The Quiet Hour

Mt Benger Mail, 12 October 1938, Page 4

The Quiet Hour

OBEDIENCE AND SACRIFICE (Continued). Now at first sight it| might seem as though Saul had done nothing to deserve the severe sentence he received in being told that God woxxld rend the kingdom from his hand. It was the sensible and right thing to do, but for one thing —Saul had received a definite command of the Lord to wait till Samuel came, and he had disobeyed it. Now his disobedience revealed in him a deeper factor, and it was this, that in the crisis he showed that he really lacked faith in God. In the last resort he believed, not what God could do for Israel through him, but what he, Saul could do for Israel. When he thought ,*e was to be left he turned from following God. The true test of a man’s faith lies in the way he acts in a time of crisis. When we fully trust God, we can say, with Job, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” The Bible is always urging that trust, even when things are darkest. When at a later date, the Judean xxobles were getting bustled in much the same way as Saul was bustled, Isaiah reminded them, that, “in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength.” The supreme example of courageous faith is of course our Lord Jesus Christ. When once he saw the chosen path marked out for him, that path that was to lead him to the Cross, we are told that He stedfastly set his face to go towards Jerusalem; when His friends warned Him that His enemies were plotting to capture and to kill Him, He replied: “I must go on my way to-day and tomorrow and the day following, for it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerixsalem !” Jesus was always the same, always at peace in His heart because He trusted in God.

Now there are just three lessons I wish to draw from this story of Saul’s rejection from the kingdom. The first lesson we must learn is that no matter how difficult to obey may he God’s commands, or how foolish from the world’s point of view, we must obey them, and not grow fretful or impatient. It is much too easy to be like Saul, and wish to serve, but in oufi way, and at our time, the kingdom of God. It requires faith and courage to await God’s time. But we should learn from this story, that fretfulness and impatience with God’s time, and God’s methods is sin, for it betokens a lack of trust in God. We should ever remember too, that in spite of all appearances to the contrary, there is a sweet reasonableness about the Lord’s commands which we must never doubt, and He often fulfils them in a way that was greater than ever we could have asked or thought. I heard recently of a woman who made a practice of tithing her income to give to the work of God. She used to hand over this amount once a quarter, and just before the money was due she received a letter from her two maiden sisters in England saying that they, were in sore straits, that the rent was £2O behind, and that if it was not paid shortly they would be put out of their house. The lady did not know what to do. Her husband had been most generous to her sisters and she felt she could ask no more. She wondered if she should send the money she had put aside for the Lord, and she prayed and prayed about it. The money would only have been part of the sum required, but she thought it would help. However, the only answer was “Thou shalt not rob the Lord thy God.’'’ The English mail went, and still she had no answer save “Thou shalt not rob the Lord thy God. ’ ’ She gave the money in to the Church, feeling still very worried, when her husband called her in, to say that he intended sending a certain quarterly pension amounting to the exact amount required to his wife’s sisters. In great joy, she told him how much it was needed, and so he said, “Well every quarter I will send the pension, as I do not require it.” Had she taken the more obvious course and sent the tithe, instead of obeying God’s voice, her prayer may never have been answered.

The second lesson we might learn from this incident is that we can never replace that inner obedience of the heart by any outward rite, however elaborate. Saul was performing the customary sacrifice, and offering honour to God, but he failed to give that true inward obedience, which alone makes the sacrifice an offering. As the prophet Micah warns ius “And what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.’’ 1 We might lay this lesson to hearty that to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams. It is not what we want ito give God, but what God wants of us. We too are heirs to a kingdom greater by far than the Kingdom of Israel. We are heirs to the Kingdom of

Heaven, but we must do as God requires. What God wants is not simply outward service, however elaborate, but that inner loyalty and trust which a Father expects from his children. That trust nevex’ falters, and that love endures to the end. Finally we should learn from this incident never to underestimate the significance of a single act of disobedience to God s commands. Probably compared with the advantages of winning the battle, the fact of disobedience to God’s command) seemed small, yet it was the turning point in Saul’s career. In the same way, it may seem a small thing to disregard, for the time being, the voice of conscience for the sake of some worldly advantage, some pleasure, something that seems wonderful at the time. Yes, but to disregard that voice may prove to be our final downfall. Saul gained the victory he so much desired, but he had no real joy, for he knew that God and Samuel had turned from; him. Bitterness was in his heart, and finally he became almost insane with jealousy of David. It the same way, anything we may gain by disobeying God’s voice, loses half its joy because we have turned from Him, and after all, we might well ask “What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his soul.” Let us therefore, follow the Mlaster, at whatever cost, for He alone can say, when all seems lost, “Be of good cheer I have overcome the world/’