Doing the Right Thing is Not Enough

Newsletter article for February 2004

© 2004 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

Saul was the first King of Israel, but he was also the last one of his family to be a king. If you recall the Bible story God became displeased with Saul and chose the boy David to succeed Saul as King of Israel. Do you remember what Saul did to displease God? If we think we are pleasing God by what we are doing then we ought to consider King Saul and try to avoid the trap that he fell into.

There are actually a couple of events in I Samuel 13-15 that are significant, but it is the first one I want to recall here. What Saul did which led God to look for the next king outside of Saul’s sons, was to offer a burnt offering to God. Now, if you know anything about Old Testament history and worship practices this doesn’t seem such a bad thing at all. It doesn’t seem like Saul was worshipping a false God. People made burnt offerings to God all the time. Many of these were actually required by law and the Bible records many more rebukes for those who did not make an offering to God, than for those who did, but Saul is one exception.

The situation was that the Philistines were gathering to attack the Israelites and Saul and the soldiers of Israel were looking to get some encouragement and strength from God through His prophet, Samuel. Samuel told Saul to meet him in seven days time at Gilgal where Samuel would offer sacrifices to God and ask the Lord to give them success against their enemies. On the seventh day Samuel was nowhere to be found and the soldiers began to lose heart and to scatter off to someplace safe before the Philistines attacked. When Saul saw his men leaving he thought that he needed to do something to keep the men together so he offered the sacrifice himself and did not wait any longer for Samuel. But just when Saul had finished making the offering Samuel arrived and was greatly displeased with Saul’s impatience. He proclaimed that because he did not keep God’s command his kingdom would not endure and God would seek a man after His own heart to lead His people.

This may seem to us to be a little harsh, but as in all the things God does it is completely appropriate. There are a couple things wrong with Saul’s actions. First, although it was a good thing for Saul to prepare to make a sacrificial offering to God, it was inappropriate for him to actually make the sacrifice. This was the role of the priest, or in this case, the prophet, Samuel. In and of itself, this probably would not have brought down such a severe rebuke from God, but the second incident in I Samuel 15 shows that the first simply revealed a greater lack of faith in God. Although Saul seemed to be making an offering to God, he really wasn’t. God’s instructions through the prophet Samuel told him to wait, and Saul did not. With his men leaving Saul decided that he couldn’t wait for God to give the men encouragement, so he did it himself. This was idolatry. Saul put himself in the place of God.

It wasn’t Saul’s actions which were so wicked (although he certainly disobeyed God), but his lack of faith in God made his sin inexcusable. Compare this with the worst sins of David, Saul’s successor. David committed adultery with the wife of one of his best soldiers. He tried to cover up the sin, and when that failed he had the woman’s husband murdered. This was nearly as great a rejection of God as Saul’s sin, and a much greater sin against others (Uriah and Bathsheba), yet David didn’t lose faith in God. There were some tragic and lingering consequences to David’s sins, but he was forgiven. There were twenty-one of David’s descendants who ruled as king from Solomon to Zedekiah, but Saul’s family died out with his great-grandchildren, and few of them enjoyed a long life.

I am sure that to many people this seems a bit backward. To our earthly eyes the sins of adultery and murder are virtually unforgivable, while the sins of impatience and improper worship seem relatively inconsequential, but then we often place our own concerns above God’s concerns. Such is the way of all sinful flesh. God looks at things a little differently. First of all the sins against God (first table of the commandments) are much worse than our sins against others (second table) for the simple fact that God is GOD, and everyone else is not. But God also can see into people’s hearts. God knows who has faith in Him and who hates Him. For those who have faith (like David) God can forgive the worst sins (adultery, lies, conspiracy, murder, misuse of authority, etc.), but for those who do not have faith (like Saul) even the seemingly good things he does (worshipping God, having compassion on an enemy, etc.) are unforgivable.

Judas also did a good work in the garden of Gethsemane when he kissed Jesus. Psalm 2 tells us, “Kiss the son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way.” Kissing is a sign of affection, and how can that be wrong when we show affection to our Lord? But Judas did not kiss Jesus to show affection, instead he used it as a sign to Jesus’ enemies so they could come and arrest him. What should have been a good work Judas turned into an opportunity for the enemies of Jesus to grab him so they could kill him. Judas lacked faith in Jesus, and so despite any good that he had done, he despaired of his life and took a shortcut to destruction despite the fact that his salvation was so near.

There are those who would tell you that if your worship is not full of feeling you should work harder to make it so, but this was Saul’s wrong solution to the problem. It is the wrong solution because the fact that you make yourself feel happy or excited about something doesn’t make it God-pleasing. Saul and his soldiers were quite satisfied with his solution to restore morale to the soldiers, but God was angry about it. You can do all sorts of things to make yourself feel good about your sins, but this is only a temporary distraction and not a proper way to deal with sin. People do it all the time. The devil encourages it, because as long as people feel good about their sins without truly repenting, they are lost and belong to him. God doesn’t necessarily want you to feel good, and He never wants you to feel good about sin. God wants you to recognize your sin, come to true (i.e. painful) repentance, and be saved.

You cannot measure your faith by your good works. If you could then Saul might have been a more righteous person than David. But God looks at us according to our faith in Him. Jesus Himself was praised as the Son of David for more than just the fact that David was His ancestor. Jesus came to rescue us from the sinful self-centeredness which makes all our good deeds tainted by wickedness. Only Jesus can sanctify us and make us holy. Only Jesus can give us hope and peace and satisfaction, and none of this comes from ourselves. If our happiness, peace, hope, or general good feelings come from within us then they cannot save us, and like King Saul they will likely turn us against God and lead us to our destruction.