“Listen to all that the people are saying to you: it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.”
~ 1 Samuel 8:7
Hi James and Ellen,
Why would you want to be Christ-follower kids? Would you want to be Christ-follower kids because your dad and ma, because your Uncle Chris and Aunt Lynn and because your grandmaa and grandpaa are Christ-followers? Would you want to be Christ-follower kids because you know it to be explicitly true what God – as God the Son, did after being cruelly hung on and heartlessly nailed to a cross for the guys, gals and kids who God – as God the Father specially elected to be His adopted kids before He placed planet Earth in the cosmic void that He is holding in the palm of His hand? Do you think that it is easier for a kid to make a decision of faith to accept as being unequivocally true what God – as God the Son, did while He was callously hung on and maliciously nailed to a cross for guys, gals and kids who God – as God the Father, specially elected to be His adopted kids who are growing up in a learning or conditioning environ that is Christ-centered than for a kid who is growing up in a learning or conditioning environ that is self-centered? Your dad’s dad and your dad’s two aunts and three uncles – along with their spouses, on your dad’s dad’s side of his family and your dad’s ma and your dad’s uncle and two aunts – along with their spouses, on your dad’s ma’s side of his family have been and most still are proactively involved in one way or another in a Christ-follower community in the town or city where they are living. Your grandmaa and grandpaa are missionaries. Your dad’s Uncle Harold pastors a church in Christian Reformed Church denomination. Your dad’s Uncle Darrell was a pastor and he still fills pulpits in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church denomination. Each one of your dad’s uncles has been an elder or an active church leader in the churches where they are and have been members. Eli was an Israelite people group judge and high priest. Samuel succeeded Eli as an Israelite people group judge and priest. Eli had two boys – Hophni and Phinehas. Samuel had two boys – Joel and Abijah. Because of the household or familial influence of a couple of Israelite people group’s spiritual and lay leaders, your grandpaa thinks that Eli’s two boys and Samuel’s two boys should have been environmentally conditioned to also become spiritual and lay leaders for the Israelite people group’s guys and gals. God – as God the Spirit, prompted Samuel to scribe what he scribed in the Samuel Book. How do you think that Samuel felt as he was scribing about his two very corrupt kids? 1 Samuel 8 has this dedicated, godly old priest and judge explaining to the whole world that his two kids – Joel and Abijah, had opted to pursue dishonest wealth, go after and accept bribes and pervert justice.
Your grandmaa and grandpaa personally know God-fearing couples who have spent decades ministering as missionaries who have had one or more of their kids turn his, her or their backs on their conditioning environs that involved spiritual teaching and life modeling from their dads and mas. Samuel grew up as a kid in a household environ which had a spiritual leader. Eli was that spiritual leader. Because Eli’s two boys had no compunction about desecrating animal sacrifices that the Levite people group priests were offering to God – as God the Father, on an altar that was dedicated to God – as God the Father, Samuel’s two boys may have at some early point in their lives come under the negative influences of Hophni and Phinehas. Your grandpaa can only conjecture regarding this. Your grandpaa does not know whether or not Hophni and Phinehas were still alive when Joel and Abijah were born. Because of the ongoing peccadilloes of Joel and Abijah, the elders among God’s specially chosen guys and gals went to Samuel and told Samuel that they wanted a leadership paradigm change to what their neighboring nations and people groups of guys and gals had; that they wanted to have a guy positioned as king to rule over them versus having judges step up to become their unofficial leaders.
Anything can become or serve as a catalytic moment for change. Any guy or gal can become or serve as a catalyst for change. Sometimes a change may be good. Sometimes a change may not be good. Samuel warned the Israelite people group elders that the change that they wanted was not going to be a good change – that they were going to end up with something that they would regret ever wanting to have. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would make some of their boys serve in his military in various ways, plow and harvest his fields and make weapons. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would make some of their daughters perfumers, cooks and bakers. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would take their best fields, vineyards and olive groves. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would take a tenth of their grain and a tenth of their sheep. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would take their menservants, their maidservants and their best cattle and donkeys. Samuel told the Israelite people group elders that a king would share with his cronies what he took from them. Because God knew that the hearts of His specially chosen guys and gals were against Him, Samuel’s warnings to the Israelite people group elders fell on deaf ears. When Samuel asked God what He wanted him to do, verse 7 says, “And the LORD told him: “‘Listen to all that the people are saying to you: it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.” Your grandmaa and grandpaa know guys and gals who have rejected God – as God the Son, to be their Lord and Savior. These guys and gals convey to your grandpaa as having empty, unfulfilled lives which is leading these guys and gals to act out in ungodly ways.
1 Samuel 8 (884)