1 Samuel 15

Well good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we are at 1st Samuel chapter 15. 1st Samuel chapter 15. Oh, we almost got there. Good job. This way a little bit. This way. There you go. Great. 1st Samuel 15. We're going to talk about King Saul and now we start talking about his downfall. Saul's downfall.
Alright, let's have some coffee. We'll pray and we'll get into God's Word. It's hot. It's warm. All right, black coffee it is. Father we thank you so much for this day and we thank you for your word. We pray that as we read your word together that it would be a blessing to our souls. We thank you for giving us your word and we pray that as we hold this gold in our hands that your spirit would teach us and even help us to live in Jesus's name. Amen.
First Samuel chapter 15. Samuel also said to Saul, the Lord sent me to anoint you king over his people, over Israel. Now therefore heed the voice of the words of the Lord. Thus says Jehovah, Lord of hosts, I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt.
Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey. Verse four. So Samuel gathered, so Saul gathered all the people together and numbered them in 200,000 foot soldiers and 10,000 men of Judah. And Saul came to a city of Amalek and laid in wait in the valley. Then Saul said to the Kenites, Go, depart, get down from among the Amalekites, lest I destroy you with them. for you showed kindness to all the children of Israel when they came up out of Egypt. So the Kenites departed from among the Amalekites, and Saul attacked the Amalekites from Havilah all the way to Shur, which is east of Egypt.
He also took Agag, king of the Amalekites, alive, and utterly destroyed all of the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were unwilling to utterly destroy them. But everything despised and worthless they utterly destroyed.
Now we're at verse 10. Now the word of the Lord came to Samuel, saying, I greatly regret that I have set up Saul as king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments. And I grieved Samuel and cried out to the Lord all night. So when Samuel rose early in the morning to meet Saul, it was told Samuel, saying, Saul went to Carmel. And indeed, he set up a monument for himself and he has gone on around, passed by and gone down to Gilgal. Then Samuel went to Saul and Saul said to him, Blessed are you of the Lord.
I have performed the commandments of the Lord. Verse 14. But Samuel said, What then is the bleating of the sheep in my ears and the lowing of the ox which I hear? And Saul said, They have brought them from the Amalekites, for the people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen to sacrifice to the Lord our God, and the rest we have utterly destroyed.
Then Samuel said to Saul, Be quiet, and I will tell you what the Lord said to me last night. And the Lord said to him, Speak on. Why, he said to him, Speak on. So Samuel said, When you were little in your own eyes, were you not head of the tribes of Israel? And did not Jehovah appoint you king over Israel? Now Jehovah sent you on a mission and said, go and utterly destroy the sinner, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are utterly consumed. Why then did you not obey the voice of Jehovah? Why did you swoop down on the spoil and do evil on the side of Jehovah?
Verse 20. And Saul said to Samuel, but I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. and gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me and brought back Agagin, King of Amalek. I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took off the plunder of sheep and ox, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilead.
So Samuel said, has Jehovah, has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of Jehovah? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For your rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry, because you have rejected the word of the Lord. He also has rejected you from being king.
Verse 24. Then Samuel said to Saul, I have sinned, for I have transgressed the commandments of the Lord and your words, because I fear the people and obey their voice. Now, therefore, please pardon my sin and return with me that I may worship the Lord. Verse 26.
But Samuel said to Saul, I will not return with you, for you have rejected the word of the Lord. And the Lord has rejected you from beginning being king over Israel. And as Samuel turned around to go away, Saul seized the edge of his robe and tore it. Samuel said to him, Jehovah has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has given it to a neighbor of yours who is better than you.
And also the strength of Israel will not lie or relent. He is not a man that he should relent. Verse 30. Then he said, I have sinned yet. Honor me now, please. Be before the elders of my people and before Israel and return with me that I may worship the Lord your God. Samuel turned back after Saul and Saul worshipped the Lord. Then Samuel said, bring Agag king of the Amalekites here to me. So Agag came to him cautiously and Agag said, surely the bitterness of death is past.
Verse 33. But Samuel said, as your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless among women. And Samuel hacked a gate. He got into pieces before the Lord in Gilgal. Then Samuel went to Ramah, and Saul went up to his house in Gibeah of Saul. And Samuel went no more to see Saul until the day of his death. Nevertheless, Samuel mourned for Saul, and the Lord regretted that he had made Saul king over Israel. Well, we need to ask ourselves, A, what is this? About? B, what's the best place to summarize? And C, what are we called to do? All right, so what's this about, Dan? Not wanting, I want to want to get hacked into pieces.
Yeah, so that's what happens to Agag, king of the Amalekites, right? So you have God's the one who tells Saul or Samuel to tell Saul that he's going to go to war against the Amalekites and the king of the Amalekites is King Agag. But what's he supposed to do when he goes to war? Kill everyone.
