Be careful what you ask for

A little over a year ago I interviewed and received a promotion at work and it moved me into a managerial war role. And at my work that can be one of the more challenging moves to make because in order to take this managerial role they wanted you to have managerial experience. And if you started before that, there was no way to get that managerial experience. So that can be a very difficult jump to make in my office. And as it turns out, it was my previous managerial experience that qualified me for that and allowed me to take that. And then that goes all the way back to my time in the Navy. I arrived at my first ship. I was 23 years old. God, that's a long time ago. 23 years old, a newly minted naval officer with little in the way of experience really about anything. And one of the first things they did was hand me a dozen sailors and say, "These are yours. They are all nuclear trained electricians, and you are now the ship's electrical officer." 23. I learned that as a manager, I am not and never can be the expert. And the bulk of my job was to enable and facilitate the success of those who were in fact the experts. It was my job to set priorities and to request the resources my people needed to get their job done. I'd begin to learn how to give and receive feedback. I learned how to own my own mistakes. I learned a lot about me and the things that were most important to me that facilitating the success of others was far more rewarding for me than even my own success. I learned that being a part of something bigger than myself was critical for me. I learned that uh how to enter into new situations and to earn rather than expect or demand opportunities. I learned resilience and adaptability. And it is this third layer that has been lifealtering for me in many ways. So, so at the at the center of all three of these learnings, these three layers of learnings were the same events, those same three years on that first ship. So, as we look at the passage of scripture today and included in this text today again as I mentioned was 1st Samuel chapters 9 and 10. The same can be true. We we have a story and this story can be looked at in a certain sense of isolation. We can look at the story and learn something from this story. We can take a little bit of a broader view and realize that Samuel who was the author of 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel or at least largely the likely the author of 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel and he had an enormous number of things that happened in his lifetime and some small set of those is included in these books because he's trying to tell some kind of story. So we ask we can then ask the questions. These are not just random things that he included but they were included for a purpose. So we can step back and say what is it that Samuel what's the larger thing that Samuel's trying to teach us? And then we can step back even further and recognize that these this book of 1 Samuel fits into our entire arc of scripture. And that as the people of God, we believe that all of scripture is inspired. That while we have these individual writers that are writing, they're carried along by the Holy Spirit. And that there is an arc to this this a meta narrative, if you will, that God is constructing in all of this. So, we look at these same events from these three different lenses, and we'll see three different lessons. I hope that's what the goal for today is. And I'm calling these three lessons to be careful. We talked about that. You I heard it in the hallway. Be careful what you ask for. That's the So, be careful, be grateful, and be hopeful. Those are the three lessons we're going to look at today as we look at these things. So, let me pray for us and we'll be looking at 1st Samuel chapter 9. Father in heaven, we are grateful that you have gathered us here this morning as the people of God to hear ultimately from you. If it is not you we hear from today, then there's little point for us to even be here. So, it is my prayer that you you would be active, that your Holy Spirit would be speaking to our hearts and that you would be honored and that in that hearing we would be changed. Again, if we do not hear from you and in that hearing be changed, then again there's little point. So it is my prayer that you would be at work and that you would be made much of here today. So do what you do and we pray this in Jesus name. Amen. All right. If you remember last week, Pastor Steven talked us through uh the Israelites demand that God would give them a king so that they could be like the other nations and that this king would defend them against their enemies. And we pick up today where that leaves off. And again, it's two chapters. I'm not going to make you sit here and listen to me read you two chapters of 1 Samuel. Okay. Um, so we're going to walk through this. I'm going to try and hit some high points. So, as I do this in these first few passages, what I want you to look for is the way Saul, who is this king that they asked for, Saul is described. So, as we read through this together, try and find those clues, if you will. So beginning in verses 1 and two of chapter 9 goes says this. There was a man of Benjamin whose name was Kish, the son of Abiel, son of Zeror, son of Beckarath, son of Aphaniah, son of a Benjaminite, a man of wealth. And he had a son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he. From his shoulders upward, he was taller than any of the other people. The story goes on to tell us that Saul's father's donkeys wander off. And he sends Saul along with a servant to go find them. And they wander for several days and are unsuccessful in finding these donkeys. And we pick up in verses 6 and 7 here and it says, "But he, the servant, said to him, Saul, behold, there is a man of God in this city, and he is a man who was held in honor. All that he says comes true. So now let us go there. Perhaps he can tell us the way to go." Then Saul said to his servant, "But if we go, what we can can we bring this man? For the bread in our sacks is gone and there is no no present to bring to the man of God. What do we have? So a couple of observations before we move on. First is that Saul wants to give up the task. He's sent to find the donkeys. He can't find the donkeys and he says forget it. Let's go home. Okay. Again