The Obedience of King Saul

I have been reading through 1 Samuel for our men’s Bible study on Wednesday mornings. I was thinking about 1 Samuel 15. In particular how King Saul was asked by God to perform a given task of wiping out a neighboring enemy. It was a pretty cut and dry assignment, remove the Amalekites from the face of the earth because they defied God by mistreating Israel during their sojourn.

Saul did as God asked, but spared King Agag (the Amalekite king) and some of the choice animals. He came back to camp and Samuel was waiting for him. He disobeyed by not devoting things to destruction as God commanded. He then rebelled by sparing and taking captive the king. Finally, he presumed that God would accept his disobedience by offering sacrifices to him from the spoils. God’s response through Samuel touched on all of these.

1. Obedience is better than sacrifice (God’s commands are to be obeyed)
2. Rebellion is as the sin of divination (God is not a genie in a lamp)
3. Presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. (God is not bought off like the false gods of the day)

After reading this I am drawn to take a hard look at what I am doing. What part of God’s Word am I not obeying? What part do I give the outward appearance of obedience and then presume upon God’s grace to me? These are some great things to wrestle with! Go and wrestle!!!

Lead with Love,
David

Small Group Conference January 18-19, 2013

For all my blog followers, mark your calendars for the JEFC Annual Small Group Conference, we will be having Michael Mack founder of smallgroups.com, long time small groups pastor and small groups champion come and talk to us about healthy small groups.  Some of the topics will be “It Takes GUTS to be real” and “Small Groups Breaking Out”.  Mike recently wrote a great book called “Small Group Vital Signs”.  Information below.

Tweets of The Week

Eric Mason (@pastoremase) 11/1/12, 11:19 PM One of the hardest yet sweetest resolves is that when knowing God thru Jesus, our lives are not our own. #boughtwithaprice

Nick Cavuoto (@nickcavuoto) 11/1/12, 7:14 PM “Fulfilling Gods purpose causes us to rely on others.” @PhilipWagnerLA @tfhny #arise2012

Charlie Daniels (@CharlieDaniels) 11/1/12, 4:50 PM Atheism has a shelf life,it never lasts past the last breath.

challies (@challies) 11/1/12, 3:14 PM “Those who give much without sacrifice are reckoned as having given little.” (Erwin Lutzer)

Kevin DeYoung (@RevKevDeYoung) 10/30/12, 6:00 PM Jesus was not just a prophet but the fulfillment of all prophecy.

Matt Capps (@MattCapps) 10/30/12, 4:04 PM “Sin cuts through all aspects of our being, and even has consequences to our cognitive faculties.” – bitly.com/WY7ofd

Lead with Love,
David

Tweets of the Week

John Piper (@JohnPiper) 10/28/12, 10:00 PM RT @ToEveryTribe: There are 103,500 evangelicals for every unreached people group. – Ron Sanford

Paul David Tripp (@PaulTripp) 10/28/12, 6:19 AM Corporate worship is designed to protect you from the temptation to minimize sin and devalue grace.

Scott Anderson (@anderson_scott) 10/27/12, 9:16 AM “The Ecuador Five had fallen into the ground and died long before they were ever cut-down by Aucan spears.” @drajgibson #missions

Max Lucado (@MaxLucado) 10/26/12, 10:00 AM I used to think I was indecisive, but now I’m not too sure.

challies (@challies) 10/26/12, 3:30 PM So true this: “When the law of God is written in our hearts, our duty will be our delight.” (Matthew Henry)

Mark Driscoll (@PastorMark) 10/26/12, 8:45 PM Idols lie. They promise a heavenly, peaceful existence that they cannot deliver.

Lead with Love,
David

Tweets of the Week

Sorry, a little late this week, I have been under the weather:

Brad Pausley (@BradPausley) 10/20/12, 11:59 AM I don’t need a new promise or revelation. I need to remind myself of his promises and apply what I already know. #sermonprep

Steve Gladen (@SteveGladen) 10/20/12, 1:51 PM Life has no remote, you need to get up and change it yourself

Steve Gladen (@SteveGladen) 10/17/12, 9:32 AM The question is not is your church missional, but what is your discipleship strategy?

Eric Geiger (@RealEricGeiger) 10/15/12, 10:01 PM Culture eats strategy for breakfast ~ Drucker

The Gospel Coalition (@TGC) 10/12/12 5:00pm Self-generated self-control doesn’t make sinners right with God

Lead with Love,
David

Tweets of the Week

Tim Hawkins (@timhawkinscomic) 10/14/12, 12:47 PM I prefer fishing to golf. I’d rather take something out of the water than put something in.

