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David - 1st Samuel 16:6-23

At this event or sacrifice or dinner afterward, I’m not sure which, Samuel is looking at all of Jesse’s sons because he knows that one of them is supposed to be the new king but there’s a lot of sons there, so he’s trying to figure out which one. Samuel looks at the first son Eliab and just knew that he was the right one. He was the first born, tall, good looking, Samuel thought for sure he was the one God had chosen, but then God makes a statement demonstrating a very important gospel principle, “Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; ;for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.” I remember asking this very question when I was like 13 years old, I was thinking about something about how God knows us or what was important to Him, and my answer was “I look at the heart.” So imagine my surprise and delight when I heard this truth taught from God’s own mouth in the scr...
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Scared and Lots - 1st Samuel 16:1-5

Even though Samuel has informed Saul that God has relieved him of the kingship, Saul isn't going to let it go easily and as far as anyone else knows, Samuel and Saul were just seen sacrificing together at the religious celebration of Saul's victory, so really, Saul is still king in everyone's eyes and only those two know what happened. The question is way would Samuel go with Saul to the sacrifice for the victory celebration knowing full well that the people would take that to mean business as usual? TB says that some possible reasons include that Samuel didn't know what else to do. If he were to tell all the people that Saul was no longer king, but without having the replacement king ready to go, then civil war could start as each tribe tried to sit their own king on the throne in the power vacuum. Another reason could be because even though Israel had just defeated the Amalekites, there were still several other nations surrounding Israel that could have seen a king-le...
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Chronology - Some Thoughts

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I was getting ready to get into chapter 16 today that is an introduction to David, but while listening to the lectures about it, something was mentioned about a Psalm being written about David’s earliest experiences and I remembered that I think David wrote most of the book of Psalms. So I started wondering how much better it would be if I studied about David and 1st and 2nd Samuel and then studied about the Psalms that David wrote during the corresponding events, if that makes sense. So like instead of doing all of Samuel, Kings, and whatever comes next, studying Samuel, which events, and then reading the Psalms that David wrote about such events. For me, I think that would be the most fulfilling, I think I would like that the best but the problem is that both TB and the IM don’t do their studying like that so I would have to stay right on top of the order of everything and go back and forth between the different books and chapters, reading and studying and putting everything together...
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Battling the Amalekites - 1st Samuel 15

I’m kind of confused about how some wars are decided on versus others. For instance, with the Philistine war in the previous couple of chapters, Jonathan just seemingly went and instigated them himself, but God aided Israel in their victory and Jonathan was praised by both TB and the IM as being inspired. Now we see Samuel coming to Saul and telling him that God wants him to go fight the Amalekites. Samuel says specifically that this is revenge for how the Amalekites treated the Israelites when they were coming out of the land of Egypt because back in Exodus 17:8-16 the Amalekites attacked Israel in their rear column which would have been the weak, old and ill people of Israel which was a coward move. The war now commanded was retribution for that offense, even though Israel won back then too. I’m not sure about the logic there but I’m not in charge. God commanding this war makes is a holy war, meaning that the laws concerning the spoils were to be kept, and God reiterates that all men...
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To The Death - 1st Samuel 14:25-52

Saul has forced his battle weary troops to make an oath of fasting for the entire day, “that I may be avenged on mine enemies” and it really sucked for them but they were obedient and didn’t eat at all. While the regular troops were forced into that vow, Jonathan was not there, however, and didn’t know of nor make that vow. When the troops pursued the Philistines into a grove of trees full of beehives and honey, the troops didn’t eat anything, but Jonathan did. After Jonathan had eaten some of the honey, another soldier told him about the vow his father had made about not eating and Jonathan replied that his father was wrong to do that and that felt so much better and had more energy after having eaten the honey. In fact, maybe they could have had even more success against the Philistines if the troops hadn’t been forced to fast. The fast was in force until the evening, and the Israelites pursued the Philistines all day “and the people were faint.” Finally, night fall came and the so...
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Attacking the Philistines - 1st Samuel 14:1-24

The Philistines are creeping into Hebrew territory and Saul only has a contingent of 600 soldiers left. Apparently, the Israelites were on. One side of a valley and the Philistines were on the other side of the valley separated by about a mile. We met Jonathan last chapter when he killed the Philistine governor in the area in order to start a war between the two peoples. To me that seemed wreckless, starting wars, but both TB and the IM say that Jonathan was a man of firm faith in God and obedient in righteousness and who am I to argue with that? Since Jonathan killed the governor, the Philistines have been getting ready to make their move and Saul was waiting for Samuel, gathering his troops but Saul has just been kind of sitting there waiting, TB suggests that this is because Saul wasn’t really interested in a war that wouldn’t serve his purposes which was to unite all of Israel behind him and since all the other soldiers had left leaving only 600 men remaining, he knew that the peop...
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The Sacrifice - 1st Samuel 13:9-23

The troops were leaving to go home and Samuel had not shown up within the 7 days that he promised, so Saul takes matters into his own hands and tells his people to bring him two sacrifices, a burnt offering and a peace offering. Saul knows good and well that only priests were authorized to make the sacrifices and the burnt offering specifically was only authorized to be made by the high priest, Samuel specifically. TB notes that in Gilgal, surely there were priests around who could have made the peace offering, and even if Saul had done that one himself, it wasn’t the super serious burnt offering and at that point was still sometimes being done at home by the oldest sons like had happened before the Levitical priesthood was organized. So it still wouldn’t have been great, but it would have been more understandable. The fact that Saul had the option to chose the one that was less serious but instead chose the very serious sacrifice that was explicitly commanded only for the high priest,...
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