Holy Bible

Saul, a choice young man. 1 Samuel 9:9 The choice young man F. A. Forrest, M. A. 1. The first thing to notice about young Saul is his fine physique. Do not despise a fine physique. Plato calls it "a privilege of nature"; Homer, "a glorious gift of the Deity"; and Ovid, "a favour bestowed by the gods." Has it never struck you how frequently the sacred writers allude to this quality? It would be easy to find a score of Bible characters who are spoken of as "comely," or "goodly," or of "great beauty." In comparison to the soul the body is not of great account; but still it must not be treated with neglect. The soul's lodgment should be kept in the best and most beautiful condition. "It is a great mistake," says Cobbet, in his essays to young men, "to suppose that you derive any advantage from exterior decoration. Though with the foolish and vain part of women fine clothes frequently do something; yet the greater part of the sex are much too penetrating to draw their conclusions solely from the outside shew of a man. They look deeper, and find other criteria whereby to judge." The piece is not very classical; but, as expressing the common feeling of the best part of women towards the dandy or coxcomb, I believe it is almost perfection. Physical beauty alone is a poor thing. Talleyrand said of a lovely woman that "beauty was her least charm." An intelligent mind and a kindly heart are as necessary almost to make a face truly beautiful as form and complexion. Physical beauty is often seen apart from spiritual beauty — "a gold ring in a swine's snout." 2. The second thing to notice about young Saul is his filial piety, There is no duty more plainly or strongly enforced in the Scriptures than the duty of obeying parents. And with it are associated the highest rewards and the severest punishments; and these rewards and punishments pertain not only to the future, but to the present life. The late William E. Forster, while still a youth, was ambitious of a political career. His own notion was to study for the law, as the likeliest means by which a poor man's son could enter Parliament. But his father insisted on his going into business. And the son did as his father wished without demur, although not without keen disappointment and pain. He fancied that his chances of Parliament were at an end. In this connection his biographer says: "The boy acted invariably in such a manner as to prove that the reverential regard he professed for his father was really felt, and that he was at all times ready to submit his own inclinations to meet the wishes of the latter." Did William Forster suffer ultimately by his filial submission? Most people will say that the father was wrong, and that his action was fitted to thwart the hopes of his boy. And that is true. But Forster, by his filial honour, had secured the interposition and influence of Heaven on his behalf. And so, unlikely as it looked, he got into Parliament, and made a name for himself there by noble and valuable services to his country — a name which will not soon be dropped from our nation's story. We must not omit to notice here additionally the affectionate consideration young Saul had for his father. 3. The third thing to notice about young Saul is his modest disposition. It is told of an old Scotch weaver that he was wont to pray every morning that the Lord would give him "a guid opeenion o' himsel'." I cannot conceive a less needed petition. The great fault with people nowadays is that they have too good an opinion of themselves — see themselves bigger and better a great deal than the reality. While pride makes men ridiculous, humility commands admiration and love. Sir Joshua Reynolds was never satisfied with his work. He said once to a friend, who was praising his pictures very highly: "Sketches, sketches, only sketches!" When George Washington rose to reply to an eloquent and flattering speech, expressive of the thanks of his country for his services in the French and Indian Wars, he blushed, stammered, and then sat down in utter confusion, drawing from the speaker the further compliment that his modesty was equal to his valour. Virgil, the "Prince of Latin Poets," could not bear to be stared at in the street: and would sometimes seek shelter in shops from the demonstrations of his admirers. But modesty may degenerate into a vice. Men suffer, and the world suffers, by an excess of modesty. Milton attributes to the just and pious honouring of ourselves every laudable endeavour and worthy achievement. And so said to his pupil: "Reverence thyself." I would rather have a man over-estimate than underestimate his powers. While the first mistake may stimulate small talents to the performance of great deeds, the last may prevent great talents from achieving half their possibilities. We are familiar with the grumblings of (so-called) "modest merit." It complains of neglect and unfair treatment. Nincompoops and nobodies are getting on, and even loaded with rewards and honours, while it is left without notice and without pay. But well has Washington Irving said of these complaints: "They are often the cant by which indolent and irresolute men seek to lay their want of success at the door of the public. Modest merit is too apt to be inactive, or negligent, or uninstructed merit. Well-matured and well-disciplined talent is always sure of a market, provided it exerts itself; but it must not cower at home, and expect to be sought for." 4. The fourth thing to notice about young Saul is his independent and generous spirit. In search of the asses, he came near to the town where resided the prophet Samuel. The servant suggested to him that he should consult the seer about the strayed herd. The idea was good — capital — here was a way out of his difficulty. "But," said Saul, "behold, if we go, what shall we bring the man? for the bread is spent in our vessels, and there is not a present to bring to the man of God: what have we?" Saul was a gentleman! Do not say that this was an Eastern custom. It was, and the plate at the church door is a Western custom. But Saul might have neglected the custom, as some among us — I do not say in this audience — may neglect the plate. He respected the religion of his fathers. To all outward seeming he walked in the commandments of Jehovah. God complains through Samuel, at a later stage of the king's history, that he had turned back from following Him, so that at one time Samuel had evidently been controlled, at least to some extent, by the Divine Will. But there was no depth in his religion. It was a superficial growth — its roots did not go down into the heart. And so the disappointment of his later history. Giving so much promise at the start, his life closed in midnight blackness and horror. ( F. A. Forrest, M. A. ) The choice young man Phillip Brooks. Let us ask ourselves what are the characteristics of the choice young man. The "choice" of anything signifies the best example of that thing. The word involves the idea not of exceptionalness but of representativeness. The choice fruit of the tree is the tree's best fruit; it is that in which the tree's juices have had their most unhindered way, and made the best which that tree was capable of making. The choice work of art is the freest embodiment of the artistic spirit, the thing in which beautiful thought and beautiful work and beautiful material have done their best. The choice man is the best specimen of humanity, the human being in whom there is least that is inhuman or unhuman, and in whom the truly human qualities are most complete. So is it with the choice young man. He is the true young man. The great point of the phrase is this — that it denotes not an exception but a true condition of human life. When, however, we go on to ask, beyond this generous consciousness of admiration, what it is which we admire in young manhood, our answer must be found, I think, in the way in which the true human life always begins with its circumference, as it were, complete, and then fills in its space with its details. It might have been just the opposite. Life might have been made to begin with some one point and slowly widen out from that point until its completeness were attained. As it is, it leaps at once to this completeness of itself; it is exuberant at the beginning; it does not distrust the world and only gradually learn that the world is worthy of its trust; it trusts the world outright, and lets all stingy questionings come afterward. Life seems so good that it is satisfied with its own normal exercises and emotions, and does not seek additions in artificial stimulants. Now here is a distinct quality in human youth, belonging to a distinct truth concerning the life of man. If it is so, then we have reached our first idea about the choice young man. In him this quality of human youth will be most bright and clear He will be most possessed with the sense of the sufficiency of life, and most eager to preserve its purity because of the completeness which he feels in it. This is the true motive of the best young man's desire for purity. It is not fear. Life, the true life, the choice life, begins upon the mountains. As the morning mists scatter, it sees the gulfs it did not see at first; but it has no natural necessity to plunge into them when they are seen. And the true power of its continence is not the horror of the gulf, but the abundance and glory of the pure hill top where the young feet stand. All this does not apply only to those things which are absolutely and manifestly vicious, to wanton licentiousness add reckless sin; it applies to all the accidents of life. It is a bad sight for the eyes to see when a young man has come prematurely into the power of those accidents, when he cannot find life abundant without what we call the "comforts of life," even those