let's I asked you to think about the way Saul's described. So remember that for me for a minute. Second is that the servant is actually the one doing the leading here. It's the servant that says, "Let's go talk to this man of God in the city." The man of God happens to be Samuel. Okay? And Samuel's in this city. And it's and it's the the the servant that says we should go talk to that to him. In addition, the as I said, the man of God in the city of Samuel. Samuel is the primary leader of the na of the nation of Israel at this point. He's he's the spiritual leader of the people of Israel. And here's Saul has no idea who Samuel is. Doesn't know where he is. He's never heard of him. And it's the servant that says, "Let's go talk to Samuel." Again, here's our king. Here's Saul. And the last um point here is is there's some debate regarding uh the gift that Saul was concerned about. Some see this as uh that Saul is aware of of customs of the day and that when you go see the man of God, you ought to have something to offer him. Others think that Saul in this sees religious leaders as people who are available for hire to do the work that you want them to do. And there's a there there's a sense in which that second sort of look at him fits for me with what we know of Saul. Can't be sure. Can't promise you that, but it seems somehow to fit for me in what we come to learn about Saul. Um, so far we get this picture of a rich, good-looking man with little in the way of leadership skills. That's what we see. And we're going to jump down to chapter 10. And Saul and the servant go actually meet Samuel. And God has come to Samuel in a vision and told him, "Hey, there's this guy coming. He's the one I've chosen." So, here we are in chapter 10 verse 1. Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on his head, his Saul's head, and kissed him and said, "Has not the Lord anointed you to be prince over his people Israel? And you shall re reign over the people of the Lord, and you will save them from the hand of their surrounding enemies. And this shall be your sign, a sign to you that the Lord has anointed you to be prince over his heritage. So the word here for prince is not the word for king. It's not what the people ask for. I think in part maybe God is trying to retain what he feels like he is supposed to be for the people of Israel. He's supposed to be their king, if you will. So, he's trying to retain some of that. And the word for prince here has the application of restrain. On the positive side, the sense of restrain is to guide and direct or to judge. But it also has this negative side which is to hinder or limit or to hold back. And I think if we look back on Saul's life later when we get to see this, I think we'll actually see both of those things. When it comes to Saul and the people of Israel, Saul and his servant end up returning home back to Jerusalem without the donkeys, by the way. And we pick up in verse 16 of chapter 10. And Saul said to his uncle, he Samuel told us plainly that the donkeys had been found. But about the matter of the kingdom of which Samuel had spoken, he told him nothing. He didn't tell anything him anything about that. So here Saul has been anointed prince or leader of the people of Israel and he gets home and he doesn't actually tell anybody about it. And later at his own coronation, he's actually hiding. And the only way they find him is because he's so tall. So we actually see a man resisting and hiding from his own calling. So again, here's the lesson. This calling for the king is ultimately an indictment of the people of God. Chapter 10 18 and 19. And and he Samuel said to the people of Israel, "Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I brought you up uh Israel out of Egypt and delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians, from the hand of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you. But today you have rejected your God who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses, and you have said to him, "Set a king over us. Now therefore, present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your thousands." So while God does not in any way abandon his people, we will see that in a bet. He did in some way allow them to have what they ask for as this cautionary tale. Be careful what you ask for. There is something that God wants to do in their lives even through their own sin. Chapter 10 24. And Samuel said to the people, "Do you see him whom the Lord has chosen? There is none like him among all the peoples. And all the people shouted, "Long live the king." While there is none like him, the things that set Saul apart are not the things that will make him a successful leader or man of God, but instead reflect the characteristics that the world often values. Wealth, being good-looking, tall. I don't think I'm going to give anything away in saying that in the chapters to come, we will not see a successful leader of God, but a selfish, fearful, paranoid leader. And it does not go well for him and the people of Israel. It calls to mind for me this warning from John in 1 John chapter 2. He says this, "Do not love the things of the world. Do not love the world or the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the father is not within within is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of possessions is not from the father, but from this world. And the world is a passing away along with its desires. But whoever does the will of God abides forever. Again, this this lust of the eyes that these people had for this good-looking, tall guy, regardless of his skills as a leader, but we want a king. Adam and Eve wanted the fruit and the knowledge it promised. Cain wanted Abel's favor with God. Jacob wanted Esau's birthright. David wanted his neighbor's wife. The rich young ruler wanted his wealth. Judas wanted a conquering king. We want our boss's office or our friend's waistline. We want comfort or money or influence. And what do all of those things have in common? A willingness to exchange God's best, holiness, service, mission for the lesser, for what the world has to offer. The warning to be careful is a lesson that Lisa used to say to one of our most stubborn sons. You don't have to learn every lesson the hard way. When our desires are at odds with God's, be careful because he may just give you what you ask for and you'd