and thanks) in prayer every day. That means I don’t forget to (1) confess any sin or to (2) pray for others specifically. I encourage, if you’re not doing it already, to get a journal—label it 21 Days—and have a record of ALL that God does. I also Listen to God by reading a 365 Bible everyday. In other words, it is most often through my regular daily planned Bible reading that God speaks to me—and I know He’ll speak to you. If you don’t have a One Year or Change Your Life Daily Bible…this might be the time to get one!

Purity Commitment: Not to touch or look at another person’s private parts, except your spouse (and if you’re not married, that means…no one.)

This is a practical way to gain power in your spiritual life that comes as a result of purity and holiness. Ask god to purify your mind…to prepare you to be more sensitive to Him, and to spend your time more wisely. But especially if you struggle with sexual impurity in any way, I would encourage you to get an accountability partner and check in with them 2 or 3 times a day for the next 21 days. (That might sound like a lot, but if you want to “get rid” of something…you can’t hide it, you must expose it.)

For some of you, this area may be less tempting than others—just ask God to show you any area that He might want to purify you more (II Tim 2:21-22).

The purity-piece to our “personal revival” is a holiness commitment…and God J likes (actually asks) us to be holy like He is holy. Think ahead--something happens to us when we become more like Him…we become powerful preachers, evangelists and leaders. Why? We’ve got nothing to hide. And we’re not ashamed of poorly representing the Gospel. We’re transparent—not perfect—but we honor God’s name by our choices in public and private…and people see, know, and they are watching!

Purpose—to lead one person to Christ in the next 21 Days.

Let’s not panic or competeJ! In Finney’s Lectures on Revival, he wrote, “Four factors have a part in conversion—three active agents and one passive instrument. The agents are God, the truth-bringer (you and me), and the sinner. The instrument is truth. Under God’s influence the truth cuts its way like fire.”

In the feedback from many of you, this piece of the commitment has been the “deal-breaker!” This is the area in which many struggled to commit. So I want to encourage you—the more often you share your relationship with Christ on a daily basis, the more comfortable you’ll become and the greater chance someone is going to be in your path (whom God puts) to hear His story!!! That’s being His agent/ambassador! But the Holy Spirit has all kinds of things going on we don’t even know…so when you are prompted to share (whether it feels funny or awkward or repetitive or you have no good reason to think they’ll even respond), go for it anyway!

One of our “teammates” has written the name of 5 people whom He knows God has placed on his heart to share with over the next 21 Days. I’d encourage you to do the same! (FYI: In the coming days, I also will send some great material from Spurgeon’s Soul Winner!)

You are loved and I am honored to be your friend. Call or write if you need anything!

Be encouraged,

Becky Tirabassi

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[i] burning heart contract

1 Samuel 4.1-7, When you put your faith not on God...

Do you remember the movie starring Harrison Ford, Raiders of the Lost Ark? It was a huge blockbuster movie only out-earned by two prior Star Wars movies. Let me play a trailer for you.

…

The story takes place after 1936 featuring Harrison Ford as an archaeologist Indiana Jones. At the college where he taught he was approached by two US Army intelligence agents. He was told that the Nazis were in the quest of the Ark of the Covenant; in the movie, the Nazis supposedly believed, according to the legend, the power of the Ark to make any army in possession of it invincible.

Indian Jones found the lost Ark first, but only to be taken away by Nazis and later to be recovered by Jones. Jones was escorting the Ark to England onboard the steamer Bantu Wind only to be stopped by a Nazi U-boat. The Nazi took the Ark to a remote canyon to test its power before presenting to Hitler.

And, there is a scene where Belloq and the Nazi perform a ceremonial opening of the Ark.

This scene follows with the spirits released from the Ark and killing all the Germans by melting their faces and bodies and exploding them. And, the cover of the Ark self closing!

I am confident that none of us would watch this movie to learn the biblical facts about the Ark of the Covenant since the movie isn’t faithful to the scriptural account of the Ark of the Covenant. However, this story of Nazi trying to harvest the power of the Ark and facing devastation illustrates the story of the Israelites trying to manipulate and domesticate God for their own gain in 1 Samuel 4-7:1.

