The people of Israel, after centuries of backsliding, of each doing what was right in his own eyes, demand the last judge and prophet Samuel to give them a king like all other nations that surrounded them.
God sees this demand as Israel's rejection of God as their King. It wasn't that God didn't want to give them a king; years before, God already had planned to give them a king as we can see God warning ahead through His laws about kingship in Deut 17:16-17. What displeased God were the reasons for their want of a king:
But the people refused to listen to Samuel. "No!" they said. "We want a king over us. Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles."
The Israelites blatantly refused to acknowledge God who was their King, their leader over their armies to fight the battles.
It depicts a major transition from Theocracy (God-rule) to Monarchy (king-rule).
So God gives them what they want:
1 Sam 10:1-9 records the anointing of Saul as the first king of Israel which is confirmed by three evidences of God's providential work in Saul's life.
The man Saul was an impressive young man, tall and likeable, unassuming and generous.
God gives Saul three evidences to show His hand on Saul's anointing:
1. Instruction: regarding the lost donkeys which caused Saul to seek out Samuel;
2. Provision: Saul would be met by three going to worship God with provision which they would share with Saul; and
3. Inspiration: Saul would be met by a procession of prophets, at which time the Holy Spirit would cause Saul to prophesy along with them.
Samuel tells Saul in 1 Sam 10:6 that Saul "will be changed into a different person" once the three signs are fulfilled, but in v.9, it states, "as Saul turned to leave Samuel, God changed Saul's heart..."
Saul's change of heart however never fully took root as we can see from his tragic downfall.
No amount of the supernatural or miraculous we experience will change our hearts. Having a heart after God, a pure and tranformed heart, does not come into being over night.
Saul disobeys God in increasingly grave situations until it finally culminates into God's rejection of him as king of Israel.
The metamorphosis of a believer's a heart into one after God's own heart - a heart moldable and touchable by God - does not consist in the degree or frequency or intensity of "spiritual" experiences, but in living out the truth of God in our lives in the mundane, the routine, the daily.
Is your spiritual walk with Christ built upon one hyped up experience after another, or is it founded upon His Word, worked out in your life in the midst of the ordinary by the indwelling Spirit?
--from Nakwon EM Oct. 29th 11:00am Sunday Worship Service
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