“And the Spirit of the LORD will come upon thee, and thou shalt prophesy with them and shalt be turned into another man. And it was so, that when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another heart: and all those signs came to pass that day. And when he came thither to the hill, behold, a company of prophets met him; and the Spirit of God came upon him; and prophesied among them.” (1 Samuel 10:6, 9-10)
“But now thy kingdom shall not continue: the LORD hath sought him a man after his own heart and the LORD hath commanded him to be captain over his people, because thou hast not kept that which the LORD commanded thee.” (1 Samuel 13:13-14)
“And Saul built an altar unto the LORD: the same was the first altar that he built unto the LORD.” (1 Samuel 14:35)
I think Saul’s story is a very sad story. Here is a guy who started out small in his own eyes and God elevated him to be king over all Israel out of nowhere, while he was just doing something so menial, like looking for his father’s horses that were lost. He accidentally meets up with prophet Samuel and he’s told that he’s going to be the very first King of Israel. There he was, he was not even expecting to see Samuel at all in his search for his father’s horses but before he knew what was happening, he is told he’s going to be king. A couple of years later, God rejects him and looks for another man to be king in his place. Why? What went wrong?
In the very beginning after his first anointing by prophet Samuel, Saul got filled with the Spirit of God. He ended up with a new heart. He even prophesied with the prophets and was gung-ho about fighting the battles of the Lord. The Bible states he became a new man. Three chapters later he’s being told God has rejected him. God has found someone else to replace him “after His own heart”. What happened?
I can’t help but notice that Saul built his altar unto the LORD after the second victory that God had given him. It is interesting that he’s just building this altar now, a couple of years after he’s already a king. (See 1 Samuel 14:35).
Maybe that is what went wrong. He did not have an altar to begin with. He did not have a relationship with God to start with. So when it came to making wise decisions and obeying God, he failed. First he decided to offer the sacrifice that Samuel was supposed to offer before a battle, instead of waiting for Samuel. When Samuel came and rebuked him he said that the people took off around him and were scattered. Also, that Saul was afraid that the enemy might be at him before he could make the offering, so he had to do it without Samuel. The second bad decision, he made a decree: to curse any man that would eat after the people had fought a great battle that day. The people were faint after a long battle, they needed to eat. Then, when he finds out his own son Jonathan ate, he was willing to kill his own son who God used to bring the victory Saul had desperately needed that day. You see him whine and cry and do a pity party because the people decided to eat. “Roll a great stone unto me this day,” he says. Finally, we know about that famous scene where God had asked him to kill all the Amalekites and everything they owned, including their livestock. But Saul saved the “good ones” for sacrifice. Samuel told him that God had no delight in sacrifices, but in obedience to His word. Talk about a man without morals and principles, a very weak man. He cared too much for himself and not enough for God. He did not have faith in God.
I looked at David (who was the man after God’s own heart), who became king after Saul, and his relationship with God. Like Saul, David started out small also, doing his father’s business on the farm, tending sheep. As a matter of fact, he was the least of all the least of his family. He was the youngest son. But we find out that he worshiped God while he was there in the field being a shepherd boy. He played his harp and sang his own songs to the Lord. And when a bear and a lion came to take any of the sheep away, he wasn’t afraid to fight them. He fought them and killed them too. He later testified that it was because the Lord was with him. He knew where his strength came from. So even before he was anointed to be king, David already had faith and love for God.
That’s the difference. That’s what will make the difference. David had a relationship with God, Saul didn’t. Saul only needed God when he was in trouble. Bringing offerings to God when he’s in the midst of a battle. Saul remembers God only when he needed Him but otherwise God just existed. Not so with David. David loved God and worshiped and praised God even as a child. The Spirit of God had to come to Saul after he was anointed. You would think that Saul would be so in love with God after that, he would have made an altar right there and then. David on the other hand already had his own altar even as a little boy. He loved God on his own without anybody telling him to love God. David loved God without the oil being poured upon him.
This is what I am learning, that having the Spirit of God doesn’t make us perfect. I believe it gives us the power to belong to and connect to Him. But it is up to us to reach out to Him. It is up to us to make our own altar and tend to it daily, to meet with God and make Him our life. Not until we learn to make our own altar where we commune with the Lord all the time, where we love Him and sing praises to Him, where everything we desire is Him, will we ever come to know the Lord. Like Saul, we will only know about God. We will never really know Him for ourselves personally like King David did.
“For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.” {Isaiah 66:2}
