Obedience

Obedience. Obedience can be defined as ‘having a clear understanding of the instructions and acting accordingly.’

God is very serious about His instructions; we see this in 1 Samuel 15. The narrative states, “The Lord of Hosts says…” He proceeds to tell King Saul (through Samuel) to ‘utterly destroy’ everything about the Amalekites – the people and property. A lil further in the story, “But Saul and the people…” Oh, they took care of most of the people and some of the property and livestock* – but most and some is not obedience. Did they have clear instructions? Yes. Did they obey? No.  God said, King Saul “turned away from Me and has not carried out My instructions.” (v11) Saul is told, “Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He has rejected you as King.” (v23)

God has a purpose for His instruction. Often when given our marching orders we tend to grab the envelope and run off with an “I got this!” and only pause down the road a bit and try to figure out a shortcut. We forget that God is Omniscient (All-knowing) and He is not limited by time or space, so He sees and knows all directions on our timeline. Meaning – what we don’t see NOW, He sees and He knows …ALL.

God had a purpose for the destruction of the Amalekites, COMPLETE – utter destruction. You see, some many-many years later, an ancestor of an Amalekite emerges. The book of Esther. Remember the bad guy Haman (Boo!) the guy who manipulated the King’s decree to annihilate the Jews? He was the ‘son of Hammedatha, the Agagite’ (Esther 3:1). Scholars believe the ‘Agagites’ are of King Agag – King of the Amalekites (1 Samuel 15:8). But there’s more: remember Mordecai (YAY!) the cousin of Esther, who raised her, he was of the tribe of Benjamin, a descendant of Kish – Saul was the son of Kish. So, here we are AGAIN, Haman (Amalekite) and Mordecai & Esther (Saul).

The principle stares us in the face – God says take care of it NOW, destroy it or you WILL see it again and seeing it again may destroy – YOU! How many of us have been broken-hearted because we did not obey thoroughly?  God desires complete obedience. Partial obedience is disobedience.  God doesn’t want most or some – He wants it ALL!  Just ask the folks who were taken captive by the Amalekites later in 1 Samuel 30 and the folks praying for Esther as she approaches the king to address the situation concerning their pending annihilation.

Obeying God with a half heart leads to a broken heart.

In Him, DeDe (“Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love & good deeds.” – Hebrews 10:24)

*Side note: Scholars are in agreement, they don’t know exactly where/when/how the Amalekites ancestry carried on – but they did.  We see in the story (1 Samuel 15) that Saul told the Kenites (folks in the region, v6) to leave before he went after the Amalekites, giving them the opportunity to flee the bloodshed. Could some Amalekites have snuck out among them? Also, it is said that Saul attacked the Amalekites within a certain regional parameter (v7). Were there more outside those parameters? We see later in 1 Samuel 27, David raided an Amalekite village (they had a village?) and again chapter 30, David encounters more Amalekites, “David fought them from dusk until the evening of the next day, and none of them got away, except four hundred young men who rode off on camels and fled.” (v17)  THOROUGH obedience is required.