which have no vicious element about them. What business has the young vigour of twenty to demand that the fire shall be warm and the seat cushioned and the road smooth? Let him not parade his incompetence for life by insisting that life is not worth living unless a man is rich — unless, that is. the abundance of life should be eked out with wealth, which is an accident of life, not of its essence. Sad is it when a community grows more and more to abound in young men who worship wealth and think they cannot live without luxury and physical comfort. The choicest of its strength is gone. The same principle, that life in the young man should be abundant in itself, would find still broader application in every relation of human action. It would bring simplicity and healthiness in every standard. It would rule out and cast aside as impertinent and offensive all that was artificial and untrue. How clear it makes the whole question of the way in which money is to be gained or given! And so it brings us at once to another practical question of young men's life. Money to the simple healthy human sense is but the representative of energy and power. It is to pass from man to man only as the symbol of some exertion, some worthy outputting of strength and life. In social life, in club, in college, on the street, the willingness of young men to give or to receive money on the mere turn of chance is a token of the decay of manliness and self-respect which is more alarming than almost anything besides. It has an inherent baseness about it which not to feel shows a base soul. To carry in your pocket money which has become yours by no use of your manly powers, which has ceased to be another man's by no willing acceptance on his part of its equivalent — that is a degrading thing. Will it not burn the purse in which you hold it? Will it not blight the luxury for which you spend it? So I rank high among the signs of a choice human youth the clearness of sight and the healthiness of soul which make a man refuse to have anything to do with the transference of property by chance, which make him hate and despise betting and gambling under their most approved and fashionable and accepted forms. Plentiful as those vices are among us, they still in some degree have the grace to recognise their own disgracefulness by the way in which they conceal themselves. It is an awful hour when the first necessity of hiding anything comes. The whole life is different thenceforth. When there are questions to be feared and eyes to be avoided and subjects which must not be touched, then the bloom of life is gone. Put off that day as long as possible. It is no drawback from the truth or power of all this that it involves the appeal to sentiment, for the presence and the power of healthy sentiment is another token of the choice young humanity. Sentiment is the finest essence of the human life. It is, like all the finest things, the easiest to spoil. It bears testimony of itself that it is finer than judgment, because a thousand times when judgment is all clear and right, sentiment is tainted and all wrong. And hosts of men, feeling the mysterious dangers which beset sentiment, would fain banish it altogether. They do not know how to use it, and so they will not try. It is explosive and dangerous, and so it shall be watched and made contraband, like dynamite. How many men do you know who can frankly look you in the face and say a piece of sentiment, and make it seem perfectly real and true, and not make either you or themselves, or both, feel silly and embarrassed by their saying it? Now if men must come to that, the longer it can be before they come to it the better! Let the sentiments have their true, unquestioned power in the young man's life. Let him glow with admiration, let him burn with indignation, let him believe with intensity, let him trust unquestioningly, let him sympathise with all his soul. The hard young man is the most terrible of all. Do you remember the simpler, nobler story of the young Christ? "When He came near He beheld the city, and wept ever it." Tell me what becomes of the hard young man, proud of his unsensitiveness, even pretending to be more unsensitive than he is, incapable of enthusiasm, incapable of tears; what becomes of him beside the knightliness of a sorrow such as that? The little child is sensitive without a thought of effort. The old man often feels the joy and pain of men as if the long years had made it his own. But, in between, the young man is hardened by self-absorption. Be sure that there is no true escape from softness in making yourself hard. It is like freezing your arm to keep it from decay. Only by filling it with blood and giving it the true flexibility of health, so only is it to be preserved from the corruption which you fear. Be not afraid of sentiment, but only of untruth. Trust your sentiments, and so be a man. It would be strange indeed if our first truth did not apply to the whole methods of thought as well as to the actions and the feelings. That truth was, you remember, that youth began with the large circumference, and then filled in the circle gradually with the details of living. It does not start with the small detail, and only gradually build out to the large idea. Now, what will that truth mean as we apply it to the intellectual life? Will it not mean that the choicer a young mind is the more immediately it will begin with the perception of great truths, which then its thought and study and experience will fill out and confirm? It is the place and privilege of the young man to know immediately that God is good, that the world is hopeful, that spirit is real. These great ideas are his ideas. He does not prove God's existence, building it up out of his own sight of the things God does. He sees God. He. the pure in heart, sees God; and then all his life is occupied in gathering into the substance of the faith which he has won by direct vision, the vividness and definiteness which separate successive experiences of God have to give. Not that your young man will not make a thousand blunders, not that he will not sometimes seem to lose his sight of truth, but that the method of his mental life is right, and so that in the end he must stand clear under a cloudless sky. The world's strength has been built up thus, by young men believing and uttering the truth they saw — the greatest, largest truth — and then their experience filling that truth with solidity until it became a foundation on which yet greater truth might rest. Begin with largeness of thought, and with positiveness of thought. The way in which a man begins to think influences all his thinking to the end of his life. Begin by seeking for what is true, not for what is false, in the thought and belief which you find about you. Scepticism is not merely the disbelief of some propositions. If it were that, there is not one of us but would be a sceptic. It is the habit and the preference of disbelieving. God save us all from that scepticism! God save especially our young men from it, for a sceptical young man is a monstrosity. What shall we say about this whole last matter, the matter of belief, except that the true young man's life, the choice young man's life, is bound to be a life of vision. To see the large things in their largeness — that is his privilege; and there is no privilege which is not a duty too. And now I do not know whether there has come at all out of What I have said anything like a clear image of the choice young man. As I said when I began, I should care little to try to create that image if it were some strange, exceptional creature that I was trying to carve. But it is not that; it is the true young human being, the type and flower of the first vigour of humanity. And these are the qualities which we have seen in him — purity of body, mind, and soul; simple integrity, and a dignity which will not have what is not his, no matter under what specious form of game or wager it has come into his hands; tenderness, sympathy, sentiment — call it what name you will, a soul that is not cynical or cruel; and positive, broad thought and conviction. Do these things, as I name them, blend with one another? Does there stand out as their result a figure recognisable and clear, well-knit and strong, brave, generous, and true, but very little conscious of itself, dimming the love and honour of the human heart. For men do love the type and flower of their own young manhood. Little children and young boys look up to it with touching reverence. Old men look back to it with wistful longing, often with a perplexed wonder how they ever passed themselves through a land which they see now to be so rich and kept so little of its richness. Only once in this sermon have! spoken of Jesus as the specimen of human youth. But He is such a specimen always. And I appeal to all of you who have sympathetically read" the Gospels to say whether you do not feel through all His life of sorrow the subtle, certain presence of this joy of which I speak. It is the ideal joy of life, burning through all the hardest and cruellest circumstances of life, and asserting, in spite of everything, the true condition of the Son of God and the Son of Man. I have spoken of the young man's character and life, and I have seemed to say nothing at all of his religion. Is it because I have forgotten his religion or thought it of small consequence? God forbid! It is because one of the most effectual and convincing ways to reach religion is to make life seem so noble and exacting that it shall itself seem to demand religion with the great cry, "Who is sufficient for these things?" When not yet driven by the stress of sin and sorrow, but exalted by the revelation of what life might be, and eager with the witness of the truth of that revelation which fills his