Not My Wants But His
But Samuel replied: “Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the LORD? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams”. 1 Samuel 15:22
Israel wanted a king and God did not want them to have one. He begged and pleaded with the nation to let Him be their king, but like the nations around them, they wanted a king. So, God gave them King Saul.
During his reign, God gave Saul some marching orders. He was to go to the Amalekites and utterly destroy them. God was very specific with Saul. He was not to leave one person among them alive, from the oldest to the youngest. In addition, he was to destroy every animal. God wanted nothing of the Amalekites left for a seed.
Saul could have done as God directed and everything would have been fine, but he didn’t. He decided that, instead of killing the king, Agag, he would bind him up and bring him back with him. Oh what a feather in his cap that would be. Saul’s people would rally around him and give him praise and honor for capturing the king. They would have their chance to humiliate him publicly and Saul would stand even taller with the people.
In addition to that, Saul kept back the best of the best of the animals to bring home and sacrifice to God. In his mind, he would bring God a gift.
But, in all of this, he violated God, and through His prophet Samuel, God rebuked Saul and ended up taking his kingdom from him and giving it to David.
Perhaps we could learn a lesson here. It is not what we want that matters. It is what God wants; and that is the only thing that matters. No matter what we think or do, if God is specific about something we need to understand that He really means it.
Saul and Israel paid a great price for their wants instead of His. Are we willing to do the same?