In this episode, we dive into the pivotal moment in 1 Samuel 8 where Israel demands a king, a request that represents a rejection of God’s direct leadership. Join us as we explore the profound implications of this shift and the warnings given by God through Samuel about the true cost of kingly rule. The conversation illuminates how this ancient story is still relevant to our modern lives, especially in our choices between earthly desires and divine guidance.
00:07:22 God’s Call to Holiness and Personal Reflections
00:13:04 Personal Testimony and Bible Reading Journey
SPEAKER 01 :
Welcome to Add Bible, an audio daily devotion from the Ezra Project. We join Alan J. Huth as he shares Bible passages and comments from over 30 years of his personal Bible reading journals.
SPEAKER 02 :
Today we are in 1 Samuel chapter 8 and we will listen to the recording from Faith Comes By Hearing, all 22 verses of 1 Samuel chapter 8. 1 Samuel 8
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When Samuel became old, he made his sons judges over Israel. The name of his firstborn son was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah. They were judges in Beersheba. Yet his sons did not walk in his ways, but turned aside after gain. They took bribes and perverted justice. Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him,
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Behold, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint for us a king to judge us like all the nations.
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But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, Give us a king to judge us. And Samuel prayed to the Lord.
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And the Lord said to Samuel, Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. according to all the deeds that they have done. From the day I brought them up out of Egypt even to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are also doing to you. Now then obey their voice. Only you shall solemnly warn them and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.
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So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking for a king from him. He said,
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These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you. He will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots. And he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to His servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to His officers and to His servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys and put them to His work. He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.
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But the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel, and they said, No, but there shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles.
SPEAKER 07 :
And when Samuel had heard all the words of the people, he repeated them in the ears of the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, Obey their voice and make them a king. Samuel then said to the men of Israel, Go, every man to his city.
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In 1983, in my journal I wrote, people asked Samuel for a king because Samuel’s sons were corrupt leaders. They wanted to be like other nations. They wanted more distance from God’s direct leadership. The whole concept of Israel asking for a king is a major transition in the nation of Israel. It appears that it’s because of Samuel’s corrupt sons that the Israelites are asking for a king. But that’s not really the case, is it? The real reason is recorded in verse 7. And the Lord said to Samuel, Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. He goes on to say, So it’s not really about Samuel’s sons, is it? It’s about a nation who over and over and over has rejected the Lord and finally now wants human leadership, not godly leadership. In 2007, after reading this passage, I wrote something a little bit different. I wrote, Samuel’s sons, Joel and Abijah, did not walk in his ways but turned aside like Eli’s sons, Hophni and Phinehas. This is the hard part of my life. I did all I could to raise my children to serve the Lord, the God of their father. Two of three so far have decided not to, and it breaks my heart, like it broke the heart of Eli and Samuel. My kids are not evil or corrupt, just spiritually misdirected. Lord, bring them back to the God of their father. That’s what I wrote as I wrote a prayer in my journal that year, crying out for my kids. Bring them back. Honor the prayers of their parents. Please, O God. So as parents, maybe you are listening to this podcast today and you’re thinking, yes, that’s what happened to me. I did all I could to raise my kids right in a Christian home and it didn’t turn out for me well either. Part of these podcasts are sharing the reality of life. And that’s what happened to us. We read the Bible to our kids every night. We took them to church. We thought we raised them as well as we could in the Lord. And yet all of us make our own choices, don’t we? But I could relate to Eli and his sons, and I could relate to Samuel and his sons, as they probably cried out for their kids. We parents cry out for ours, don’t we? So let’s take a moment to contemplate this lesson today from 1 Samuel 8. For those of us who have children who are misdirected spiritually, we’re going to pray. And for those of us who have had better luck with our kids following the Lord, hopefully you will take a moment today to thank God for that, that wonderful opportunity that you’ve seen in your own lives. So, Lord, we do lift up children of Christian parents today. It doesn’t always turn out the way we think, the way we want, but it’s not over. Our kids still can return to you, just like we read yesterday in 1 Samuel. But we lift up all the children of Christian parents who are not walking with the Lord, are not walking in the way that seems like following in their father’s footsteps. We ask you, Lord, to intervene. to touch the hearts of our