own self-consciousness, the young man looks abroad for help that he may realise it. then he finds Christ. And he finds Christ in the way that belongs to him just then and there, just in the time and place where be is standing. He finds Christ the model and the master. It is the personal Christ that makes the young man's religion. "Behold this Christ standing before me, pointing to the heights of the completed human life, and saying not, 'Go there,' but saying, 'Follow me' — going before us into the land our souls desire!" When religion comes to mean simply following Christ, when the young man gives himself to Christ as his Leader and his Lord, when he prays to Christ with the entire sense that he is laying hold of the perfect strength for the perfect work — then the whole circle is complete. Power and purpose, purpose and power, both are there; and only the eternal growth is needed for the infinite result. ( Phillip Brooks. ) A choice young man Wayland Hoyt. A great writer has said that it is possible for us to be good for nothing in history save as a warning. Saul stands in history as a warning. I. OBSERVE, THAT PRAYER SHOULD BE SUBMISSIVE. I cannot think the Israelites were wrong in their wish for a king. There is a provision in the Book of Deuteronomy for a king. But mark, they were wrong in demanding a king. 1. So sometimes God listens to and allows the blinded prayers of our hearts, and they turn to curses. "Thine own wickedness shall reprove thee and thy backslidings," etc.; "I gave thee a king in my anger," etc. 2. God sometimes grants in the way of reproof. I have seen parents who prayed: "O, spare my sick child," mourn that their boy ever lived to grow to manhood. The shadow of death receded in answer to that dictating prayer, but a darker shadow took its place. I have heard young men pray" "O Lord, give me success in this life." I have heard them declare: "That success they would have." In pain. beyond expression poignant, they afterward found out that character, made strong and shining with virtues, is better than applause, than power, than riches. 3. Let us rather pray as did our great exampler in Gethsemane. Let us never forget that our blessing is wrapped up in God's will. and not in our own. II. LET US LEARN THAT DIVINE PROVIDENCES DESCEND TO AND INCLUDE WHAT WE CALL THEIR TRIVIALITIES OF LIFE. Could there be anything more trivial than searching for runaway asses. Yet, on this trivial circumstance swung the door through which Saul passed to his throne. Long before Mohammed's power was settled, when pursued by his enemies, at one time, he pushed back a bough that was before a cave and entered the opening. A moment after a bird lit on the bough As the enemy came up the bird flew away. Said the enemy: "He could not have gone into that cave, or the bird would not have been on that bough," and they passed on, and Mohammed's life was saved. Tell your troubles in God's ear. Don't think them too trivial. III. LEARN THAT THERE MAY BE A FAIR BEGINNING AND A DARK ENDING. Saul attributed his first great victory to God, and would not allow the needless shedding of blood. But the drawback was, Saul had not given himself to God. There was another Saul who, when smitten down by the blinding light, cried out: "What wilt Thou have me to do?" His life was henceforth a seeming failure. He loses all things, but Saul, the king, has all things — he has his crown. Saul of Tarsus, stripped of all earthly things, awaits his crown. "Henceforth," says he, "there is laid up for me a crown," etc. Saul, the king, lost his crown in death, etc. See the difference. The one gave himself to God, the other did not. Which choice is to be preferred? Which do you make? ( Wayland Hoyt. ) The ruin of a choice young man W. Williams. A life of bright promise may prove a life of disastrous failure. I. THE BRIGHT PROSPECTS OF THIS CHOICE YOUNG MAN. 1. His natural endowments were such as admirably to fit him for the position it was the will of God he was to occupy, so that he entered upon his office with advantages from which the best auguries might have been formed. "See ye him," said Samuel, "whom the Lord hath chosen, that there is none like him?" I would here remark the advantages to us, as young men, of good health, and a strong, vigorous body. 2. Nor was Saul lacking in moral qualities. His occupation, his concern for his father, his obedience to the prophet, his respect for religious ordinances, clearly indicate him to have been a man of quiet, plodding, and God-fearing disposition. Yes, you may have all these, and be in the eyes of all "a choice young man, and goodly;" yet lacking one thing, as Saul did, when trial and temptation come, the fair promise of your youth may be blighted; and when you, and others interested in you, expected to be reaping a harvest of bliss, there will be nothing left but bitter disappointment and vain regret. II. ABUSED PRIVILEGES. What God expected from the king of His people is clearly defined in Deuteronomy 17:14-20 . Saul was no doubt made acquainted with these injunctions by Samuel, so that there was no excuse whatever for his failure. Indeed, it is clear that his failure came not as the result of ignorance, but of a stubborn, rebellious will, which set itself in opposition to the will of God; and also from want of obedient faith. The first indication of these signs of defection, we have in 1 Samuel ch. 13. This injunction was to be a test of Saul's faith, and it failed. Another test was given him. "Go," said Samuel, "and smite Amalek" In this test of obedience he again failed; for, contrary to his commission, he spares Agag, and also brings of the spoil of war to offer in sacrifice to God. In this his pride is manifest — he cares little for the approbation of God, but wants honour before the people. God requires of you heart allegiance. The only true safeguard you can have for this life is in giving yourselves up to Christ,. Without this you may, and some of you will, become moral wrecks like Saul. III. BLIGHTED PURPOSES. 1. The Divine purposes cannot be frustrated by our unfaithfulness. Without any interference with their moral liberty, God, no doubt, fulfils His own designs even by wicked men. The counsel of the Lord, that shall stand. God makes all events and all lives subservient, to His wise and holy will. Yet this is no excuse for our lack of fidelity to duty. 2. Saul's own purposes were broken off. His heart must have been big with hope when he received the Divine anointing, and in pursuing his course of disobedience, he, no doubt thought to win renown for himself and Israel Self-aggrandisement was the secret purpose in much of his disobedience; and then as to his son Jonathan, whom he made a general in his army; as a father, he must have cherished purposes concerning him. But all were doomed to disappointment, and that by his own folly. He who serves God takes the best way to serve himself. It is a solemn truth, too, that when a man has begun to go wrong, he finds it harder every step he takes to retrace his course. Another startling truth, which it may be wise to mention, is given us in the ruined prospects of this virtually discrowned monarch. 3. He sins beyond the possibility of repentance. Awful capabilities of self-torture lie folded within every human soul. Youthful sins lay a foundation for aged sorrows HEART allegiance to Christ will be the only insurance you can have against becoming the victims of clans of evil forces now lying in ambush within the mysterious recesses of your soul. But in addition to the blighted purpose of Saul, there were others who suffered by his sin. No man liveth unto himself. What a blight did Saul's sin bring upon the hopes of Samuel. Saul, too, blasted the purposes of his family. His sin involved his sons in his misfortune; for the sceptre passed away from his house, and his family became extinct. ( W. Williams. ) Saul: A shipwreck A. Whyte, D. D. Dr. Newman, after attempting three times to preach on Saul, is compelled to confess that Saul's character continues to be obscure to him and he warns us that we must be cautious while considering Saul's obscure character. But, unhappily, the obscurity begins further back than Saul. The obscurity begins with Saul's father and mother. We never hear of Saul's mother; but what kind of a father can Kish have been. We know all about Samuel. All Israel, from Dan even to Beersheba, knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord; all Israel but Kish and his son Saul. Yes, there is some quite inexplicable obscurity about Kish as well as about Saul; an obscurity that perplexes us and throws us out at the very opening of the son's sad history. And yet, when we turn back and begin to read Saul's whole history over again with our eye on the object; when we stop and look round about us as we read, the ancient obscurity begins to pass off, but only to let alarm and apprehension for ourselves and for our own sons take its place. Saul staggers us and throws us out till we look at ourselves and at the men round about us, and then we soon see, what had before been obscure to us, that our inborn and indulged tastes, likings, dispositions, inclinations, and pursuits rule us also, shape us, occupy us, and decide for us the men we know and the life we lead. Josephus says that Samuel had an inborn love of justice. But Saul had inherited from Kish an inborn and an absorbing love of cattle and sheep; and, till they were lost, Saul had no errand to Samuel's city. Why hold up our hands at Saul's obscurity, and at Saul's ignorance of Samuel. We have it in ourselves. We also see what we bring, eyes to see, and ears to hear, and hearts to love if you have no more sense of religion and life than Saul and his father had, at least, like them, give the preference to a religious servant. Saul's servant knew