Too Busy to Worship, Too Big to Obey

Something has happened to this timid boy from Benjamin who said, I'm so small in my own eyes. Who am I? He is now thinking, I got this. I don't have to wait for God. I don't have to wait for his blessing. I can do this in my own strength. So we assume the role of priest. Samuel shows up, sees, smells the offering, and Samuel says this in first Samuel 13 verse 13. You have done foolishly. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought out a man after his own heart. [00:28:11] (50 seconds)  #WaitOnGod

Whatever reason, he didn't obey fully the commandment of God. Why didn't he take out all the sheep and the cattle like he was supposed to? He maybe he's thinking in the natural, look, I got hundreds of thousands of soldiers that I need to feed, and I'm just gonna let these go to waste. No. I I gotta I gotta feed my army. So, you guys, we can always find natural reasons to justify disobeying God. Alright? We can. We can kind of manipulate things, and this is what humans are good at, exactly what he did. If you wanna write this down, it's not in the notes, but Saul was Look at this. He was filtering the commands of God through his own perspective. [00:31:50] (40 seconds)  #StopFilteringGod

I wanna worship you. You guys, worship if you have a worship problem, it's probably tied to a pride problem. Worship and humility go hand in hand because this is what worship is. Worship is saying, God, I cannot, but you can. God, I am not enough, but you are. Bending the knee and saying, God, you are greater than I am. That's what worship is. Coming to terms with, God, I'm nothing without God, you are so good. When we sing songs like, I exalt thee, I exalt thee, it's just saying, God, you are better than I am. So if you wanna be a great worshiper, have a great humble heart. [00:42:20] (51 seconds)  #HumbleWorship

I wonder if there's any areas of your life where you're not giving God full obedience at this time. Maybe you've made some excuses or downplayed the severity of it and you say, you know what? God's given me a pass on this thing right now. It's not a big deal. The Lord says this in John 15 or John fourteen fifteen, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. If you love me, you will obey. He says, why do you say, Lord, Lord? Why do you call me master, but you don't do what I say? I know it's difficult. There's people that you have to forgive and you're like, man, but you don't understand what they've done. The Lord says, I'm not just expecting you just to pretend like it didn't happen, but move towards forgiveness. Move towards reconciliation. [00:43:16] (54 seconds)  #ObedienceIsLove

To love your neighbors, to love your enemies. You say, yeah, but you don't know what they've done? The Lord is saying, look, love your enemies. If the Lord could even love Judas, who would stab in the back, you can love your enemies. You can pray for those who persecute you. There's some commandments that are difficult. He doesn't say if you love me, you'll always be happy or if you agree with my commandments, then obey them. He says if you love me, obey my commandments. [00:44:10] (31 seconds)  #LoveYourEnemies

For the people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen. So he shifts the blame. He downplays the severity of the event, and then he actually tries to twist it and say, well, the reason we obeyed was so that we could honor God. Right? How twisted are you when you're starting to say, the reason I obeyed God was so that I could honor God. I disobeyed God so that I could honor him. He says this, we kept the sheep to sacrifice to the Lord your God. I don't know if it's significant that he says the Lord your God. That he doesn't say the Lord my God or our God. It's very kind of just blame shifting and washing his hands of it trying to seem innocent. He says, the rest we devote to destruction. And I love what Samuel says in verse 16. He just says, stop. [00:35:08] (54 seconds)  #NoMoreExcuses

And as Samuel turned to go away, the bible says this, that Samuel says, the Lord's gonna take you off your throne, and he walks away, and Saul reaches out and grabs his shirt, basically like, no, like, don't take this kingdom from me, and and Saul's shirt rips. And then Samuel turns this into a teaching moment, and he says, in the same way, Saul, that you just ripped my shirt, the Lord's gonna rip the kingdom from you. This prophetic moment. So it says, as Samuel turned to go away, Saul seized the skirt of his robe and it tore. And Samuel said to him, the Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours, look at this, who is better than you. [00:38:47] (41 seconds)  #KingdomTorn

You guys, offering the sacrifice was the role of the priest, not the king. Not the king, even king Saul. It was the role of the priest. And Saul would have known this. He would have had this in the old covenant, in the the books of the law. He would have known specifically, this is the priest's job, nobody else. He knew how serious this was. And yet, he did it because of the pressures that were mounting upon him. He decided, I can't wait for God. I need to take this into my own hands. How many of guys have been there before? Right? That that we know that we're supposed to honor the Lord in some way, but because we're so busy, we're so stressed, the problem is right in front of us that we think, you know what, Lord? It seems like you're running late, so I better take this into my own hands. [00:25:39] (51 seconds)  #DontUsurpGod