1. When you put your faith not on God, we loose the spiritual battle.

1 Samuel 4 accounts how the Ark of the Covenant was captured in the hands of the Philistines. This chapter answers this question: What happens when we put our faith not on God? The main problem was that the Israelites did not put their faith in God, but in the Ark itself. Another word, the Ark itself became an idol to them. Let see how this plays out.

We are told in verse 1-3 that the Israelites fought against Philistines, only to loose four thousand of them on the battlefield. During the time of Joshua, a similar lost was suffered at the hands of Ai in Joshua 7. When the Israelites suffered the lost, Joshua 7:6 records Joshua and the elders’ response: “Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell facedown to the ground before the Ark of the Lord, remaining there till evening. The elders of Israel did the same, and sprinkled dust on their heads.” Joshua and the elders of his time dealt with the devastating lost by turning to God in sorrow and repentant heart. God revealed to Joshua how the lost was the direct consequence of one man, Achan’s sin against God.

But the response we see in 1 Samuel 4:3 shows no such act of humbling before God, seeking his guidance for the cause of loosing the battle. Instead, they determined, “Let us bring the ark of the LORD’s covenant from Shiloh, so that it may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.” They believed in the power of the Ark just like the Nazis did in the movie as though the Ark in itself has the power to win the battle. The Ark represented Yahweh’s presence with Israel; it was the central symbol leading them to the Promised Land out of the desert; playing a crucial role in the crossing of the Jordan in Joshua 3-4 and during the beginning period of conquest. The Ark was important because it was the symbol of God’s presence. But, for the Israelites, the Ark itself became the power to win the battle.

They confidently marched against the Philistines now having the Ark. The Ark was tended by the wicked, good for nothing, worthless two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas. The moral of the Israelites was so high that verse 5 tells how they raised a great shout that shook the ground making the Philistines tremble in fear.

So, we expect the Israelites to win, but the outcome is even more devastating than before; they lost thirty thousand foot soldiers. The two wicked sons of Eli died in the battle. Worse of all, the Philistines captured the Ark.

What happened when the Israelites put their hope, trust, their confidence not on God, but on the Ark? They were using God for their own gain, with no regard to God’s glory. They trusted not God, but the symbol of God’s presence to deliver them. God dealt with this by taking away the Ark on which they put their idolatrous faith in.

Eli having heard his sons’ death in the battlefield was so shocked when he heard the capture of the Ark, it says in verse 18, he fell backward and broke his neck. And, his daughter-in-law, the wife of Phinehas died while giving birth to her son. She named him “ichabod” meaning no glory. When the Israelites wrongly and idolatrously trusted the Ark rather than God, they suffered the devastating lost in the battlefield, loosing their own and ultimately loosing the Ark, the symbol of God’s presence.

What does God do when you and I put our faith not on God, but on the material possessions, on the job prospects, on our brains, on the get-rich and succeed-ideals of America, and on other people? We loose the spiritual battle.

2. Why should you put your faith in God alone?

Chapter 5 and 6 answers this question; “Why should we put our faith in God alone?” Why should the Israelites, the Philistines, or anyone put their trust in God alone? Let’s see how this chapter answers this question.

The Philistines feared so much that they were ready to face the major defeat against the Israelites when they learned of the presence of the Ark. But, they were able to defeat the Israelites and even capture the much feared Ark. They put the Ark next to their idol Dagon, thinking that their idol Dagon gave them the victory over the God of Israel. Depending on what sources you consult, Dagon was either a god of grain or fish. It was an idol fashioned after human image with head and arms and hands.

Next day, they found their idol fallen on its face on the ground before the Ark. They served and worshiped the idol that they had to pick up with their hands and put it back in its place. In the following morning, they found their idol Dagon decapitated and armless, with its head and hands lying on the threshold to the temple.

The writer of 1 Samuel makes an interesting observation at this point. Verse 5 says that because of their idol’s head and hands touched the threshold, they didn’t step on the threshold. Here was their idol found prostrating before the Ark in submission to God of Israel and later found destroyed before the Ark by God of Israel. God is sovereign and powerful. The wise thing would be to turn to God of Israel. But, instead of fearing God of Israel who proved more powerful and superior to the lifeless, powerless, helpless idol Dagon, they feared upsetting their destroyed idol by stepping on the threshold. It just shows the extent of their unbelief, their unwillingness to face the reality, the truth.