Samuel. Saul was led up to the door of his earthly kingdom by the piety of his father's servant; and you may be led up some day to the door of the heavenly kingdom by one of your servants who has interests and acquaintances and experiences that up to tonight you know nothing about. Saul with another hearts Saul with the Spirit of God upon him! You cannot understand. Another heart has more meanings than one in Holy Scripture; and so has the Spirit of God; and so has prophecy. Isaiah prophesied of the atoning death of Christ, but so did Caiaphas. The Spirit of God came upon Jesus at the Jordan, but He came also on Samson at the camp of Dan and upon Balaam beside the altar of Baal. Matthew Henry in two or three words makes clear to us all the obscurity of Saul's other heart. "Saul," says the most sensible of commentators, "has no longer the heart of a husbandman, concerned only with corn and cattle; he has now the heart of a statesman, a general, a prince. When God calls to service He will make fit for it. If He advances to another station, He will give another heart; and will preserve that heart to those who sincerely desire to serve Him." So He will. But that is just what Saul, another heart, and all, did not sincerely desire to do. And here hangs the true key to the whole of Saul's sad history. He was elected and crowned king over Israel, but he was as ignorant all the time of the God of Israel as he was of Samuel, the great prophet of the God of Israel. The truth is, another heart, prophetical spirit, and all, Saul all along was little better than a heathen at heart. And hence it is that what has often been called the profanity of Saul's character scarcely rises to the dignity of profanity. Saul's most presumptuous sins scarcely attain to profaneness. You must have some sense of what is sacred before you can be really profane. But Saul has no such sense. In his youth he had not one spark of insight or interest in the religious life and worship of Israel. He had never heard of Samuel. At the same time, in giving Saul another heart, the God of Israel gave Saul the greatest opportunity of his life to make himself a new heart God suddenly made a break in the ungodly and heathenish life of the son of Kish. So much so that Saul for the moment was almost persuaded to become an Israelite indeed. No; there is no such obscurity about Saul getting another heart and yet that heart coming to nothing. We have all had the same thing in ourselves. We ourselves have gone out on an errand of duty or of pleasure and have come back with another heart. Sometimes it has been at a time of sorrow, and sometimes at a time of joy and gladness. At the death of a father or a mother, at the time of leaving home to take our place in a lonely world; or, again, at that happy time when our loneliness was so graciously dealt with by God. God, I feel sure, lets no man become a married man without giving him the great opportunity and the new start in religion He gave to Saul when He made him king of Israel. In the kingly heart that God gives to every bridegroom we are not far for the time from the kingdom of heaven. Had Saul's change of he

Benson Commentary 1 Samuel 9:1 Now there was a man of Benjamin, whose name was Kish, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the son of Bechorath, the son of Aphiah, a Benjamite, a mighty man of power. 1 Samuel 9:1-2 . A mighty man of power — This seems not to be meant of his wealth or interest in his country, for Saul himself says he was of a mean family, 1 Samuel 9:21 ; but of his great strength, courage, and fortitude. A choice young man and goodly — Comely and personable. Higher than any of the people — A tall stature was much valued in a king in ancient times, and in the eastern countries. 1 Samuel 9:2 And he had a son, whose name was Saul, a choice young man, and a goodly: and there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he: from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people. 1 Samuel 9:3 And the asses of Kish Saul's father were lost. And Kish said to Saul his son, Take now one of the servants with thee, and arise, go seek the asses. 1 Samuel 9:3 . The asses of Kish were lost — Asses were there of great price, because of the scarcity of horses, and therefore were not thought unworthy to be sought by Saul, especially in these ancient times, when simplicity, humility, and industry were in fashion among persons of quality. 1 Samuel 9:4 And he passed through mount Ephraim, and passed through the land of Shalisha, but they found them not: then they passed through the land of Shalim, and there they were not: and he passed through the land of the Benjamites, but they found them not. 1 Samuel 9:5 And when they were come to the land of Zuph, Saul said to his servant that was with him, Come, and let us return; lest my father leave caring for the asses, and take thought for us. 1 Samuel 9:6 And he said unto him, Behold now, there is in this city a man of God, and he is an honourable man; all that he saith cometh surely to pass: now let us go thither; peradventure he can shew us our way that we should go. 1 Samuel 9:6 . A man of God and an honourable man — One of great reputation for his skill and faithfulness. Acquaintance with God and serviceableness to the kingdom of God make men truly honourable. He can show us our way — The course we should take to find the asses. He saith peradventure, because he doubted whether so great a prophet would seek, or God would grant him, a revelation concerning such mean matters; although sometimes God was pleased herein to condescend to his people, to cut off all pretence or occasion of their seeking to heathenish divination. 1 Samuel 9:7 Then said Saul to his servant, But, behold, if we go, what shall we bring the man? for the bread is spent in our vessels, and there is not a present to bring to the man of God: what have we? 1 Samuel 9:7-8 . Behold, if we go, what shall we bring the man — It was a part of the honour they did great men, in those countries, to make them a present when they had occasion to address themselves to them. Particularly their prophets were thus honoured; being men of God, before whom they judged they ought not to appear empty, but to bring them presents, either as a testimony of respect, or as a grateful acknowledgment, or for the support of the prophets themselves, or of the sons of the prophets, or of other persons in want known to them. Thus, also, it was usual to show their respect to their king, 1 Samuel 10:27 . The fourth part of a shekel of silver — A small present, but as acceptable as the widow’s mite, being all they had left on their journey. 1 Samuel 9:8 And the servant answered Saul again, and said, Behold, I have here at hand the fourth part of a shekel of silver: that will I give to the man of God, to tell us our way. 1 Samuel 9:9 (Beforetime in Israel, when a man went to inquire of God, thus he spake, Come, and let us go to the seer: for he that is now called a Prophet was beforetime called a Seer.) 1 Samuel 9:9 . Come, let us go to the seer — So termed, because he discerned and could discover things secret and unknown to others. And these are the words, either of some later sacred writer, who, after Samuel’s death, inserted this verse, or of Samuel, who, being probably fifty or sixty years old at the time of writing this book, and speaking of the state of things in his first days, might well call it before time. 1 Samuel 9:10 Then said Saul to his servant, Well said; come, let us go. So they went unto the city where the man of God was . 1 Samuel 9:11 And as they went up the hill to the city, they found young maidens going out to draw water, and said unto them, Is the seer here? 1 Samuel 9:12 And they answered them, and said, He is; behold, he is before you: make haste now, for he came to day to the city; for there is a sacrifice of the people to day in the high place: 1 Samuel 9:12-13 . He came to-day to the city — He had been travelling abroad, and was now returned to his own house in Ramah. High place — Upon the hill mentioned 1 Samuel 9:11 , and near the altar which Samuel built for this use. Ye shall straightway find him — At home and at leisure. Before he go up to eat — The relics of the sacrifices. Because he doth bless the sacrifice — This was a peace-offering or a thank-offering, and the blessing of it, no doubt, consisted both of thanksgiving to God for mercies received, and of prayer to him that this sacrifice might be accepted. But perhaps it was not what was offered upon the altar, but what the people ate afterward, that he blessed. We may observe here, that by blessing of victuals in Scripture, is meant, chiefly, the giving thanks to God for the food before it be eaten. Instances of which we have in abundance in the New Testament, our Lord and his apostles being continually said to give thanks before any thing was eaten. And here it is said, He doth bless the sacrifice, and afterward they eat that be bidden — It is probable, however, that Samuel both prayed for God’s blessing on what they ate, and gave thanks that they had it to eat. We see here how ancient the custom has been of praying to God, and giving thanks at our meals, and how blameable they are that neglect it. 1 Samuel 9:13 As soon as ye be come into the city, ye shall straightway find him, before he go up to the high place to eat: for the people will not eat until he come, because he doth bless the sacrifice; and afterwards they eat that be bidden. Now therefore get you up; for about this time ye shall find him. 1 Samuel 9:14 And they went up into the city: and when they were come into the city, behold, Samuel came out against them, for to go up to the high place. 