Fri.’s Devo - Obedience is Better Than Sacrifice

Read: 1 Samuel 15:1-16:23; John 8:1-20; Psalm 110:1-7; Proverbs 15:8-10 God was ready to punish the Amelekites who opposed Israel when they left Egypt. He instructed Saul to completely annihilate their people and animals and spare no one. Saul took 210,000 soldiers with him to fight them. Saul warned the Kenites to get out of town because he was coming to kill all the Amelekites in their town. (The Kenites were Moses’ father-in-laws kin who had been allies to Israel.) They attacked the Amalekites and captured their king, Agag, and spared the best of the animals. They only destroyed things that were worthless. The Lord came to Samuel and told him he was sorry that he ever made Saul the king because he was so disobedient. This greatly saddened Samuel because he loved Saul as a son. The next day, Samuel went to tell Saul what God had said. He was told that Saul had gone to the town of Carmel to set up a monument to himself. When Samuel found him he asked Saul if he had done what God had asked him to do. Saul assured him he had. Samuel asked him why he was hearing the bleating of the sheep. Saul had a quick answer. He had saved the best animals to make a sacrifice to God. Samuel had heard enough. He told Saul what the Lord had said about him. Saul argued that he had done what the Lord asked. He brought back King Agag, but he destroyed everything else. He only kept the animals to sacrifice them. Samuel told him that God wanted obedience more than he wanted a sacrifice. His rebellion was just like witchcraft to God and his stubbornness was as bad as offering idols. Because Saul rejected God’s command, God had rejected him as king. Saul then repented and said that he had done those things because that was what the people wanted him to do. He begged Samuel to come with him to his sacrifice. Samuel refused to go with him and Saul tried to keep him but tore the hem of his robe accidentally. Samuel said that in the same way the Lord had torn the kingdom from him that day and given it to someone else. Saul begged him to please come to his sacrifice so the people would see that he still honored him. (Saul had a real big rejection/ego problem.) Samuel finally agreed. Samuel told them to bring King Agag to him and cut him to pieces. Agag means “he will overtop”. Samuel knew that if he let him live, he would do just that. God told Samuel to go and anoint God’s choice as a king. He would be one of Jessie’s sons. Sure enough, the one God chose didn’t look like a king that people would choose. He was the youngest of the sons and still a shepherd. Samuel anointed David with a flask of olive oil. When he did, the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day on. The Spirit of the Lord had left Saul and a tormenting spirit had come to take its place. It made Saul depressed and fearful. Saul’s servants recognized what had happened to Saul so they recommended that he let a good musician come and play the harp to chase away the spirit. Saul agreed, and the found David who played the harp with the Spirit of the Lord. He was brought to the palace to play whenever Saul was oppressed. In John, it was the day after the Feast of Tabernacles. It was the day in the Temple that they would begin to read the Torah again. They celebrated this day as a return to Eden. Jesus was teaching them when a woman was brought to him. She had been caught in the act of adultery. They wanted Jesus to judge her so they could trap him somehow. Jesus didn’t fall into their trap, instead, he started writing in the dirt. When they demanded an answer from him he told them that he would give them an answer, but let the one who had never sinned throw the first stone. Then he started writing again. The accusers started leaving from the oldest to the youngest. I’m sure that the Holy Spirit had begun to point out things in their past that they and others knew. No one had never sinned. Jesus, the only one who could accuse her, looked at her and said, “Woman, where are your accusers?” Then he told her that he didn’t accuse her either. She was to go and not sin anymore. This woman was a type of Eve and Jesus was undoing the curse that had come on mankind because of sin. He was the removal of the curse. Lord, thank you for your atoning blood that redeems us from the curse of the law.