1 Samuel 10:14-19: a reflection

14Saul’s uncle said to him and to his servant, “Where did you go?” He said, “To seek the donkeys. When we saw that they were not found, we came to Samuel.” 15Saul’s uncle said, “Please tell me what Samuel said to you.” 16Saul said to his uncle, “He told us plainly that the donkeys were found.” But concerning the matter of the kingdom, of which Samuel spoke, he didn’t tell him. 17Samuel called the people together to the LORD to Mizpah; 18and he said to the children of Israel, “The LORD, the God of Israel, says ‘I brought Israel up out of Egypt and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, and out of the hand of all the kingdoms that oppressed you.’ 19But you have today rejected your God, who himself saves you out of all your calamities and your distresses; and you have said to him, ‘No! Set a king over us!’ Now therefore present yourselves before the LORD by your tribes and by your thousands.”

On the day Saul is presented as Israel's first king, Samuel delivers a pointed word from God. He recounts God's faithfulness, I brought Israel up out of Egypt and delivered you from all who oppressed you, and then names what the people's demand for a king really meant: But today you have rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities, and have said, Set a king over us. In demanding a human king, Samuel says, they had rejected the God who had been their true King and Savior.

Notice the exchange the people made. God himself had been their king, the one who saved them again and again from every distress. But they wanted a king they could see, a human ruler like the other nations had, visible, tangible, marching before them into battle. And in wanting that visible security, they were, at heart, rejecting the invisible God who had actually been saving them. They preferred a king they could see to the God they had to trust.

That exchange is a temptation we know. God is our true king and security, but he is invisible, and trusting an unseen God is hard. So we are tempted to prefer visible, tangible securities, wealth, human backing, our own arrangements, things we can see and control, over trusting the God we cannot see. It can be, at heart, a quiet rejection of God's kingship in favor of a security we can lay hold of. Beware of preferring the visible to the God who actually saves. Do not exchange trust in your unseen King for securities you can see. He is the one who saves; let him be your king.

Lord, Israel rejected you as their king because they wanted a ruler they could see, preferring visible security to trusting the God who had actually saved them. Show me where I do the same, preferring tangible securities, wealth, human backing, my own arrangements, over trusting you, my unseen King. Keep me from the quiet rejection of your rule in favor of what I can see and control. You are the one who saves me; help me trust you as my king, and not exchange you for visible securities.