1 Samuel 9:14-15 . Behold, Samuel came out against them — Met them directly in his way to the sacrifice. For so God, in his providence, had disposed things, as it follows in the next words. The Lord had told Samuel in his ear — That is, secretly, perhaps by a small, still voice. In the Hebrew it is, He revealed, or uncovered the ear of Samuel. 1 Samuel 9:15 Now the LORD had told Samuel in his ear a day before Saul came, saying, 1 Samuel 9:16 To morrow about this time I will send thee a man out of the land of Benjamin, and thou shalt anoint him to be captain over my people Israel, that he may save my people out of the hand of the Philistines: for I have looked upon my people, because their cry is come unto me. 1 Samuel 9:16 . To-morrow I will send thee a man, &c. — This shows still that all was done by God’s direction. Out of the hand of the Philistines — Though driven out of the country by Samuel, they were now ready, as appears by the following history, to invade it again; and being the constant and nearest enemies of the Israelites, they were most dreaded by them. And from these did Saul in some measure save them, and would have saved them much more, if his and the people’s sins had not hindered. For I have looked upon my people, because their cry is come unto me — Though he would not hear their cry to relieve them from the oppressions of their kings, ( 1 Samuel 8:18 ,) yet he was so gracious as to make those kings instruments of their deliverance from the oppression of their cruel neighbours. 1 Samuel 9:17 And when Samuel saw Saul, the LORD said unto him, Behold the man whom I spake to thee of! this same shall reign over my people. 1 Samuel 9:17 . The Lord said unto him — Most probably, by a divine, silent suggestion, or secret notification to his mind, without any voice, 1 Samuel 9:15 . This same shall reign over my people — The phraseology in the original is peculiar, the word rendered reign, implying coercion and restraint; ???? ???? , jangzor begnammi, He shall rule my people sternly and rigidly, with an absolute, uncontrollable power. So the eastern monarchs ruled. 1 Samuel 9:18 Then Saul drew near to Samuel in the gate, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, where the seer's house is . 1 Samuel 9:19 And Samuel answered Saul, and said, I am the seer: go up before me unto the high place; for ye shall eat with me to day, and to morrow I will let thee go, and will tell thee all that is in thine heart. 1 Samuel 9:20 And as for thine asses that were lost three days ago, set not thy mind on them; for they are found. And on whom is all the desire of Israel? Is it not on thee, and on all thy father's house? 1 Samuel 9:20 . As for thine asses that were lost, &c. — This must have satisfied Saul that he was a prophet, as he hereby showed that he knew for what Saul came to him, though he had not told him. And on whom is all the desire of Israel? — That is, all Israel desire a king, and there is no one more fit for such an office than thyself. On all thy father’s house — That honour is designed for thee, and after thy death for thy family and posterity, if by thy sin thou dost not cut off the entail. 1 Samuel 9:21 And Saul answered and said, Am not I a Benjamite, of the smallest of the tribes of Israel? and my family the least of all the families of the tribe of Benjamin? wherefore then speakest thou so to me? 1 Samuel 9:21 . Of the smallest of the tribes of Israel — Such indeed the tribe of Benjamin was, having been all cut off except six hundred, (Judges 20.,) which blow they never recovered, and therefore they were scarce reckoned as an entire tribe, but as a remnant of a tribe; and being ingrafted into Judah, in the division between the ten tribes and the two, they in some sort lost their name, and together with Judah were accounted but one tribe. 1 Samuel 9:22 And Samuel took Saul and his servant, and brought them into the parlour, and made them sit in the chiefest place among them that were bidden, which were about thirty persons. 1 Samuel 9:22 . In the chiefest place — Thereby to raise their expectation, and to prepare them for giving that honour to Saul which his approaching dignity required. 1 Samuel 9:23 And Samuel said unto the cook, Bring the portion which I gave thee, of which I said unto thee, Set it by thee. 1 Samuel 9:23-24 . Bring the portion — The master of the house was wont to distribute to every one his portion. And Samuel had commanded the cook, before they sat down, not to set one dish upon the table, but to keep it till he called for it. And set it before Saul — As the principal place was given him at the feast, so the principal dish also was set before him, to express still the great regard he had to his person. Behold that which is left — Or rather, reserved. For unto this time it hath been kept, since I said, &c. — That is, when I first signified that I had invited the people to join with me in my sacrifice, and afterward to partake with me of the feast, I then ordered the cook to reserve this part for thy use. 1 Samuel 9:24 And the cook took up the shoulder, and that which was upon it, and set it before Saul. And Samuel said, Behold that which is left! set it before thee, and eat: for unto this time hath it been kept for thee since I said, I have invited the people. So Saul did eat with Samuel that day. 1 Samuel 9:25 And when they were come down from the high place into the city, Samuel communed with Saul upon the top of the house. 1 Samuel 9:25 . Samuel communed with Saul — Concerning the kingdom designed for him by God, and his administration of the government; upon the top of the house — For coolness in the evening, and privacy. The Vulgate adds here, Saul prepared him a bed on the top of the house, and slept, an addition which Houbigant approves, accounting very plausibly for the deficiency of the Hebrew. The Seventy also understood the passage in a similar way, translating it, And they spread a bed for Saul on the top of the house, and he slept. 1 Samuel 9:26 And they arose early: and it came to pass about the spring of the day, that Samuel called Saul to the top of the house, saying, Up, that I may send thee away. And Saul arose, and they went out both of them, he and Samuel, abroad. 1 Samuel 9:27 And as they were going down to the end of the city, Samuel said to Saul, Bid the servant pass on before us, (and he passed on,) but stand thou still a while, that I may shew thee the word of God. 1 Samuel 9:27 . Samuel said, Bid the servant pass on before us — That thou and I may speak privately of the matter of the kingdom. Which Samuel hitherto endeavoured to conceal, lest he should be thought now to impose a king upon them, as before he denied one to them: and that it might appear by the lot mentioned in the next chapter, that the kingdom was given to Saul by God’s destination, and not by Samuel’s contrivance. That I may show thee the word of God — That is, a message delivered to me from God, which now I shall impart to thee. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary 1 Samuel 9:1 Now there was a man of Benjamin, whose name was Kish, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the son of Bechorath, the son of Aphiah, a Benjamite, a mighty man of power. CHAPTER XI. SAUL BROUGHT TO SAMUEL. 1 Samuel 9:1-14 . GOD'S providence is a wonderful scheme; a web of many threads, woven with marvelous skill; a network composed of all kinds of materials, great and small, but so arranged that the very smallest of them is as essential as the largest to the completeness of the fabric. One would suppose that many of the dramas of the Old Testament were planned on very purpose to show how intimately things secular and things sacred, as we call them, are connected together; how entirely the minutest events are controlled by God, and at the same time how thoroughly the freedom of man is preserved. The meeting of two convicts in an Egyptian prison is a vital link in the chain of events that makes Joseph governor of Egypt; a young lady coming to bathe in the river preserves the life of Moses, and secures the escape of the Israelites; the thoughtful regard of a father for the comfort of his sons in the army brings David into contact with Goliath, and prepares the way for his elevation to the throne; the beauty of a Hebrew girl fascinating a Persian king saves the whole Hebrew race from massacre and extermination. So in the passage now before us. The straying of some asses from the pastures of a Hebrew farmer brings together the two men, of whom the one was the old ruler, and the other was to be the new ruler of Israel. That these two should meet, and that the older of them should have the opportunity of instructing and influencing the younger, was of the greatest consequence for the future welfare of the nation. And the meeting is brought about in that casual way that at first sight seems to indicate that all things happen without plan or purpose. Yet we find, on more careful examination, that every event has been planned to fit in to every other, as carefully as the pieces of a dissected map, or the fragments of a fine mosaic. But of all the actors in the drama, not one ever feels that his freedom is in any way interfered with. All of them are at perfect liberty to follow the course that commends itself to their own minds. Thus wonderfully do the two things go together - Divine ordination and human freedom. How it should be so, it baffles us to explain. But that it is so, must be obvious to every thoughtful mind. And it is because we see the two things so harmonious in the common affairs of life, that we can believe them to act harmoniously in the higher plane of redemption and salvation. For in that sphere, too, all things fall out in accordance with the Divine plan. "Known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world." Yet this universal predestination in no degree interferes with the liberty of man. If men reject God's offers, it is because they are personally unwilling to