Mark Driscoll (@PastorMark) 10/12/12, 12:31 PM You have to laugh at yourself. Otherwise you’ll waste all that great material.

David Platt (@plattdavid) 10/9/12, 11:03 AM The book of Revelation is not intended to drive us to charts; it’s intended to drive us to Christ.

Eric Geiger (@RealEricGeiger) 10/9/12, 11:26 AM No matter how deep we think we are in our faith – we will topple if we don’t live in community.

The Gospel Coalition (@TGC) 10/8/12, 5:00pm Self-generated self-control doesn’t make sinners right with God

Folded Hands and Closed Eyes

My son asked me the other day, “Dad, why do we close our eyes and fold our hands when we pray?” To tell you the truth I didn’t have a decent answer for him that was Gospel centered and not rooted in traditional legalism!

He cited examples in my own prayer life where I have prayed while driving, and the example that I don’t always close my eyes when we kneel beside the bed at night…kids are unbelievable inconsistency detectors!

The more I think about this question and without researching when the tradition started that we close our eyes and fold our hands, the answer I will give my son is “because of distractions.”

This world is filled with distractions, if we can close our eyes and blind ourselves to the LCD screens and countless visual distractions around us and fold our hands to keep them from texting, social networking, and blogging then maybe we can sit still enough to actually hear from God.

Lead with Love,
David

Tweets of The Week

Stephen Miller (@StephenMiller) 10/3/12, 3:55 PM
If being a cool Christian in the world means bashing the church, I would rather be uncool.

Thom Rainer (@ThomRainer) 10/3/12, 2:22 PM
RT @SamRainer: The most important theologian in a child’s life is the parent. 2 Timothy 3:14-15.

Ed Stetzer (@edstetzer) 10/3/12, 11:30 AM Be willing to change the plan when new information directs it. Irrational stubbornness is not a mark of leadership.

Bob Kauflin (@bkauflin) 10/4/12, 1:10 PM Paul uses the phrase “in Christ Jesus” over 100 times in his letters. How often am I aware & grateful that’s my position?

challies (@challies) 10/4/12, 8:35 AM The fundamental, base-level commitment of the Christian life, is a commitment to obedience. challi.es/QTa8Hy

C.J. Mahaney (@CJMahaney) 10/4/12, 7:44 AM There are no wasted words in Scripture, just hurried readers of Scripture.

Tweets of the Week

Matt Perman (@mattperman) 9/25/12, 3:21 PM
One of the chief tasks of a leader is to give words to what people already feel and know.

Mark Driscoll (@PastorMark) 9/27/12, 10:22 AM
Everything the Father forbids is for our good. If we remember that when tempted, obedience is a joy.

Mark Batterson (@MarkBatterson) 9/27/12, 10:23 AM
your biggest mistakes as parents double as your greatest opportunities. you get to model how to say sorry!

Thom Rainer (@ThomRainer) 9/25/12, 4:03 PM
People stick with a church when they get involved with a small group.

Steve Gladen (@SteveGladen) 9/25/12, 5:55 PM I always wondered why somebody didn’t do something about that, then I realized I am somebody! #leadership

Ryan Huguley (@RyanHuguley) 9/24/12, 4:30 PM
If your sermon offends NO ONE, you’re not preaching like Jesus. If your sermon offends EVERYONE, you may just be a jerk.

Enjoy!

Tweets of the Week

I am trying to be more intentional about blogging.  Blogging always gets the leftover time from my schedule and often I consume the whole meal!  I have seen a couple of bloggers do this as ways of keeping themselves int he thick of it.  I liked it so much that I decided to follow suit so here it is some of my favorite tweets from the past 7-10 days:

9/18/12-Daniel Darling (@danieldarling)  ”Because we are an impatient people, we often create man-made lists for what spiritual growth looks like.” 

9/21/12-Thom Rainer (@Thom Rainer)  ”Small groups are essential to spiritual growth and to remaining connected to the local church.”

9/21/12-Michael Mack @michaelcmack “Spinning is great for cycling, bad for leadership.”

9/18/12-Steve Gladen @stevegladen  ”Christians need relationships to grow. We don’t grow in isolation; we develop in the context of fellowship.”

9/16/12-Funny One Liners @funnyoneliners “There are no limits to what you can accomplish when you’re supposed to be doing something else.”

Lead with Love,

David