don't change me, change the system- 1 Sam 8- the call for a king
God is so amazingly gracious that He works for us even when we work against God. In Romans 5:7-8 Paul says,
“Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”We can imagine dying for someone who has been important to us. We would be willing to die to protect our child. Or, we would be willing to die for a parent or a mentor who has loved us and treated us well. … But, would we be willing to die for someone who sued us? Would we be willing to die for the playground bully? Would we die for an enemy? … Paul says that is exactly what God was willing to do. God worked to save us while we were actively working against God and God’s good plans for the world.
We see that same character trait at work in today’s reading from 1 Samuel. The elders of Israel come to Samuel, and they are not impressed with Samuel’s children. They don’t think his children will be good leaders. They wanted a change. They were rejecting the old pattern of priests and judges who were leading the tribes of Israel. And you have to admit that as you read through that time in their life, things weren’t exactly going well. But the problem wasn’t really their political structure.
At that time they were a alliance of tribal groups who were occasionally led by people called “judges” who God rose up as they were needed. Other than that the elders and the priests seemed to give leadership. The real problem was that they were stuck in a cycle of rebellion against God. This is called the judges cycle. Things would go well and they would ignore God and turn to other gods, then things would go poorly for them as they stepped out from under God’s protection, then they cried out to God and God would raise up a judge who would come and defeat whatever enemy was attacking and peace would be restored, which is when they would turn away from God and God’s ways again. So, the problem wasn’t really the political system, it was the people living within it.
Perhaps the same is true for us. Capitalism can be a great system. It has brought more wealth to more people than any other system we know of. But the greed of human beings can turn that system into an oligarchy, where wealthy corporations run the show for their own advantage. Then if people get crushed under the wheels of that machine… well…. That’s just business. … Capitalism works well as long as generous and caring people participate in it to help those who fall through the cracks (and every system has cracks). There are many people calling for a socialist shift, but perhaps the problem isn’t the system. Perhaps those participating in it has been walking off the path God and his prophets have set. The path that calls for generosity towards the widow and orphan- the path that calls for a consideration of a transcendent reality that will ultimately have to be answered to regarding how people are treated and the integrity of each human being- a path that calls for a Sabbath even for servants and animals once per week. Capitalism can work, if compassionate and generous people are a part of it at every level.
Those who call for a change of the system don’t realize the same is true of their system. Those who call for a communist shift look around at the experiments in China, North Korea, and Soviet Russia, and they see how it has failed. They think something was wrong with the structure- in some way it wasn’t “done right”. I suspect they same will be true o this system as of others. It depends if you have people of integrity working at every level of that system. Without people of integrity the system quickly degenerates. Even worse, when sinful, greedy, prideful people get in power they can turn any system into a hellish reality.
On the other hand, if you have people of truly godly integrity in the positions of power, any system can likely work well. I’m sure there were times in human history when a monarchy worked well as long as good people were involved. If there was a queen or king who understood themselves as a servant of God and understood that they would at some point stand accountable before God regarding the widow and orphan in their kingdom, I can imagine that system working well.
But back to our story. The assumption of the elders who came to Samuel seemed to be that the system was the problem (rather than the people in it). They were calling for a new system. They wanted to take a lesson from the other nations and use a new model of governance by appointing a king.
Samuel is upset by this. It seems like he sees it as a rejection of his leadership, but God says that it isn’t a rejection of Samuel, it is the people’s rejection of God. God doesn’t seem to be surprised. God says to Samuel, “…they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. Just as they have done to me, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods…”. God is not surprised.
Since the people were rescued from Egypt there has been a tendency to turn away from God and towards the ways of the nations around them especially their worship of various gods. When Moses was receiving the commandments he came down the mountain to see the people worshipping a golden calf. Over and over again they were tempted to turn away from God and to turn towards some other nations’ gods. … The whole Bible has been described by some in two parts- God’s rescue of the people from slavery in Egypt, and the second and longer rescue, which is rescuing the people’s hearts that are constantly being drawn back to slavery in Egypt.
In their latest call for a king, we might as well say they were calling for a pharaoh. We might rightfully ask if they have every really left Egypt. The God we have though, is the God who pursues us anyway.
I once heard a (true) story about a pastor whose son rejected everything his father stood for. His son ended up in a bad crowd and became addicted to powerful narcotics. His father tried to get him to come home, but he was an adult and didn’t want to have anything to do with his dad. The man got used to the idea that his son was lost to a world of drugs.
One day he got a call in the middle of the night that his son was in jail. He got up and put on his coat and made his way down to the police station. When he got there the person working the counter said that there was no one there with his son’s name. He told her that he would not be there in the middle of the night if he didn’t get a call. Could she please check again, could she please check other police stations. She did and there was no sign of his son in their system.
Perplexed, the father decided he would try to track down his son. He knew he sometimes stayed at a crack house in a certain part of town. He drove up to the house that had more dandelions than grass. He walked up to the door and it found it open. He walked in and his eyes scanned the bodies strewn about all over until his eyes caught his son sleeping on the couch. He quietly walked over, thankful that his son was okay, and kissed him on the forehead. Then he left and went back home without waking his boy up.
6 month later his son called him. He told him that he was clean, and that he was holding down a job, and that he was even going to church again. The son wanted to have lunch with his dad, so they met. At some point during lunch the son asked his father, “aren’t you going to ask what brought about the change in me?” The father, so grateful for the transformation he sees in his son hardly cares, but he asks anyway, “what happened?”. His son looks him in the eyes and says, “I wasn’t asleep when you kissed me on the forehead”.
It was the realization of his father’s love for him that, even in the middle of the night, he was willing to drive to a sketchy part of town and walk into the sketchiest house on that block to find his son and kiss his forehead.
I think that is the kind of God we have we make all kinds of wrong turns and like a GPS God recalculates a course correction for us to get us back on track. ….
And so for the people calling for a king. God tells Samuel to listen to the people, but God will continue to chase them. He will continue to work with them, even in their rejection. God will continue to find a way to save his children. Even when they reject him by killing him on a cross, he will even use that to save them.
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