accept of them. If they receive His offers, it is because they have been made willing to do so. "Ye will not come unto Me that ye might have life," said our Lord to the Jews. And yet it is ever true that "it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." God having given the people permission to appoint a king, that king has now to be found. What kind of person must the first king be- the first to supersede the old rule of the Divinely-inspired judges, the first to fulfill the cravings of the people, the first to guide the nation which had been appointed by God to stand in so close a relation to Himself? It seemed desirable, that in the first king of Israel, two classes of qualities should be united, in some degree contradictory to one another. First, he must possess some of the qualities for which the people desire to have a king; while at the same time, from God's point of view, it is desirable that under him the people should have some taste of the evils which Samuel had said would follow from their choice. To an Oriental people, a stately and commanding personality was essential to an ideal king. They liked a king that would look well on great occasions, that would be a commanding figure at the head of an army, or in the centre of a procession; that would arrest the eye of strangers, and inspire at first sight an involuntary respect for the nation that had such a ruler at its head. Nor could anyone have more fully realized the wishes of the people in this respect than Saul. "A choice young man and a goodly; there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he; from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people." Further, though his tribe was small in number, it was not small in influence. And his family was of a superior caste, for Kish was "a mighty man of power." And Saul's personal qualities were prepossessing and promising. He showed himself ready to comply with his father's order about the asses that had strayed, and to undertake a laborious journey to look for them. He was interested in his father's business, and ready to help him in his time of need. And the business which he undertook he seems to have executed with great patience and thoroughness. A foot journey over a great part of the territory of Benjamin was no easy task. Altogether, he shows himself, as we say, a capable man. He is not afraid to face the irksome; he does not consult merely for his ease and pleasure; labour does not distress him, and difficulties do not daunt him. All this was so far promising, and it seems to have been exactly what the people desired. But on the other hand, there seems to have been, from the very beginning, a great want in Saul. He appears from the very first to have wanted all that was most conspicuous and most valuable in Samuel. It is a circumstance not without its significance, that the very name and work of Samuel do not seem to have been familiar or even known to him. It was his servant that knew about Samuel, and that told Saul of his being in the city, in the land of Zuph ( 1 Samuel 9:5-6 ). This cannot but strike us as very strange. We should have thought that the name of Samuel would have been as familiar to all the people of Israel as that of Queen Victoria to the people of Great Britain. But Saul does not appear to have heard it, as in any way remarkable. Does not this indicate a family living entirely outside of all religious connections, entirely immersed in secular things, caring nothing about godly people, and hardly ever even pronouncing their name? It is singular how utterly ignorant worldly men are of what passes in religious circles, if they happen to have no near relative, or familiar acquaintance in the religious world to carry the news to them from time to time. And as Saul thus lived outside of all religious circles, so he seems to have been entirely wanting in that great quality which was needed for a king of Israel - loyalty to the Heavenly King. Here it was that the difference between him and Samuel was so great. Loyalty to God and to God's nation was the very foundation of Samuel's life. Anything like self-seeking was unknown to him. He had early undergone that momentous change, when God is substituted for self as the pivot of one's life. The claims of the great King were ever paramount in his eyes. What would please God and be honouring to Him, was the first question that rose to his mind. And as Israel was God's people, so the interest and the welfare of Israel were ever dear to him. And thus it was that Samuel might be relied on not to think of himself, not to think of his own wishes or interests, except as utterly subordinate to the wishes and interests of his God and his nation. It was this that gave such solidity to Samuel's character, and made him so invaluable to his people. In every sphere of life it is a precious quality. Whether as domestic servants, or clerks, or managers, dependent on others, those persons are ever of priceless worth whose hearts are thus set on objects outside themselves, and who are proof against the common temptations of selfishness and worldliness. And when they are the rulers of a nation, and are able to disregard their personal welfare in their burning desire to benefit the whole people, they rise to the rank of heroes, and after their death, their names are enshrined in the memories of a grateful and admiring people. But in these high qualities, Saul seems to have been altogether wanting. For though he was not selfish and self-indulgent at first, though he readily obeyed his father in going to search for the strayed asses, he had no deep root of unselfishness in his nature, and by-and-bye, in the hour of temptation, the cloven foot unhappily appeared. And ere long the people would learn, that as Saul had in him no profound reverence for the will of God, so he had in him no profound and indefeasible regard for the welfare of God's people. The people would come to see what a fatal mistake they had made in selecting a king merely for superficial qualities, and passing by all that would have allied him, as Samuel was allied, to God himself. Now it seems to have been God's purpose that the first king of Israel should be a man of this kind. Through him the people were to learn that the king who simply fulfilled their notions, was capable, when his self-will was developed, of dragging the nation to ruin. No! it was not the superficial qualities of Saul that would be a blessing to the nation. It was not a man out of all spiritual sympathy with the living God that would raise the standing of Israel among the kingdoms around, and bring them the submission and respect of foreign kings. The intense and consistent godliness of Samuel was probably the quality that was not popular among the people. In the worldliness of his spirit, Saul was probably more to their liking. Yet it was this unworldly but godly Samuel that had delivered them from the bitter yoke of the Philistines, and it was this handsome but unspiritual Saul that was to bring them again into bondage to their ancient foes. This was the sad lesson to be learned from the reign of Saul. But God did not design altogether to abandon His people. When the lesson should be learnt from Saul's history, He would guide them to a king of a different stamp. He would give them a king after His own heart - one that would make the will of God the great rule, and the welfare of the people the great end of his government. David would engrave in the history of the nation in deeper letters than even Samuel, the all-important lesson, that for kings and countries as much as for individuals, "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;" that God honours them that honour Him, while they that despise Him shall indeed be lightly esteemed. But let us now come to the circumstances that led to the meeting of Saul and Samuel. The asses of Kish had strayed. Very probably they had strayed at a time when they were specially needed. The operations of the farm had to be suspended for want of them, perhaps at a season when any delay would be especially inconvenient. In all ranks of life, men are subject to these vexations, and he is a happy man who does not fret under them, but keeps his temper calm, in spite of all the worry. Especially is he a happy man who retains his equanimity under the conviction that the thing is appointed by God, and that He who overruled the loss of Kish's asses to such high events in the history of his son, is able so to order all their troubles and worries that they shall be found conducive to their highest good. At Kish's order, Saul and one of the servants go forth to seek the asses. With the precise localities through which they passed, we are not accurately acquainted, such places as Shalim or Zuph not having yet been identified. But the tour must have been an extensive one, extending over most of the territory of Benjamin; and as it must have been necessary to make many a detour, uphill and down dale, to this farm and to that, the labour involved must have been very great. It was not a superficial but a thorough search. At last, when they came to the land of Zuph, they had been away so long that Saul thought it necessary to return, lest his father should think that some evil had befallen them. But the servant had another string to his bow. Though Saul was not familiar with the name or the character of Samuel, his servant was What God hides from the wise and prudent, He sometimes reveals to babes. It is an interesting thing in the history of the Church, how often great people have been indebted to servants for important guidance, perhaps even for their first acquaintance with saving truth. The little captive maid that ministered in the house of Naaman the Syrian was the channel through whom he came to know of the prophet of Israel who was