And Saul said, Bring hither to me the burnt-offering and the peace-offerings. And he offered up the burnt-offering.
Samuel told Saul to wait seven days at Gilgal for him to come and offer the sacrifices. The seventh day ran out, the army melted away, and Saul called for the offerings himself — why could a man who wanted God's help not wait for it?
The waiting was the test. Saul's patience lasted only as long as the crowd did.
Then Saul loses patience; he does not know the patience of faith which is "strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might." His patience stops where faith should begin. When the people scatter, when man's support fails him, everything fails this poor king. His flesh, driven to act, at once seizes the place that belongs to the prophet. It reverses the order God established and tramples it underfoot.
He did wait — almost. A man can keep a rule long enough to quiet his conscience and still never lean on God.
He waits for him long enough to satisfy the demands of conscience. Nature can go a long way on that principle. But nature does not feel its own weakness, and it does not feel that everything depends on God. That sense is what makes a man wait on God as his only resource and worker… If he had had confidence in God, he would have understood that he should wait for Him, whatever the result might be. He would have seen that it was useless to do anything without Him, and that he ran no risk in waiting for Him.
Saul later gave his reasons, and each one was something he could see. One thing was missing from his list.
The poor king saw the people deserting him, the power of the enemy, and the absence of the man he leaned on. But he did not see God.
Offering was not Saul's work to do. In taking the sacrifice into his own hands he stepped over a line God Himself had drawn.
So Saul offers the sacrifices. He pushes into the priest's office, and in effect he ignores all need of the very thing that lay at the base of sacrifice — a mediator. The flesh, with all its religiousness and carefulness, never grasps that it has no standing before God. It would push its way into the holiest things.
What did Saul think the burnt offering would do for him?
But Saul was not Melchizedek! What place did the burnt offering have in his mind, that he should act like this? It could have been little more than a lucky charm, as the ark was to the people in the day of Hophni and Phinehas. It is GOD who counts. If we let the outward, visible things He Himself appointed crowd Him out of our minds, they become truly harmful in our unspiritual hands.
Saul may well have thought the seven-day appointment was only Samuel's plan, and that the plan had failed. The law had already answered that excuse.
Samuel's arrangement was not everything. Long before his day the law had already provided for just such a situation. The divine instruction was: "you shall come… to the judge who is in those days… you shall not turn aside from the verdict that they declare to you, either to the right hand or to the left" (Deut. 17:8-12)… Samuel was without doubt the judge God raised up for his day. The word of God required full obedience to his instructions. Saul disobeyed. What looked practical swayed him, and he treated the word of God, through Samuel, as no more than Samuel's opinion.
The timing is what makes this so heavy. The hour that could have settled the kingdom is the hour that lost it.
How often carelessness loses the hour for establishing the offered blessing! That hour becomes instead the moment of forfeiture and defeat… At this very point burnt offerings and peace offerings were about to confirm the kingdom and the king forever. Right here Saul breaks down… Samuel should have stood in the place of offering, blessing the sacrifices, the people, and their king. Instead he becomes the prophet of woe to Saul.
- Command. The seven days were a command from God through Samuel, not a plan Saul could revise when it looked impractical.
- Clock. Saul waited long enough to quiet his conscience, but not long enough to lean on God. There was no risk in waiting.
- Eye. He saw the people scattering, the enemy massing, the prophet missing. God was the one thing he left out.
- Altar. He took the offering into his own hands, stepped into the priest's place, and pushed past the need of a mediator. He used religion as a charm instead of trust.
- Cost. Samuel came with woe instead of blessing. The hour meant to confirm the kingdom became the hour Saul forfeited it.
And it came to pass, as soon as he had ended offering up the burnt-offering, behold, Samuel came; and Saul went out to meet him, that he might salute him.
Saul finishes the burnt offering. At that very moment Samuel walks into the camp, and the king goes out to greet him as if nothing had happened. This verse turns on a few minutes, and on what a warm welcome can hide.
Samuel did come. But Saul had already acted, so the help arrived too late to do him any good.
God's help arrives at the moment when the flesh has just attempted to come to its own rescue. What use is this help to him therefore? Saul is not an unbeliever. He does not openly despise Israel's God, and he knows that a sacrifice is needed to come near Him. Far from despising the prophet, he "went out to meet him and greet him."
Another writer notes how long Saul had already held out, and how little time was left.
He waits until near the end of the seventh day — so far into it that there seems to be no hope of Samuel coming. In open disobedience he offers the burnt offering, or has it offered for him. He has barely done this before Samuel comes.
The same hour could have gone either way. One writer marks how quickly an hour of blessing can turn into an hour of loss.
How often the hour set for establishing the offered blessing is lost through carelessness! It becomes instead the moment of forfeiture, of defeat, and of Satan's power. At this very point the kingdom and the king were about to be confirmed for ever by burnt offerings and peace offerings. Here Saul breaks down. The first man, Adam, gave place to the last Adam. In the same way the first king must be set aside to make room for the Second, the true David.
Saul had waited. The question is why his waiting collapsed at the moment the people drifted away.
When the people scatter, when man's support fails him, everything fails this poor king. His flesh drives him to act. He at once seizes the place that belongs to the prophet, and so he reverses and tramples on the order God had set up.
Something can look like faith for a long time without ever being faith.
The flesh can imitate faith up to a certain point, but no further… Nothing is harder for the flesh than to stand still and wait for God to save. Its patience is often impressive, and it may even impress Christians. But it ends at the moment when faith is required — the faith that does not count difficulties or impossibilities, because faith holds fast to God, who is above them all.
The strangest detail in the verse is the greeting itself. Saul seems pleased with himself for the courtesy, and one writer treats that satisfaction as the warning.
Saul was treating as worthless the word of God spoken by His prophet. At that very time he went out to meet and greet (bless) him, and he seemed well satisfied with himself for showing him this outward honour… What must it be to go out in appearance only to meet and bless the Lord, while living and acting against His revealed will?
This was not a one-off. It matched a pattern that ran through his reign.
Selfishness and pride mark Saul's whole course, hidden under a cloak of humility… He was a self-seeker throughout. He used the name of God only for his own ends, and the things of God as a pedestal to display his own glory.
One writer sets Saul's act beside a later king who did the same thing, and says what it stands for today.
He had already shown what the unbelief of the flesh produces. He failed to wait for Samuel at Gilgal, and he intruded into the priest's office, as King Uzziah did later. Under the law of Moses, intruding into the priesthood was a most glaring act of sacrilege. What matches it today is the refusal of Christ in His priestly and atoning work as the only way to come to God. This will explain the terrible judgment upon Uzziah and the setting aside of Saul. No one is fit to lead His people if he fails to see that Christ's sacrifice and His priestly pleading for them are absolutely necessary.
- Moment — Samuel arrived just as the offering ended. The help Saul needed was already on the way when he stopped waiting for it.
- Motive — his patience broke the moment the people scattered. It was the flesh copying faith, not faith itself.
- Mask — Saul went out to greet and bless the prophet while acting against the word that prophet carried. The outward honour left him well satisfied.
- Method — the act seized a place God had never given him. One writer reads that trespass as a picture of refusing Christ's priestly work as the only way to God.
- Measure — the hour set to confirm his kingdom for ever became the hour of loss. The first king is set aside to make room for the true David.