have been better after better off following heart after God instead. All right, the second lens that I'm calling be grateful. So again, Samuel is trying to tell a larger story here. So we're going to go back to 1st Samuel 10 18 and 19. And he said to the people of Israel, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I brought you up out of up Israel out of Egypt and delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of the kingdoms that were oppressing you. But today you have rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses, and you have said to him, "Set a king over us. Now therefore, present yourselves before God by your tribes and by your thousands." This is a broader statement about the faithfulness of God. Regardless of the fact that they have actually requested something that God that is rejecting God, God remains faithful to the people of Israel. God has made a covenant with Abraham, a solemn promise to gather to himself a people, not because those people are deserving or special, but because God chose them for himself. God is the one who saves. God is the one who protects. God is the one who prospers. And after Samuel anoints Saul, but before Saul returns home with his servant, Samuel gives Saul some instructions. Um, I'm going to read a broader section here, but part of it's on the screen. So, when you depart from me today, when you Saul, depart from me, Samuel, today you will meet two men by Rachel's tomb in the territory of Benjamin and Zelah. And they will say to you, "The donkeys that you seek are found, and now your father has ceased to care about the donkeys, and is anxious about you, saying, "What shall I do about my son?" Then you shall go on from there further, and come to the oak of Tabor. Three men going up to God at Bethl will meet you there, one carrying three young goats, another carrying three loaves, another carrying a skin of wine. And they will greet you and give you two loaves of bread which you shall accept from their hand. And after you shall come to Gilth Elohim, where there is a garrison of the Philistines, and there as soon as you come to the city, you will meet a group of the prophets coming down from the high place with a harp, tambourine, flute, and liar before them prophesying. Here you go. Then the spirit of the Lord will rush upon you and will and you will prophesy with them and be turned into another man. Now when these signs meet you, do what your hand finds to do, for God is with you. Verse nine, when he turned back to leave Samuel, God gave him another heart and all these signs came to pass that day. So despite the fact that the Israelites had rejected God and then asking for their king to be the things that God desired instead of asking God to be the those things that they wanted despite the fact that Saul is not the person God would have chosen. God remains with Saul. In the chapters that follow, we will see the emergence of David. And David is described not as the one that the people had chosen, but as the one after God's own heart. I hope I'm not giving away the end of the story, but in 1st Samuel chapter 13 says this, "And Samuel said to Saul, you have done foolishly." So again, not a big surprise. Saul's not a great leader. He's tall and handsome and wealthy, but he's not a great leader. So you have done foolishly. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God, which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. 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 had commanded him. So there is no there there is a reason to be grateful here. God remains faithful to his promises even when his people don't. In our sin, God is with us. It doesn't mean that there won't be consequences or that we won't have suffering. Jesus himself describes our faith as one in which we need to take up our cross or to bear at least in part the consequences of our sin but not their ultimate penalty which he took for us for us. In our unfaithfulness, God remains faithful. This reflects the grace and mercy that is at the very heart of God. Before we ma move on, I want to make one more observation. Why did Samuel include the whole story about the donkeys? He's writing this. He has thousands and thousands of stories he could have told over the the why the donkeys. What's the importance of the donkeys? I mean, he could have just said Saul ran into Samuel and you know, but he didn't. Instead, he includes the story about the lost donkeys. And I I you know, look, I didn't talk to Samuel. I can speculate here a little bit. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses were all shepherds. David, who we will who we will meet soon, was a shepherd. All the great pillars of the faith were shepherds. Saul can't find a donkey. It isn't that being a shepherd is an honored role. And in fact, in the chapters to come, we'll see that David is sent to the fields to look after the sheep while his dad and brothers handle the important stuff back at the house. We'll see that in a story that's coming later. But here's the thing about being a shepherd is there's no such thing as a selfserving and lazy shepherd. Everything about being a shepherd is about the sheep or the donkeys. How does Jesus describe himself? I am the good shepherd. This leads us to our last point that we can be hopeful. So while Samuel knew nothing of Jesus proclamation, he included this story of Saul as a failed shepherd. And in my mind, it's because it contrasted with David and others. But the Holy Spirit was at work in Samuel's heart. And the Holy Spirit knew about Jesus and about this story. So be hopeful as our last lens here as we broaden out even further. And while I have alluded this to this already, there are a number of things in this passage that I think point us to Jesus. One of the things that we believe is that all of scripture is inspire sorry inspired by God. Which leads us to the conviction that the Bible is not a random collection of events or even a random collection of individually cohesive stories that somehow got randomly strung together. But again, it's this larger narrative that God is writing throughout history. There's this old youth group joke that if your youth pastor asks you what a particular passage is about and you have no idea, answer Jesus cuz there's a decent chance you're probably right. It's maybe incomplete, but there's something true about that. And