able to heal him. Many a distinguished Christian has acknowledged, like the Earl of Shaftesbury, his obligations to some pious nurse that when he was a child told him Bible stories and pressed on his heart the claims of God. Happy those servants who are faithful in these circumstances, and of whom it can be said, "They have done what they could!" Of this servant of Saul's we know nothing whatever, save that, in his master's dilemma, he told him of the Lord's servant, and induced him to apply to him to extricate him from his difficulty. It does not appear that the city was Samuel's usual place of abode. It was a place to which he had come to hold a religious service, and the occasion was evidently one of much importance. It is interesting to observe how the difficulty was got over, of their having no present to offer to the man of God, in accordance with the custom of the country. Saul, though in comfortable circumstances, had absolutely no particle of money with him. His servant had but a quarter of a shekel, not designed apparently for spending purposes, but perhaps a little keepsake or kind of amulet he carried about with him. But there was such hospitality in those days that people going about the country had no need for money. So it was when our Lord instructed the disciples when sending them out on their missionary tour - "Provide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves, for the labourer is worthy of his meat." Those who have presumed on these instructions, holding that the modern missionary does not need any sustenance to be provided for him, but may safely trust to the hospitality of the heathen, forget how different was the case and the custom among the Hebrew people. But now, as Saul and his servant came to the city, another providential meeting takes place to help them to their object. "As they went up the hill to the city, they found young maidens going out to draw water." The city was up the hill, and the water supply would naturally be at the bottom. From the maidens that were going down to the fountain, they obtained information fitted to quicken their movements. They learned that the prophet had already arrived. The preparations for the sacrifice which he was to offer were now going on. It was just the time to get a word with him, if they had business to transact. Very soon he would be going up to the high place, and then the solemn rites would begin, and be followed by the feast, which would engross his whole attention. If they would catch him at the proper moment they must "make haste." That they did quicken their pace, we cannot doubt. And it was necessary; for just as they reached the city Samuel made his appearance, about to go up to the high place. If they had lost that moment, they would probably have had no opportunity during the whole day. Nor is it likely that Saul, who had no great desire for the company of the prophet, would have waited till the sacrifice and the feast were over. The two men were brought together just in the nick of time. And thus another essential link of God's chain, bringing the old and the new ruler of Israel into contact with each other, was happily adjusted, all through means to us apparently accidental, but forming parts of the great scheme of God. From this part of the narrative we may derive two great lessons, the one with reference to God, and the other with reference to man. First, as it regards God, we cannot but see how silently, secretly, often slowly, yet surely, He accomplishes His purposes. There are certain rivers in nature that flow so gently, that when looking at the water only, the eye of the spectator is unable to discern any movement at all. Often the ways of God resemble such rivers. Looking at what is going on in common life, it is so ordinary, so absolutely quiet, that you can see no trace whatever of any Divine plan. Things seem left to themselves, and God appears to have no connection with them. And yet, all the while, the most insignificant of them is contributing towards the accomplishment of the mighty plans of God. By means of ten thousand times ten thousand agents, conscious and un- conscious, things are moving on towards the grand consummation. Men may be instruments in God's hands without knowing it. When Cyrus was moving his armies towards Babylon, he little knew that he was accomplishing the Divine purpose for the humbling of the oppressor and the deliverance of His oppressed people. And in all the events of common life, men seem to be so completely their own masters, there seems such a want of any influence from without, that God is liable to slip entirely out of sight. And yet, as we see from the chapter before us, God is really at work. Whether men know it or not, they are really fulfilling the purposes of His will. Calmly but steadily, like the stars in the silent heavens, men are bringing to pass the schemes of God. His wildest enemies are really helping to swell His triumphs. Oh, how vain is the attempt to resist His mighty hand! The day cometh, when all the tokens of confusion and defeat shall disappear, when the bearing even of the fall of a sparrow on the plans of God shall be made apparent, and every intelligent creature in earth and heaven shall join in the mighty shout - "Alleluiah, for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth." But again, there is a useful lesson in this chapter for directing the conduct of men. You see in what direction the mind of Saul's servant moved for guidance in the day of difficulty. It was toward the servant of God. And you see likewise how, when Saul and he had determined to consult the man of God, they were providentially guided to him. To us, the way is open to God Himself, without the intervention of any prophet. Let us in every time of trouble seek access to God. Have we not a thousand examples of it in Bible history, and in other history too? Men say it is not right we should trouble God with trifles. Nay, the living God knows not what trouble is, and in His scheme there are no trifles. There is no limit one way or other in the command, " In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God." "Acknowledge Him in all your ways, and He will direct your steps." But above all, acknowledge Him with reference to the way of life eternal. Make sure that you are in the way to heaven. Use well the guide book with which you are furnished. Let God's word be a light to your feet and a lamp to your path; and then your path shall itself "be like the shining light, shining brighter and brighter unto the perfect day." 1 Samuel 9:15 Now the LORD had told Samuel in his ear a day before Saul came, saying, CHAPTER XII. FIRST MEETING OF SAMUEL AND SAUL. 1 Samuel 9:15-27 . THE meeting between Samuel and Saul was preceded by previous meetings between Samuel and God. God had prepared the prophet for his visit from the future king of Israel, and the first thing brought before us in these verses is the communication on this subject which had been made to the prophet a day before. It is very interesting to observe how readily Samuel still lends himself for any service he can render on behalf of his people, under the new arrangement that God had permitted for their government. We have seen how mortified Samuel was at first, when the people came to him with their request for a king. He took it as a personal affront, as well as a grave public error. Conscious as he was of having done his duty faithfully, and of having rendered high service to the nation, and reposing calmly, as he probably was, on the expectation that at least for some time to come, Israel would move forward peacefully and happily on the lines which he had drawn for them, it must have been a staggering blow when they came to him and asked him to overturn all that he had done, and make them a king. It must have been one of those bewildering moments when one's whole life appears lost, and all one's dearest hopes and hardest labours lie shattered, like the fragments of a potter's vessel. We have seen how, in that sad moment, Samuel carried his sorrows to the Lord, and learning thus to view the whole matter from God's point of view, how he came to make comparatively little account of his own disappointment, and to think only how he could still serve the cause of God, how he could still help the people, how he could prevent the vessel which he was no longer to steer from dashing against the hidden rocks he saw so clearly ahead. It is impossible not to be struck with the beauty and purity of Samuel's character in this mode of action. How many a good man takes offence when slighted or superseded by some committee or other body, in connection with a political, social, or religious cause which he has tried to help! If they won't have me, he says, let them do without me. If they won't allow me to carry out the course which I have followed, and which has been undoubtedly highly beneficial, I'll have nothing more to do with them. He sulks in his tent like Achilles, or goes over to the enemy like Coriolanus. Not so Samuel! His love for the people is too deep to allow of such a course. They have behaved badly to him, but notwithstanding he will not leave them. Like an injured but loving wife, who labours with every art of patient affection to reclaim the husband that has abused her and broken her heart; like a long-suffering father, who attends with his own hands to the neglected work of his dissipated son, to save him if possible from the consequences of his folly - Samuel overlooks his personal slight, and bears with the public folly of the people, in the endeavour to be of some use to them in the important stage of their history on which they are entering. He receives Divine communications respecting the man who is to supersede him in the government of the people, and instead of jealousy and