children and bring them back to you. And as we think about our kids, I look back at my journal entry back in 2002. When I read this passage, I wrote, We want to be like others. God wants us to be like Him. He calls us to be holy, a royal priesthood, separated from the world, sons of a king, servants of the Most High, a separated walk, give up self and follow Him. But we want to be like others. He wants us to be like Him. So I guess God had a little bit of trouble with his kids too, right? The family of Israel. And so we want our kids to be like us. We want our kids to be like God. Father, hear our prayer. Help us as we pray that and watch our kids come back to you. Well, back to the story about mom for a minute. I have a surprising entry on this day in that journal in 2002. I wrote, Dad admitted to emergency room at Penrose yesterday. Both parents are in the hospital, going down tonight. So there, my mom was in the hospital on one floor, and then my father was admitted on the other floor. And I’ll have to pick up the story later on in these journals in the next few days to find out what happened to Dad and what’s happening to Mom. Well, we’ve already prayed for our kids today, so Father, we just ask again, touch our children, draw them close to you, draw them back into relationship with you, that you may receive the glory and the honor as you do so. In Jesus’ name, we do pray it because we really want this in our heart of hearts. Amen. All of the Ad Bible radio programs are available to you in writing. We transcribed all of Ad Bible into an 11-book series called Day by Day Through the Bible, and we did it in a unique way by authors of the Bible. You can get the complete set or a book at a time at our website, EzraProject.net. For example, there are the writings of Moses, the writings of Solomon, the writings of the minor prophets, and the writings of the major prophets, the writings of the Old Testament historical books, and the writings of Old Testament leaders. Covering the New Testament, we have the writings of Matthew and Luke, the writings of John, the writings of Paul, and the writings of Mark, Peter, James, Jude, and Hebrews. So this 11-book series covers all 66 books of the Bible, chapter by chapter. So if the radio program was on 1 Samuel, you would find the written version in day by day through the Bible, the writings of Old Testament historical books. If the radio program is covering Daniel or Jonah, you would find all the minor prophets in the writings of the minor prophets. But say you’re studying the gospel of John in your own personal quiet time. You can find our coverage of John’s gospel in the writings of John, which includes not just his gospel, but other writings like 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John and Revelation. Or you are going to be reading one of Paul’s epistles. You could find them all in the writings of Paul. Our Day by Day through the Bible series is a tremendous resource as you read and study any book of the Bible. It will deepen your understanding of God’s Word and enhance your personal quiet time because each book breaks down the passage with comments from my personal Bible reading journals, offers life applications, and prayers related to the passage. If you want more from your time in God’s Word, visit EzraProject.net and try one of our day-by-day through the Bible devotional books. Any of the 11 books are a great place to start, or get the full set to use wherever you are in the Bible today or wherever you are heading in your Bible reading. I know you’re going to enjoy it. Thanks for listening to AdBible today. You might wonder how I became a daily Bible reader. When I was 15 years old, a buddy and me stole his father’s car. We could steal his father’s car because his father was in Vietnam, serving in the war. So he was never home. So we took the car that day. Neither one of us with a driver’s license. And we took off out east of Colorado Springs on a dirt road. We were flying down this dirt road at 60 miles an hour. And he lost control of the car. We began to spin, and we were going down the road, fishtailing, and he spun the wheel of the car, 60 miles an hour. The car tumbled, crushed the top, tucked the wheels under, totaled the car. I was on a dirt road. I don’t know if I was thrown out of the car or crawled out of the car, but I looked at that car, and I thought, am I even alive? Am I broken? Am I bleeding everywhere? And I began to pat myself down, and I felt like I was okay. So I stood up, and I was uninjured, amazingly. The sheriff came to draw up the accident. He said, it’s a miracle you guys are alive. I got home that night, went down into my bedroom. My mother came to me and said, you ought to thank God you’re alive. I was laying on my bed, and I was thinking about the day’s activities. And I just thought, wow, I could have been dead today. I wasn’t the driver. I was the passenger. I wasn’t in control. But God was. At that moment, I figured out at 15 years old, God could take my life any time. He could have that day. So as I laid there, I thought, okay, you could take my life any day. So you saved my life today for a reason. For whatever reason that is, I’m going to live for you and that reason. As I said that, I heard a voice say to me, there’s a Bible on your bookshelf. Get it down and read it. I must have heard something, because I got up, I went over to the bookshelf, and I pulled down a Bible. I opened it to the first page, just like I would any other book, and I began to read God’s Word. I read Genesis chapter 1. The next day I read Genesis chapter 2. The next day I read Genesis chapter 3. And a chapter a day, I began to read God’s Word at 15 years old. If you do that, by the way, it’ll take you about three and a half years to finish reading the Bible a chapter a day. And that’s a good plan. So that’s how I became a daily Bible reader. And when I finished going through the Bible the first time, at 18 years or so, I just started over because I thought that’s what Christians did was read their Bibles every day. So that’s how I became a daily Bible reader.