let me see if I can convince you that that that part of this story about Saul and why it's included is not because it shows us who Jesus will be, but who Jesus won't be. So 1st Samuel 10:es 23 and 24 says this, "And when he Samuel stood among the people, he was taller than any of the people whom and his should from his shoulders upward. And Samuel said to the people, "Do you see whom the Lord has chosen? There is none like him among the people." And all the people shouted, "Long live the king." Isaiah tells us this about Jesus. It says, "For he grew up before him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He had no former majesty that we should look at him and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with with grief. And as one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised and we esteemed him not. What attracted the people to Saul were exactly the things that Jesus did not have. 1st Samuel 8:22. The Lord said to Samuel, "Obey their voice and make them a king." Matthew chapter 3. And when Jesus was was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were open to him, and he saw the spirit of God descending and coming to rest upon him. And in and the behold, a voice from heaven said, "This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased." Do you see the contrast here? Saul is who the people wanted. Jesus is who God wanted. 1st Samuel 9:4 and5. Then they Saul and a servant passed through the land of Benjamin but did not find them the donkeys. When they came to the land of Zaf, Saul said to the servant who was with him, "Come, let us go back. Let us let my father cease to care. Unless my father ceases to care about the donkey and become anxious about us. And John 10 says, I am the good shepherd. The shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. You see what I'm seeing here? This failed shepherd gives up. Got hard. Can't find him. I'm going home. Jesus says he's going to leave the 99 to find the one. He's the good shepherd. Lays down his life for his sheep. 1st Samuel 10:13-14. And when he had finished prophesying, he came to the high place. Saul's uncle said to him and said and to his servant, "Where did you go?" And he said, "To see the donkeys, to seek the donkeys." And and when we saw them not to be found, we went to Samuel. And in John 12, and Jesus found the young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written, fear not, the daughter of Zion, behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey's colt. So, so, so Saul returns to Jerusalem with no donkey. Jesus returns to Jerusalem on a donkey, symbolizing peace. Jesus is the better king chosen by God, not by us. One who came to find the lost sheep. One who came to bring peace between us and God. One who is dedicated to our flourishing, not his own. One who came to offer himself on our behalf. One who died and rose again that we might have new life. one who has commissioned us as followers to be part of his work to go into all the nations baptizing and teaching. These triple warnings, be careful, be grateful, be hopeful, are pretty timeless and they remind us who it is we follow. They remind us of our own tendency to settle for the world's lesser rather than God's greater. They bring us back to the gospel that despite our own rejection of God, he pursued us. that Jesus came to live and to die in our place that we might know him that he has called us to love the king, live the kingdom and serve the common good. Can I chose close with one final observation? Whenever I read this story of Jesus triumphal entry, the Palm Sunday story, if you will, entering into Jerusalem on a donkey, a symbol of peace, when kings would go out and then they would return to the city, if they went out and were able to negotiate peace, they would return on a donkey. When they went out and conquered, they would return on a horse, on a stallion. Jesus returns on a donkey because he brought peace. What peace did he bring? He brought peace between us and God. He brought peace between God and men. These people that were there that day as Jesus arrives on this donkey swinging their branches saying, "Hosana, hosana, in five days are going to be screaming," crucify him. only to then three days later for him to rise in victory over that death that we might have hope. It always reminds my heart not just to be careful about who and what I follow. What reminds me to be grateful for who my savior is on my behalf, but that there is hope in this life to know him, to serve him, to know and put the shoulder to the blow with others whom he has gathered to himself to be part of something bigger than ourselves. But there is this ultimate hope that Jesus is going to return to Jerusalem again. And this time he's not on a donkey. I can't hardly read this passage. Then I saw the heaven opened and behold a white horse. The one sitting on it as faithful and true. And in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame, and on his head are many diadems. And he has written as a name written that no one knows but himself. And he has clothed in a in a robe dipped in blood. And the name by which he is called as the word of God. And the armies of of heaven arrayed and fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. And from his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. And he will rule them with a rod of iron. And he will tread on the wine press with the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. And on his robe and on his thigh are written the name King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Pray with me. Father in heaven, we are grateful. We are careful. And we are hopeful because you have accomplished something that we could not. That you have pursued us even when we did not pursue you. And that Jesus is our great king. The great and better king than Saul. Even the ba great and better king than David. And it is him who we serve. And it is my prayer that we would not forget that and that we would resist the temptation to follow after the things of the world and that we would see the things that matter most to you rather than the things that matter most to the world. So God, it is our um conviction that you were up to something. You have promised to gather to yourself a people and we here are evidence of that and we are grateful. We are hopeful. Send us today and that in Jesus name. Amen.