Who Will Save Us?

This last Lord's Day, I was visiting a friend's church. His sermon was on 1 Samuel 13. The theme of the sermon was "Who will save us?" Saul had just been called by the people and installed as king over Israel after the people rejected God as their king and demanded a king like the nations. Saul was the picture of a good king, from worldly standards, but as we saw in the text, his pomp and pride were his undoing. After one victory, he declared his superiority by blowing a horn to signal victory. This incited the Philistines, his enemy, to gather a crushing army and, in fear, the majority of Saul's army fled and hid. The ones who remained by his side trembled, unarmed and afraid. His next misstep was that instead of waiting until Samuel was there to offer a sacrifice and give him the word of the Lord, as he was commanded, he waited until the appointed time and then took the offering of a sacrifice upon himself. When confronted with his sin, he blamed the people, the Philistines, Samuel, and ultimately God for forcing him to sin. As the chapter ends, you are left with a scene where Saul and his son Jonathan are standing with 600 unarmed men (with make-shift weapons) against well over 30,000 Philistines who were marching toward them for battle. Will Saul save the people?



We, as good Christians, will say that Christ is King, and we will also agree that he delivers us, but what does he deliver us from? How does he rule our lives? Do we actually trust him when our backs are against the wall? This story shows us a people who did not trust God to be their king. They wanted the security of a king who looked kingly, and they found that king in Saul. Their eyes were on the success of this world, and God just happened to give them exactly what they wanted. (Be very careful what you ask for in prayers. God is gracious and often will not give us what we want, but occasionally he may, to show us the folly of our ways, say "yes" to our prayers.) While we do not have to stand shaking and ill-prepared against a daunting army of Philistines with a king with an inflated ego, there are many ways in which I believe that we would trade our reliance on God for something more tangible and, in our eyes, more reliable. If we just made a bit more money, things would be OK. If we got that new job, or maybe different co-workers, then our work would be more satisfying. If we could find a church with the right programs then we would fit in better. Or maybe if our pastor that was a better speaker, or was more entertaining, the church would grow. There are countless ways that we can seek to improve our lives, but do we rely on Christ? Do we prayerfully take our petitions to God, seek wisdom, and strive to trust God and be content, even if we do not get what we want or must we have something more, new, different, or better? Is Christ enough to even satisfy us, let alone save us?

There is also the danger that we become like King Saul. Saul was explicitly commanded to wait for Samuel, but he acted on his own accord. He was more concerned with acting than he was with acting rightly. He had to do something, but obedience was not practical anymore (or seemingly responsible and safe). Do we desire to do something rather than wait on God for deliverance? Mankind is bent on a desire to save ourselves, and we see this in Saul. We often wrestle with the promises of God when they do not meet our time-frames, especially when it appears as though time is of the essence and something must be done. We must act, and we must act now. While there are truly situations where inaction is detrimental and irresponsible, we must first and foremost obey the commands of God, for disobedience is always sin and the incorrect course of action, but we must also seek wisdom and approach the throne of grace not through hasty action but through humble prayer. Do we trust God to be with us in our time of need?

At the end of this text, we were left looking for the one who would deliver the people in their time of need. The story demonstrated that the king the people demanded was a man after their own heart, but was not mindful of God, nor was he willing to seek after and obey God. Samuel declared judgment upon Saul declaring: "But now your kingdom shall not continue. The LORD has sought out a man after his own heart, and the LORD has commanded him to be prince over his people, because you have not kept what the LORD commanded you”. King David was being raised up by God to lead Israel. But even David would not be perfect. King Jesus, the greater-than-David, would have to come in order to lead his people into a kingdom that would never fail. The story of Saul is a tragic story. He was the type of king that we would look for, and he wasn't able to save. He is a counter-example of the great King of Heaven, who we would have crucified (and we did). King Jesus laid down his life only to take it up again after defeating an enemy greater than all the armies of the world, the enemy of sin, death, and the Devil. King Jesus was a man after God's own heart because he was God tabernacled with us. King Jesus is the one that Saul pointed to through his failures. We share in the failures of Saul, but any who trust in Jesus Christ and wait upon him for deliverance will be saved. Who can save us? Only one man: King Jesus.