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The question I've been pondering this week is this: Why did God call Saul? Unlike New Testament Saul who turned into the Apostle Paul, a giant of faith, Old Testament Saul remained just Saul and turned out to be severely lacking in faith. He failed to be faithful almost as soon as he became king. Quick on the heels of anointing Saul, God announced that his crown would be taken from him and given to a more worthy man.
So why did God pick Saul when he was doomed to failure? Here's what I've concluded. This question presumes that a monarchy would have worked out, if only God had chosen the right man. But I think God made it clear that any king was not going to be good for Israel. A theocratic monarchy was not God's ideal form of government. God allowed Israel to have a king because it's what they wanted. It was a case of "Okay, but this is a bad idea." It really didn't matter who God chose. The form of government itself was flawed. As we will see as we continue through the Old Testament, good kings were rare, and even icons like David would end up making mistakes that led to tragedy for the king and kingdom. While the Israelites might have believed that the chaos of the period of the judges was due to lack of kingly leadership, God understood that the problem of faithlessness wouldn't be solved by a monarch. God's preferred approach was a pure theocracy, where He reigned as Sovereign, with the priests acting more as administrators than awe-inspiring leaders, and judges were called upon as needed rather than claiming a throne by right.
I think God called Saul because he looked the part of what the people thought they wanted in a king. He was physically commanding, literally head and shoulders above everyone else. God knew that if he chose someone less obviously "perfect" for the job, those shortcomings would be blamed for his failure. After letting Israel experience a king "suited" for the job, God said "Now let's try this again, with the kind of person I like" and this time He picked the shepherd boy, David. Of course, David would prove to have problems of his own too. But God had already established the pitfalls of royalty through the example of Saul.
Saul had royal bearing, but he was jealous, temperamental, and impulsive. Most of us know how jealous he was David. Not many know that long before he became obsessed with killing David, he almost killed his own son, Jonathan. Saul had rashly declared that anyone who ate any food before he had "avenged himself" on the Philistines would be put to death. It was a boneheaded order--just the kind of grandiose, kingly command that Saul tended to be fond of. It made no sense to insist that his men keep fighting with no food. Jonathan, not knowing about the command, ate a bit of honey. When this came to Saul's attention, in a move reminiscent of Jephthah, Saul insisted Jonathan be executed. In a moment that had to be awkward for the supposed king, the people of Israel intervened and basically told their king, "Uh, no, we're not going to let that happen." So Saul had to back down. Pretty lame for a king--experiencing back talk from his son in front of everyone and then having his own army refuse to carry out his commands.
The Bible says that "God was sorry he ever made Saul king", but I think that was the writer's interpretation of God's feelings. It was like the author heard God say "Boy, was this guy a mistake" and assumed that God had been taken by surprise as he, the author ,was by Saul's failure. What he missed, but what I think is evident to us, is that God had know from the start that a king--any king--was going to be a mistake.
Highlights of 1 Samuel 1:9-1 Samuel 21
- The Boy Samuel
- The Ark is Lost to the Raiders of Philistine
- Saul Called
- Saul Uncalled
- David and Goliath
- Saul and David
Fun Facts: Saul & David Movie Trivia Edition
About half way through the 2000-2001 school year, my ninth grade Bible class arrived at the stories of 1 Samuel in our curriculum. Rather than go through the usual lessons and review questions in the textbook, I decided we'd make a movie about the stories of Saul and David. It seemed like a fun way to learn these Bible stories. Well, what started out as a scheduled two week shoot turned into six weeks of filming. The finished product was a memorable feature length film that we debuted on the "big screen" of our church. Though short on the budget and film-making expertise, we made up for those deficits with creativity, a sense of fun, and a lot of heart. Herewith some "movie trivia" based on our film on 1 Samuel:
- Did you know how we kept our "PG-13" rating? Okay, our film was unrated. But still, this was a group of high school freshman trying to make a family friendly film out of some pretty adult source material. When it came to Samuel (played by yours truly) slaying King Agag, we accomplished that with some artful blood spatter and sound effects. When Saul tasked David with bringing him 100 Philistine foreskins as the price of marrying his daughter, we changed it to 100 ears (which we recreated with a bowlful of torn up tortillas drenched in red-dyed corn syrup which I admit is still pretty gory. But at least it didn't involve penises!)
- Did you know how we created Goliath and handled his death? For the part of Goliath, we put seventh grader Evan, wearing a fake beard, on the shoulders of eighth grader Jeffrey and had them wear a long trench coat, making Evan into a misshapen giant. Camera action created the illusion of the stone striking Goliath in the forehead. From a distance, we showed David, played by ninth grader Anson rushing up to the stricken giant, and pulling out Goliath's sword and decapitating him. (We had removed Evan and replaced his head with a basketball now wearing the fake beard). According to the Bible, that's how Goliath was killed, not the blow from the sling stone. However, the part where David drop kicked Goliath's head across the battlefield was a piece of artistic license on our part.
