Saul and Agag

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1 Samuel 15
“OH that My people had hearkened unto Me, and Israel had walked in My ways” (Psa. 81:1313Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways! (Psalm 81:13)), saith the Lord. It is He alone who knows the loss incurred by the disobedience of His people.
Saul has proved a failure. There is something pathetic in the way the Lord addresses Samuel: “It repenteth Me that I have set up Saul to be king; for he is turned back from following Me, and hath not performed My commandments.”
There was nothing ambiguous in the commandment given to the king about his dealings with the Amalekites. He was to “utterly destroy” them and their possessions. Many years before Jehovah had said that the remembrance of Amalek was to be blotted out from under heaven (Deut. 25). Although Jehovah is slow to execute judgment, enters this place with reluctant step, the time is now come. The cup is full. Saul, instead of doing as he is commanded, spares Agag, the Amalekite king, also spares “the best of the sheep and oxen, and of the fatlings and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them.” Disobedience pure and simple. It is in vain for him to assure Samuel that he has “performed the commandment of the Lord,” the bleating of the sheep gives the lie to the statement. “And Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?” (1 Sam. 15).
If in another day the dumb ass spake and forbad the madness of the prophet, so at this time the poor sheep in their innocent bleating convict the disobedient king, who, instead of judging himself, makes excuses, and meanly blames the people. This is useless, for the Spirit of God says, “But Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep,” &c. The falling king pleads that these latter had been spared to sacrifice unto the Lord. A lame excuse, and he is assured in solemn tones by the prophet, “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of lambs.”
Saul is here plainly shown to be a complete failure, utterly coming short in laying hold of the mind of the Lord. He has been weighed and found wanting. If previously he fails as to prayer, he now completely fails as to the commandment of the Lord. The prophet reminds him of the time when he was “little in his own eyes,” clearly indicating he was so no longer.
His magnanimity, as he supposed, might be shown in the sparing of Agag. It, however, ought not to take us long to decide what grave results must follow magnanimity being shown to the devil. Moreover, the Lord wants His people’s obedience more than their property.
With Saul there is no self-judgment. He is a great contrast to his successor. When David was in a strait he said, “Let me fall into the hand of the Lord, for great are His mercies: but let me not fall into the hand of man” (1 Chron. 21:1313And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let me fall now into the hand of the Lord; for very great are his mercies: but let me not fall into the hand of man. (1 Chronicles 21:13)). There is nothing in this about King David. Nothing! Let Saul have but the approval of the people, and little care has He for the approval of the Lord. This is only too plainly seen in the desire he expresses, “Honor me now, I pray thee, before the elders of my people.”
Saul, however, is allowed to continue for some time, as many others are. But the link is broken, the die cast, the tree has fallen. Rejected of the Lord, and forsaken of Samuel, he gradually sinks lower and lower. It is possible that some readers may find difficulty in the sang of the Lord that it had repented Him that he had set up Saul to be king, especially when put beside the statement used elsewhere (vs. 29).
“The strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for He is not a man that He should repent.” Neither indeed does He, that is to say, He never repents of His original purpose. When man’s responsibility is in question then the matter is different and easily understood.
God knows everything, but His knowledge does not clash with the responsibilities of men. For instance, God sends the prophet Jonah to Nineveh to cry to the people of that city, “Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be destroyed.” The Ninevites repent, judgment is averted, and the Ninevites spared. Saul sparing Amalek means that they only live to plunder and destroy later on (see 1 Sam. 30). So much for the result of his magnanimity!
W. R. C.