Yeah, right. So this means they're going to be under the ban, right? So just like when they defeated Jericho. Destroy. You don't take anything. You destroy everything and everyone, right? And this is punishing them for what they did to the Israelites when they came out of Egypt and they were trying to pass through and they're being nice and friendly. Hey, we're not going to take anything. We won't steal anything. We'll make sure we pay you if we do take anything. and the Malachites came out and attacked him instead. And so this is kind of settling an old score.
So Saul gathers a big huge army, right? And what happens with the war? There's one tribe that he likes to go. Oh yeah, the Kenites, right? Hey, you guys were nice, so you come out. And then, you know, that doesn't spend many verses on the battle itself, does it? Yeah. The battle's like, bloop! He wins, he captures the king. But what else did they capture? Captured all the best of the best. Oh, instead of destroying everything, what does he do? Captures, um, ox and stuff.
Yeah and so the story then switches from Saul in the army to Samuel and what what Samuel tried to do? He tries to say no. Well interestingly at first he tries to go find Saul but Saul's not where he thinks he is. He goes to Carmel and etc and Saul's built a monument for himself. Saul is seeming to get more and more prideful. Yeah. So Saul does catch up to Samuel. And how does how's that go? Samuel ain't so happy. Well, at first, Saul's like, well, hey, welcome here, buddy. This is good, right? Hey, look what we we destroyed them. We won. Dude, this is great. And we've done everything God commanded.
And what does Samuel say? No. Why do I hear sheep then, boy? Maybe it's just a Torah prophet on over there. Yeah, well that would be Greek, not Hebrew. So yeah, what about the sheep? And what does Saul say? What's his way to get around it? Well, we brought the best of the best so we could sacrifice them to God. But is that what God said to do? No. And do you think that's what really was going on? No, right?
They've got the best of the splendor. He probably wants to gain some weight. He wants some lamb chops. Yeah, the point is, right? There are people who will do this. They'll even take things and they'll make it sound religious, even though the thing they're doing is wrong. The Lord sees right through that. Samuel sees right through that.
He's like, man, when you were just a little guy, you were tall, but when you were just low esteem and humble, God made you king. And now what has Saul done with his heart? Made it hard. And here's how we know that I don't think Saul was being truthful.
Because who's still alive? Um, David? Mm-mm. Hey, Gag. Why is the king still alive? Bribes? Saul's playing political games. He's not obeyed the Lord. And so what does Samuel say? You ain't gonna be king anymore. Yeah, you're not gonna be king anymore.
It's interesting because he grabs his robe and it rips and stuff like that. But then in verse 30, Saul does say, I have sinned, I have transgressed, yet honor me now. He doesn't want to lose face in front of the people. God's going to do what he's going to do, but please don't shame me in front of everyone. Don't make me look like I'm not of much weight and value. So go worship with me.
Samuel does it. And then what does Samuel do? He says bye. Well, first he kills the king. And he says, bring Agag here. And what's Agag thinking? I think I'm better now. Yeah, right. Man, I'm glad I'm not dead. Well, then he dies. Yeah. And then Samuel leaves. Saul goes to his place. Samuel goes to his place. And they never see each other again. And yet, what does Samuel do? Night after night after night? He mourns, right? He weeps. He loves Saul. He thought he was going to be a great king. And he's sad, right? That people had rejected the Lord because they wanted a king. And now he's looking at the king and he's saying, He's not David though. Don't spoiler alert! Man.
Okay. Well, so summarize this whole thing for me. If you got like one or two sentences real fast. Um, I think maybe when it is, um, when, uh, seems like, uh, you have disobeyed Jesus' law. Okay. Are you talking about that's what you would underline as the best verse? Yeah. Okay, I'm saying, tell me what all this is about real fast. Summarize it. Oh, it's about he disobeying God by getting the best stuff. Okay, yeah. I would say Saul disobeys God and loses the kingdom. In my Bible, I have verse 22 and 23 underlined as well as verse 28 underlined. So, that's where about like the kingdom of Israel is being torn from him this day. So, let's talk about sea calling. What are we called to do? You're called to go get your homemade knife and hack someone to pieces like some type of serial killer? This on you that you need to go overthrow some kingdom and power?
Nope. I just sin against God. Okay. Yeah. God takes it. God takes it seriously. Yeah. God takes sin seriously. Good. Well, that's great. So just don't sin. Ever. Because you never sin. You can't. But the nice thing is Jesus died for you. The nice thing is we have a better King, don't we? And did our King Jesus ever do anything wrong? Did he ever disobey his father's will? No, right? We have a wonderful King.
What a blessing, huh? You ready to pray? Can you pray for us to close? Sure. Okay. God, please help that we have a good day today, and please help that we will take home what we learned. Amen. Amen. Well, may you rest in King Jesus. Though your sins be as scarlet, He can make them as white as wool. He's the perfect King. Trust in Him and have peace. We'll see you next time. Bye.