- Did you know how we made do with our limited costume budget? The school had exactly two military jackets in our costume trunk--an Army coat and U.S. Marines dress jacket. I don't know where they came from. The green army coat was Saul's (played by ninth grader Danny) key costume piece. The iconic black Marine jacket with red trim was worn by ninth grader Manny, who played Saul's son, Jonathan. In the scene from 1 Samuel 18 where Jonathan gives David his tunic, sword, bow and belt, we had Jonathan give David the Marine jacket, which David wore for the rest of the film as his signature costume piece.
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| Saul's costume |
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| Jonathan's costume, which he eventually passed on to David |
- Did you know one of my favorite lines was a mangled word? During the scene where Saul confronts his daughter--David's wife--Michal (played by ninth grader Abbie) for allowing David to escape, Danny ad-libbed the line: "How could you betray me, you worthless wrench!" I'm not sure whether Danny meant to say "wretch" or "wench" but it came out as a tool, and it makes me chuckle every time I think of it, even 22 years later.
- Did you know which parts of 1 Samuel we left out of our film? Our movie begins with the anointing of Saul as king--the early chapters that cover Samuel's growing up years, the loss of the Ark, and how Saul was chosen to be king were all left out. We also chose not to do the scene in 1 Samuel 19 lies on the ground naked and prophesies all day and all night long. We also left out the part where David pretended to be insane while on the run from Saul. David was hiding out amongst the Philistines and to convince them that he was no longer a threat to them, he pretended to be crazy "scratching on doors and drooling down his beard" (1 Samuel 21: 12-15).
What Stood Out to Me
The Eli Effect
One of my great fears as a parent, especially now that I have a full-on teenager, is that I will end up being an Eli. A father who loses his sons because he didn't do what he needed to do to raise them correctly. Parenting your child towards not just success, but decency, in favor with God and man, is the most important task a person can have. The fear of failing in that task--unintentionally through permissiveness and inattention--are constant worries of mine. I can just hear the sermon: "How many of us are Eli's, unleashing tepid reprimands but shirking the hard work of reigning in his wayward sons. Our goal should be to be Samuel, faithful to God no matter the cost, speaking the hard truths, setting an example of righteousness for his children" etc etc.
Except, I guess Samuel failed too. 1 Samuel 8:2-3 tell us that Samuel's sons Joel and Abijah were "greedy for money. They accepted bribes and perverted justice." How could Samuel have failed too? We can speculate that he was too busy serving the Lord to look after his home, but that's pure speculation. We don't know what--if anything--Samuel did "wrong."
I'm not sure what the answer is. I pray that I will do the best I can and that God will preserve my children. Because the reality is that even if we are not Eli's, our children are their own people. They will make their own decisions. And even a Samuel cannot guarantee the outcome they want.
The Loss of the Ark
It was a tremendous shock to Israel to lose the Ark. Such a loss should have been impossible. How could the enemy even approach the holy Ark and live? It was the horrific news of the ark's capture more than the deaths of Hophni and Phineas in battle that lead to the death of their father Eli and Phineas' wife.
I think somewhere along the way the Israelites lost sight of what the Ark was. They had come to see the Ark as the visible manifestation of God's presence--kind of like an idol. As long as they had the Ark, they could not lose. They no longer understood that having the Ark was not the same as having God. It was just a wooden box overlaid with gold. But God had not left. He was there, as He always had been. It was His presence, not the Ark itself that caused the Philistine idol of Dagan to fall down. It was His radioactive Holiness that caused the outburst of illness wherever the Ark went in Philistia, and seventy men in Israel to perish after looking inside when it was returned. God was still there. But when Israel headed off into battle, taking His box with them, they went without Him. And without His help, the Ark was useless.
The Message of David and Goliath: A Bible Story Classic
Rich Mullins sums it up better than I ever could with this song from his early days.
That you've probably heard
And at the risk of being redundant
I'm gonna tell you something
That may not thrill you
But it could not hurt
Well it comes out of the sacred
Writing of the Israelites
It's the story of David
And how he slew Goliath
He didn't trust in him much
And so to David's alarm
He tried to fit him in his armor
But the thing was so heavy
David couldn't stand up
So he left it by the river
Where he gathered five smooth stones
I guess it's safe to say he figured
He wasn't going out alone
He's not alone
What's wrong with being small
The bigger they come
You know the harder they fall
When you're fighting for Zion
And you're on the Lord's side
Well I think you're gonna find
They ain't no trouble at all (Trouble at all)
No trouble at all
No trouble at all
No trouble
Among the Philistines
At the sight of this scrawny little shepherd
Coming out to meet the record-breaking mammoth of a man
Who was a killing machine
But it didn't shake David
'Cause he was smart enough to know
It's more the size of who you put your faith in
Than the size of your foe
What's wrong with being small
The bigger they come
You know the harder they fall
When you're fighting for Zion
And you're on the Lord's side
I think you're gonna find
It ain't no trouble at all
--Rich Mullins, "What Trouble Are Giants"
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