At the center of man’s rebellion is the desire to be autonomous, the desire to decide what is good and evil and to follow through and leave within those self-imposed boundaries. From Adam and Eve, this theme is continued in the bible where generation after generation the Children of Israel chose to do what is right in their own eyes. They forget, modified, cheery picked or ignored the knowledge of God and created rules for themselves or did not have rules (lawlessness), the bible describes a special class of curses in Romans 1 for this kind of people. This is the central theme in the book of judges
The statement “every man did what was right in his own eyes” is stated seven times . The last verse in the book concludes with the statementt
Judges 25:21 In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
The book of judges seems to point out that the reason why everyone did what was right in their own eyes is because they did not have a king, it was a lack of good leadership. Poor leadership is the root cause of failures in family, church, organizations and society, the bible teaches us that it is the leader who sets the pace for how the followers experience the blessings or curses spelled out in Genesis 28. Therefore, the next books after Judges from 1 Samuel to 2 Kings explore this theme intensively
Every leader after Saul is compared by the golden standard set by the son of Jesse
For David had done what was right in the eyes of the LORD and had not turned aside from anything the LORD commanded all the days of his life,except in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.1 Kings 15:5
David and Saul did a number of things, as leaders over our homes and societies we could learn from.
Partial Obedience
In my article the bread of life I explain that the bible purposefully contrasts the life of David and Saul, and draws the conclusion that the main difference between the two is that David obeyed God’s voice wholeheartedly and Saul did not. Saul made many mistakes, but primarily he disobeyed God’s instructions on two occasions and on the third he inquired from a medium. The root issue was that he believed that he could do it on his own, God’s instruction was one of those things that he could factor in during his decision making (and not the only thing ). He did what was logically good in his eyes. The bible records that
Saul died because he was unfaithful to the LORD; he did not keep the word of the LORD and even consulted a medium for guidance 1 Chronicles 10:13
A good case is when God asked him to destroy Amalek the instructions were very clear “devot to destruction all that they have do not spare them but kill all”. After God gave him victory the bible records that
Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen and of the fattened calves and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them. All that was despised and worthless they devoted to destruction. 1 Samuel 15:9
One of the many reasons he gave for sparing the sheep and oxen was that he wanted to give them to God as a sacrifice
The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal. 1 Samuel 15:21
I think Saul was casual in following God’s instructions, he picked the part that was good and left out the part he did not like and came up with a way of justifying his disobedience by saying that the sheep will be used for sacrifice. God looked at his partial obedience as disobedience and called his rebellion worse than divination and his presumptions same as idolatry. Cherry picking God’s instructions is what cost Saul the throne, David on the other hand followed God’s instruction to the letter, he did not want to reason out the instructions. Saul’s heart posture is best illustrated by his reaction to the judgment made by Samuel regarding his sin
Saul replied, “I have sinned. But please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel; come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord your God. 1 Samuel 15: 30
He cared more about what men thought about him more than God, he showed no remorse or fear of consequences
Wholehearted obedience
As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 1 Kings 11:4
The bible gives 8 accounts of David hearing from God and executing the instructions exactly the way he had heard them. The bible calls his obedience whole hearted, he was 100% committed to the cause and assignment God gave him
The best example of his wholehearted obedience was his response to the Bathsheba fiasco as pronounced by prophet Nathan, David showed deep remorse and wholehearted repentance. The bible tells us that although he was notoriously polygamous David learned that women can steal his heart from God, so in the final years of his life he put away his concubines and wives, and refused to remarry or have sexual relations with a woman.
When King David was very old, he could not keep warm even when they put covers over him. 2 So his attendants said to him, “Let us look for a young virgin to serve the king and take care of him. She can lie beside him so that our lord the king may keep warm.” Then they searched throughout Israel for a beautiful young woman and found Abishag, a Shunammite, and brought her to the king. 4 The woman was very beautiful; she took care of the king and waited on him, but the king had no sexual relations with her. 1 Kins 1-4
The cost of obedience pales in comparison to the cost of disobience – TB Joshua
Blessings or Curses 