WHEN YOU WERE SMALL IN YOUR OWN EYES
Toward the end of the Prophet Samuel's life, the Israelites grew weary of being under judges and desired to have a king to rule over them so that they could be like the other nations of the world. Though God was displeased with their desire, He permitted them to have their king, saying to Samuel, "Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them." (1 Samuel 8:7). Consequently, Saul, the son of Kish, became the first king of Israel.
After Saul had reigned for some years, God said to him, "Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly
destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman,
infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass." (1 Samuel 15:3). Rather than utterly destroying everything of
Amalek as God had directed, Saul chose to keep Agag the Amalekite king alive,
along with the very best of their cattle and other belongings. Only the things that were “vile and worthless” were destroyed.
For this disobedience God was not happy, and He sent
Samuel to confront Saul. When Saul saw
Samuel, he declared to him that he had performed the commandment of the Lord. When asked about all the spoil, he answered
that it was all the people's fault; it was they who had kept the best of the
flocks and herds to offer a sacrifice to God. Twice Saul argued his innocence, twice he
threw everyone else under the bus, and twice he was rebuked for his
willfulness. Samuel said to Saul, "When
thou wast little in thine own sight, wast thou not made the head of the
tribes of Israel, and the LORD anointed thee king over Israel?" (1
Samuel 15:17). Then Samuel spoke God's
judgment, which was harsh, but also just: "Because
thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, He hath also rejected thee from being
king." (1 Samuel 15:23b).
This whole story emphasizes the importance of absolute obedience
to God's revealed will in the life of every child of God. It is only when we humble ourselves before
our God that He is able to exalt us.
When we are little in our own sight, then we will learn to trust God
more and ourselves less. He then can
direct our works to accomplish His divine purpose free from the taint of our
own notions and ambitions. God wants to
rule in the kingdom of our lives, but He doesn't interfere when we choose to
reject Him and set ourselves up as rulers of our own destiny. He will warn us of the consequences of our
decision, but then leave us to reap the fruit of it. Worse still is when we set someone else up as
king in our life, and allow them to govern what we believe, and what we
do. We must work out our own salvation,
we must learn to follow and obey the Lord for ourselves. Our motivation is clear and understandable
enough: we just want to be like the nations of the world; we just want to be
like everybody else, but God has called us to be a peculiar and unique people
who are zealous to do His will.
You see, Amalek represents our old carnal nature and
our fleshly man. That nature is "corrupt according to the deceitful lusts"
(Ephesians 4:22), and therefore must be utterly destroyed. There is nothing redeemable about it. It has been nailed to the cross of Christ so
that this body of sin might be dealt with once and for all (Romans 6:6). Paul said, "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good
thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I
find not" (Romans7:18). We
can’t pick and choose the things of our life that we will nail to the cross. That is God’s job, and He has condemned
everything that pertains to our old nature before we knew Christ. He has done this so that He can transform us
into a new spiritual man. “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified
with him, that the body of sin might
be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.” (Romans
6:6). “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things
are become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
The reason that Amalek was at the top of God's hit list
was because Amalek attacked and sought to destroy Israel right after they had
been delivered out of the bondage of Egypt (Exodus 17:8). They did this without any provocation
whatsoever. As a result, God said, "I will utterly put out the remembrance
of Amalek from under heaven," and, "...will
have war with Amalek from generation to generation." (Exodus 17:14b,
16b). On that fateful day, Moses stood
on the hill of Rephidim with Aaron and Hur holding the rod of God over his head
to secure the victory for Israel. As
long as the rod was held aloft, Israel prevailed in the fight; but when Moses
grew weary and lowered the rod then Amalek prevailed. In the end, Aaron and Hur had to hold up
Moses' arms so that Israel could win the day.
Moses built an altar to the Lord after the battle and called it
Jehovah-nissi (the Lord our banner) to emphasize to all Israel that God Himself
had won the victory, and not the strength of Israel's armies or their own might.
Christians are often surprised by the tenacity of the
flesh. After being saved, they are
filled with joy and victory, but very soon the old nature raises its ugly head
and begins to resist the things that the Spirit of God is trying to work in
their lives. "For the flesh lusteth against the
Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the
other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would." (Galatians
5:17). Such resistance seems unprovoked,
but choosing to live for God sets one right smack in the middle of a spiritual
warfare. Our victory, however, is in
knowing that we can't win the battle through our own strength. We must rally
under the banner of God's might and power.
It is the cross of Christ that gives us such power because it is there
that we die to our old nature, but rise again to a new life in Christ
Jesus. Like Moses, God raises His banner
of victory over us until the battle is won, and He holds us up when our
strength fails until we have prevailed over our enemies.
We must each learn to walk in God's Spirit if we want
to be victorious in our spiritual lives, and to grow in Christ. To be carnally minded is death, but to be
spiritually minded is life and peace. We
cannot pick and choose the things of the flesh that we want to keep, and the
things we should destroy. We do not have
God's perspective. We, like Saul, have
no problem destroying all the junk in our lives; but the "good" stuff
we think we can salvage. Being human, we
want to be kings over our own lives, and have the freedom to make those choices,
but let's not mix our rebellion and self-will with Christianity and think that
God will be pleased with us. It doesn't
work like that. We were bought with the
price of Jesus' blood and sacrifice. We
gave up those rights when we accepted the deal.
Samuel told Saul, "Behold, to
obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft,
and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry." (1 Samuel 15:22b, 23a).
Samuel was later
sent to the house of Jesse to anoint a new king over Israel. Samuel was impressed by the older sons of
Jesse who were tall, strong, and handsome; and thought that surely they were
the right material for kingship. "But the Lord said to Samuel, Look not on his appearance or at the
height of his stature, for I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man
sees; for man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart."
(1 Samuel 16:7). All of the things that
man counts important and praiseworthy in this life are worthless in the sight
of God if they are not born out of obedience to the perfect will of God. Those things only breed pride and arrogance
because they originate from man's carnal nature, and not from God's heart. We must learn to lose our carnal lives if we
would desire to gain the abundant life of Jesus, which is eternal life. "And this is the record, that God hath
given to us eternal life, and this
life is in His Son." (1John 5:11).
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