Fri.’s Devo -Saul’s First Seven Days as King

Read: 1 Samuel 12:1-13:23; John 7:1-30; Psalm 108:1-13; Prover s 15:4 Samuel addressed all Israel about the king God had given them. First he reminded them that he had been a faithful judge and they agreed. He had never perverted justice or swindled any money from them. He reminded them of Israel’s history of turning away from the Lord and worshipping other idols. *** As a sign of how wicked they were by asking for a king, God would send thunder and rain down upon them even though it was not the time of rain. Samuel prayed and it rained and thundered. It scared the people so much that they cried out for Samuel to pray for them. Samuel warned them to stay faithful to the Lord. If they abandoned the Lord, God would abandon them. *** Saul was thirty years old when he became the king and reigned for 42 years. Samuel had given Saul the command to meet him in 7 days at Gilgal and on his way, he and his men defeated a Philistine garrison at Geba. This caused the Philistines to gather a huge army of thousands as well as chariots. They camped at Micmash. Israel was so outnumbered and in an impossible situation. Many ran for their lives. Saul waited for Samuel and when he didn’t come, he saw his men were leaving by the minute. He finally panicked and offered the sacrifice himself. As soon as his finished, Samuel arrived. He was not pleased with Saul for not waiting. Saul had been king for 7 days and already, Samuel told him he would lose his leadership for a man after God’s own heart. *** Samuel left and Saul took his 600 men he had left and went to meet the troops of the Philistines. Meanwhile the Philistines divided their troops into three groups and sent them in different directions scouting out the land. *** There were no blacksmiths in the country because the Philistines didn’t allow the Israelites to have them to sharpen their swords. The only men on Israel’s army that had swords were Jonathan, Saul’s son, and Saul. Israel was between a rock and a hard place. *** In John, Jesus and his disciples knew that the Jewish leaders where plotting his death so they stayed out of Judea but it was the time of the Feast of Tabernacles when all Jewish men were required by the law of Moses to come to Jerusalem and participate. Jesus told his disciples to go ahead of him because he was not going. *** Jesus surprised them all by showing up in the middle of the seven day festival. He went into the Temple and began to teach. The people were astonished because they had heard of how the Jewish leaders wanted to kill him and here he was teaching in public and no one was doing anything. Some wondered if he could be the Messiah but they argued that the scriptures said that no one would know where the Messiah came from and they all knew where Jesus came from. *** Jesus knew what they were talking about and told them that they didn’t know where he came from. They also didn’t know the one who sent him. This made the religious leaders so mad they wanted to arrest him right then, but didn’t. *** No one could touch Jesus until the Father said it was time. He would finish every word he had to say and every miracle he needed to perform before he would be released into their hands. Jesus wasn’t murdered, he freely gave himself to them. They could do nothing on their own. God was in control. *** Lord, you are soverign over everything and all the earth. It is comforting to know that. We trust you to rule our lives and the affairs of our nation. We war against the evil and stand for your truth. We wait for our deliverance to come on your wings.