Perhaps, the Philistines didn’t get it that it was God who struck down and destroyed the lifeless, powerless, useless, and worthless idol. God made further statement about why he was to be feared and worshiped. Soon after, the people of Ashdod and its vicinity God sent a terrible outbreak of tumors. Some thinks it was a form of bubonic plague, tumors referring to the swelling of the infected lymph nodes, a disease carried by rats. Whatever the nature of the disease was, it was severe enough that they the people of the town of Ashdod didn’t want it any more. So, the Ark was passed down to the next town Gath. The same disaster struck the people in Gath as well. So, it was sent to Ekron. For seven months, this went on.

Chapter 6 shows how the Philistines dealt with this crisis. They recognized that the disaster was caused by possessing the Ark of the Lord. They realized that they were in the same predicament as the Egyptians faced at the hand of God. The Egyptians, especially Pharaoh hardened, their hearts against God facing plagues after plagues. They didn’t want to make the same mistake, so they devised a plan to send the Ark back. Two things matter to them

First, they made sure that the Ark was accompanied by the five gold tumors and five gold rats to honor to Israel’s God in order to appease him to stop the destruction (6:5). The Ark and the gold were to be put on a brand new cart pulled by two cows. The offering was to appease God so that the plague would stop. It wasn’t necessarily to remove their guilt because guilt offering would involve shedding of blood.

Second, they wanted to makes sure it was God who destroyed Dagan and brought the disease and death. They did this by choosing two cows that never been yoked before. The cows’ calves were pen up. The natural instinct would be for the cows to move towards their calves. Unnatural, supernatural thing would be for the cows to pull the cart holding the Ark and the gold offerings.

God proved to them it was indeed he who brought the disaster to them by having the cows pulled the cart all the way to Israel’s town, Beth Shemesh.

Once the Ark arrived, the Israelites of Beth Shemesh greatly rejoiced. The ark came to the field of Joshua. They sacrificed the cows using the wood of the cart. But, the joy was quickly replaced by fear and sadness when some of the Israelites irreverently treated the Ark by looking into it.

Why should you put your faith in God?

• Put your faith in God because God alone is God; there is no other gods beside our God of the Bible.
• Put your faith in God because the alternative is to face a terrible judgment; put your faith in God because he is to be feared.
• Put your faith in God because he alone can remove the guilt of your sins and forgive you by shedding of the blood. Note how the Ark arrived at the Field of Joshua in Beth Shemesh. Joshua, the Hebrew name is the same as the Greek name Jesus. It is Jesus’ sacrificial death and shedding of his blood that truly forgives us and puts us in right relationship with God.

Applications

1. What are you idols that you trust more than God?

Think about how you might be like Israelites. When they were defeated, they didn’t seek God for his help, his guidance. They didn’t care what God really thought about their situation. Worse, they put their faith not in God, but in the object of his presence, the Ark. They made the Ark their idol.

This is like the mentality that just coming to church on Sunday is really enough. Somehow, Sunday attendance is really all that matters. Outside of Sunday, it is as though God doesn’t exist in our lives. If we act as though God doesn’t exist outside of Sunday service, then we have something other than God at the center of our lives.

2. How are you like the Philistines insisting on holding on to your idols even when God reveals himself to you in judgment and salvation?

God demonstrated his power, his superiority, his sovereignty over the idol Dagon. Yet, the Philistines didn’t abandon their idol to choose, to worship, to follow God of Israel.

God demonstrated his power by judging the Philistines by sending them the terrible plague. Yet, all they wanted was to get rid of the Ark of God so that they could go on serving their decapitated, limbless, helpless, powerless, lifeless, motionless idol that couldn’t help them, save them or do anything at all.

God demonstrated his healing, his salvation through the shedding of the blood of the sacrificed animals to Philistines. It wasn’t their gold tumors or rats that ensured the end of the plague. It was the shedding of the sacrificed animals at the field of Joshua, at the field of Jesus. It is the blood of Jesus Christ that ensures our salvation, forgiveness of sins, real life.

3. How are you like the those who were killed at Beth Shemesh by showing no fear of God by acting against his will?

Job 28:28 says, “The fear of the LORD-that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.”