Yielding to the Lord - A Lesson from 1 Samuel 8 Episode #161

The Burt (Not Ernie) Show

So today we’re back to our series, Every Book A Promise, and here we are in 1 Samuel.

You know, I first thought we’d look at the life of Hannah and her son Samuel, because it’s beautiful and encouraging and just causes hope to spring forth.

But as I prayed over this episode, I landed on chapter 8.

In the Amplified, this chapter has a header title - Israel Demands A King.

Sometimes the results of the things we want the most are not so great.

And it’s really critical to yield to the Lord, to let the Holy Spirit do what only He can do in us and through us, and not just fight for our own way. The work of yielding is, at times, hard work. It takes effort on our part to bend the knee to the Lord, and let Him have His way fully and completely, while we choose to trust Him even when we know that our own desires may need to be placed on the altar, given fully to Him, and we step back and choose trust and gratitude and ask Him to give us a heart that wants what He wants for us. His ways are best, and what He chooses for us is best…but boy, it can be hard to get to the place of accepting that and yielding to His will when we really really want some certain thing.

Here we find the nation of Israel in 1 Samuel chapter 8.

Israel demands a king.

Samuel was a prophet, and in this chapter we find him older, verse one says Samuel was old, and he appointed his sons as judges over Israel. Verse 3 tells us that his sons did not walk in his ways, but turned aside after dishonest gain, took bribes, and perverted justice. Now that’s a sad, sad result. Those boys were not like their daddy. Isn’t that just so sad?

Verse 4 says the elders of Israel went to see Samuel and just told him, Hey, you’ve gotten old and your sons don’t walk in your ways. Now give us a king, appoint a king over us to judge us and rule over us. Like all the other nations. (verse 5)

When we want to be like the crowd, like they have over there, and they have this and everybody else has it and is doing it this way, so that’s what I want too, that can be a sign that we’re on the wrong path, the wrong track. Cuz usually when everybody is doing some certain thing, it’s likely not honoring the Lord. What the world does, well, that doesn’t look like the Kingdom of God. Let’s put it that way. When, say, your kids want to do what everybody else is doing, do you just say yes, sure, go for it, I don’t care what you do, go on, be like everybody. Be a photocopy of the world. UHHH, ya probably don’t react that way.

And God doesn’t want us, His people, His Church, to look and act and demand the things of the world. Our citizenship is in heaven, it says in Philippians 3:20, so we’re here but as ambassadors, not as citizens. Pilgrims. Just passing through.

Now here’s what it sort of takes a turn as far as what we might expect God’s response to be. In verse 7 the Lord tells Samuel that the people hadn’t rejected him, but had rejected God from being King over them. Verse 9 from the Amplified says this, and this is God speaking to Samuel here: “So now listen to their voice, only solemnly warn them and tell them the ways of the king who will reign over them.”

That’s a powerful verse.

God’s response to being rejected by the people He’d rescued out of Egypt and given this nation to, like He made them into a nation, and His response to being rejected as their King was to let them have what they’re demanding but to warn them solemnly and tell them what is going to be life under a king. The king will reign over them, because that’s what kings do.

Verses 10-18 provide the record of Samuel’s warning to the people. The king will take your sons for these tasks and your daughters for these other tasks, and he will take the best of your fields and vineyards and your olive groves and your grain and your donkeys and your flocks and you will be his servants, and then one day you’re going to cry out because of the king you’ve chosen for yourselves, but the LORD will not answer you on that day because you have rejected Him as King.

There is a twofold promise in chapter 8.

A promise of living with the result of what you demand, and by this I mean any area of life that we reject God’s Lordship and Kingship over, we can’t demand what we want, reject His reign and rule, and then expect Him to make it all right in the snap of a finger when we realize we don’t like the results of that which we demanded from God. (Now I believe per the New Testament there is grace but that comes with repentance, and that’s not always a theme that folks in the Church like to hear about. Often churchy people don’t like to repent. We like the grace, we like the forgiveness, but it’s kind of goes with repenting, doesn’t it?)

In the end, the people got their king. Saul, from the tribe of Benjamin.

And God did a profound work down through the lineage of the next king, David.

God gets done what He aims to get done, and we don’t really have the power to thwart His eternal plans…because guess what? He knows every word we speak before it is formed on our tongues so says Psalm 139:4.

So we don’t mess up and trash and thrash His eternal plans. We are created, He is the Creator, and we don’t have the power to ruin what He wills to be accomplished. But that’s not an excuse to demand our own way. It should be a warning that we don’t understand the holiness of God the way that we ought to.

God’s holiness reminds me that I should trust Him fully and serve Him honorably and repent when I find myself demanding my own way.

And when He solemnly gives me a warning about what will happen if He gives me that which I am pining and whining for…do I listen, or do I say, “Yeah yeah, just give it to me.”

So what’s the positive promise here?

That we can listen and heed and be blessed beyond measure, if we have ears to hear and hearts to understand. If we yield. If we say, “Not my will, but Yours be done in this area, in this part of my life, where I really want this, but Your will, not mine.” There’s a blessing to be had in those moments of yielding, a blessing that may well be unique to those situations.

You know, kings like the one they were demanding in 1 Samuel chapter 8, kings recruit. That’s evidenced clearly in this passage. He’ll take this, he’ll take that, he’ll take the other, and then he’ll take even more. Kings recruit. Sometimes people in other positions of leadership recruit.

But God, He doesn’t treat us like recruits, like a mass of numbers, because that’s not very personal or loving. Your God is so personal. Your God loves you so incredibly much. Isn’t that the reality of John 3:16 and 17? For God SO loved. That tiny word SO is awfully important, it packs a huge punch and gives us a mighty big glimpse into the heart of our Father.

God will have assignments for you, tasks that fit into what Paul told us about in Ephesians, good works created in advance for you to do. I think that’s in chapter two of Ephesians. Super encouraging chapter, by the way, Ephesians 2. And 3. Well, the whole book…who am I kidding, it’s powerful and man you need a boost about your life and if you matter in the whole scheme of things? Read Epheisans. It’ll boost ya!

Being recruited feels so very different than being granted a Kingdom assignment straight from the God who SO loves you.

No comparison between the two.

Man recruits. God assigns out of the depths of His great and unending love.

One feels heavy and burdensome and wearying. The other brings joy and nearness to the Lord and fits us. Like a cookie back in the shape of the cutter, ya know? Okay, this fits me exactly and perfectly, this is the cloth I was cut from, wow oh wow, this is not heavy and cumbersome and awkward. It fits. And feels like a gift even as I do the work of it.

Does that kind of make sense as a distinction? Recruit vs assign.

Yield to Him, ask Him for His assignments, the good works He has planned for you to be doing, and enjoy the truth that you are SO loved by your King. The promise of 1 Samuel for this series on the podcast is basically this: you will never regret yielding to your one true King rather than demanding what you want, and you will be blessed by the God who SO loves you each and every time you say, “Not my will, Lord, but Your will be done.”