dislike, shows every readiness to help him. It is refreshing to find such tokens of magnanimity and disinterestedness. However paltry human nature may be in itself, it can become very noble when rehabilitated by the Spirit of God. Need we ask which is the nobler course? You feel that you have not been treated perhaps by your church with sufficient consideration. You fret, you complain, you stay away from church, you pour your grievance into every open ear. Would Samuel have done so? Is not your conduct the very reverse of his? Side by side with his, must not yours be pronounced poor and paltry? Have you not need to study the thirteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians, and when you read of the charity that "beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things," ask yourselves whether it might not be said of you that you have neither part nor lot in this matter? The communication that God had made to Samuel was, that on the following day He would send to him the man whom he was to anoint as captain over Israel, that he might save them from the Philistines; for He had looked upon His people, because their cry was come up to Him. There is an apparent inconsistency here with what is said elsewhere. In chap. 8:13 ( 1 Samuel 8:13 ), it is said, that "the Philistines came no more into the coast of Israel, and that the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel." But probably "all the days of Samuel" mean only the days when he exerted himself actively against them. As long as Samuel watched and checked them, they were kept in restraint; but when he ceased to do so, they resumed their active hostility. The concluding verses of chap. 8 ( 1 Samuel 8:19-22 ), show that in Saul's time the Philistine oppression had become so galling that the very smiths had been removed from the land of Israel, and there was no right provision even for sharpening plough-shares, or coulters, or axes, or mattocks. Undoubtedly Saul removed this oppression for a time, and David's elegy shows how beneficial his reign was in some other ways, although the last act of his life was an encounter with the Philistines in which he was utterly defeated. It is evident that before Saul's time the tyranny of their foes had been very galling to the Israelites. The words of God, "their cry is come up to Me," indicate quietly a very terrible state of distress. They carry us back to the words uttered at the burning bush, "I have seen, I have seen the affliction of My people which are in Egypt, have heard their cry by reason of their task-masters; for I know their sorrows." God speaks after the manner of men. He needs no cry to come into His ears to tell Him of the woes of the oppressed. Nevertheless He seems to wait till that cry is raised, till the appeal is made to Him, till the consciousness of utter helplessness sends men to His footstool. And a very blessed truth it is, that He sympathizes with the cry of the oppressed. There is much meaning in the simple expression - "their cry is come up to Me." It denotes a very tender sympathy, a concern for all that they have been suffering, and a resolution to interpose on their behalf. God is never impassive nor indifferent to the sorrows and sufferings of His people. All are designed to serve as chastenings with a view to ultimate good. The eye of God is ever watching to see whether the chastening is sufficient, and when it is so, to stop the suffering. In the Inquisitor's chamber, the eye of God was ever on the boot and the thumbscrew, on the knife and the pincers, on the furnace and all the other instruments of torture. In the sick room. He watches the spent and struggling patient, knows every paroxysm of pain, knows all the restlessness and tossing of the weary night He understands the anguish of the loving heart when one after another of its treasures is torn away. He knows the unutterable distress when a child's misconduct brings down grey heirs with sorrow to the grave. Appearances may be all the other way, but "the Lord God is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and of great compassion." The night may be long and weary, but the dawn comes at the appointed time. "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy." But now Samuel and Saul have met. Saul is as unfamiliar with Samuel's appearance as with his name; he goes up to him and asks where the seer's house is. "I am the seer," replies Samuel; but at the moment Samuel was not at liberty, and could not converse with Saul. He invites him to go up with him to the high place, and take part in the religious service. Then he invites him to the feast that was to follow the sacrifice. Next day he is to deal with him as a prophet, making important communications to him. But in regard to the matter which occupies him at the moment, his father's asses, he need trouble himself no more on that head, for the asses are found. Then he gives Saul a hint of what is coming. He makes an announcement to him that he and his father's house are the objects of the whole desire of Israel. It is not very apparent whether or not Saul had any inkling of the meaning of this remark. It may be that he viewed it as a mere expression of politeness, savouring of the customary exaggeration of the East. At all events, his answer was couched in those terms of extravagant humility which was likewise matter of Eastern custom. "Am not I a Benjamite, of the smallest of the tribes of Israel? and my family the least of all the families of the tribe of Benjamin? Wherefore then speakest thou so to me?" The sacrifice next engages the attention of all. Samuel's first meeting with Saul takes place over the symbol of expiation, over the sacrifice that shows man to be a sinner, and declares that without shedding of blood there is no remission of sin. No doubt the circumstance was very impressive to Samuel, and would be turned to its proper use in subsequent conversation with Saul, whether Saul entered into the spirit of it or not. If it be asked. How could a sacrifice take place on the height of this city, whereas God had commanded that only in the place which He was to choose should such rites be performed? - the answer is, that at that time Shiloh lay in ruins, and Mount Zion was still in the possession of the Jebusites. The final arrangements had not yet been made for the Hebrew ceremonial, and in the present provisional and unsettled state of things, sacrifices were not limited to a single place. After the sacrifice, came the feast. It was now that Samuel began to give more explicit hints to Saul of the dignity to which he was to be raised. The feast was held in "the parlour" - a room adjacent to the place of sacrifice, to which Samuel had invited a large company - thirty of the chief inhabitants of the town. First Saul and his servant are complimented by having the place of honour assigned to them. Then they are honoured by having a portion set before them which had been specially set apart for them the day before. The speech concerning this portion in ver. 24 ( 1 Samuel 9:24 ) is somewhat obscure if it be regarded as a speech of Samuel's. It seems more natural to regard it as a speech of the cook's. It will be observed that the word " Samuel ' in the middle of the verse is in italics, showing that it is not in the Hebrew, so that it is more natural to regard the clause as having "the cook" for its nominative, and indeed this talk about the portion is more suitable for the cook than for Samuel. Servants were not forbidden to speak during entertainments; nor did their masters disdain even to have serious conversation with them (see Nehemiah 2:2-8 ). There is another correction of the Authorized Version that needs to be made. At the end of ver. 24 ( 1 Samuel 9:24 ) the words "Since I said" are not a literal rendering. The original is simply the word which is constantly rendered saying . It has been suggested ("Speaker's Commentary") that a word or two should be supplied to make the sense complete, and the verse would then run: - "unto this time hath it been kept for thee [against the festival of which Samuel spake], saying, I have invited the people." The part thus reserved was the shoulder and its appurtenances. Why this part was regarded as more honourable than any other, we do not know, nor is it of any moment; the point of importance being, first, that by Samuel's express instructions it had been reserved for Saul, and second, that these instructions had been given as soon as Samuel made arrangements for the feast. To honour Saul as the destined king of Israel was Samuel's unhesitating purpose. Some men might have said, It will be time enough to show this mark of respect when the man is actually chosen king. Had there been the slightest feeling of grudge in the mind of Samuel, this is what he would have thought. But instead of grudging Saul his new dignity, he is forward to acknowledge it. There shall be no holding back on his part of honour for the man whom the Lord delighted to honour. If the words of ver. 24 ( 1 Samuel 9:24 ) were really spoken by the cook, they must have added a new element of surprise and impression to Saul. It was apparent that he had been expected to this feast. The cook had been warned that a man of consequence was coming, and had therefore set apart that portion to him. Saul must have felt both that a supernatural power had been at work, and that some strange destiny - possibly the royal dignity - was in reserve for him. To us, pondering the circumstances, what is most striking is, the wonderful way in which the fixed purpose of God is accomplished, while all the agents in the matter remain perfectly free. That Saul and his servant should be present with Samuel at that feast, was the fixed decree of heaven. But it was brought about quite naturally. There was no constraint on the mind of Saul's