Archive for the ‘Scripture’ Category
Run to God when you sin, not away from Him.
And Samuel said to the people, “Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil. Yet do not turn aside from following the LORD, but serve the LORD with all your heart. And do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty. For the LORD will not forsake his people, for his great name’s sake, because it has pleased the LORD to make you a people for himself.” 1 Samuel 12:20-22
The Israelites were guilty. They had sinned directly against God, dethroning Him as king and appointing Saul as sovereign over them. Samuel, the faithful priest, stood above the people to rebuke them of their sin in a farewell address. God honored Samuel’s rebuke and flexed His authority in powerful displays of thunder and rain, much to the fearful dismay of the people.
“Pray for your servants to the LORD your God, that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil!” the people exclaimed – the dread of God’s judgment upon them. Certainly they deserved death. They deserved to be punished for treason against an infinitely holy God. The weight of their sin was full and unbearable.
Samuel’s response must have surprised them: “Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil.”
“That sounds a little backwards, Samuel,” they must have thought. The Israelites must have been dumfounded by his response to their fearful repentance. How could they not be afraid after what they had done? Samuel must have known the people’s tendency to hide from God in shame after sinning. He addressed it while the wound of conviction was still fresh in the people.
“Do not be afraid,” he said, “…Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart…for the Lord will not forsake his people.”
The Israelites were certainly puzzled. God was not going to forsake them? Hadn’t He just shown His disdain for the Israelites’ sin in powerful, frightening displays of thunder and rain? Yet they were now to turn toward Him and serve Him?
Samuel knew something of God that the Israelites then and most Christians today do not know, or are at least prone to forget. His message to the Israelites, and to us, is the same: Do not turn away from God when you sin; turn toward Him, for He will not forsake you.
Our tendency is to run from God when we sin. We feel shameful – guilty even – unworthy of approaching God. We’re deceived into thinking we must be faithful to God for an undisclosed period of time before we are able to pray or sing or serve again. We turn aside after “empty things” like our own religious performance, which “cannot profit or deliver.” We forget so easily the Gospel of grace which saved and sanctifies us.
When convicted of sin, we must remember that God’s pleasure in us is not based on our obedience or perfection. God’s pleasure in us is based on His pleasure in glorifying Himself in the redemptive praises of His people through faith in Jesus Christ. Because of this, we are freed to run to God when we sin rather than striving for obedience before approaching God again.
Because of this, we also do not have to fear God’s judgment. As God’s people through Christ Jesus, we no longer relate to God as sinners before a Judge. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). We are now children before our Heavenly Father. “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Romans 8:15). We are now recipients of blessing from Christ’s perfect obedience to the Law, not recipients of curse from our disobedience to the Law.
Biblical narrative shows that the Israelites vowed obedience to God over and over and over again, yet continually fell back into sin, running to idols and heartless religiosity. Their sin was rampant and their faithfulness was inconsistent at best. But God was still faithful, and a thousand years after the writing of 1 Samuel, a baby was born in a stable in rural Judah.
More than two thousand years later, we liken the Israelites more than we’d choose to admit with our inconsistent obedience and idolatrous sin. But God remains faithful, “for His great name’s sake.” Let us run to Him regardless of our performance for Him.
