Dig Deeper - Sunday 9th February 2025
Sermon Reflection Questions - Misplaced Trust
1 Samuel 8:1-22
Dig Deeper notes from Sunday 9th February service:
Around the world there are families that have become political dynasties in India, Pakistan and Africa. You may be able to name some of them. They are not all bad, but certainly they are not all good. Unfortunately, there is a pattern among leaders in the Bible where descendants are not necessarily as good as their parents. Gideon Judges 6; Eli 1 Samuel 2 and this passage Samuel himself. All cases of misplaced trust.
Samuel is getting old, neighbouring countries are getting hostile, his sons are off the rails. So, the Israelite Tribal Elders come up with a plan to have a king so that Israel can be like other nations. Samuel feels rejected by this, but God says it’s me they are rejecting not you. He also says if they want a king tell them what it will be like, which Samuel does in vv10-18 (Check out what God expects of an Israelite king should be like in Deuteronomy 17.)
The Tribal Elders listen to Samuel’s warning, but are still determined to have a king ‘like other nations’. There’s no indication that they have asked God who has led the Israelites out of Egypt what he sees as the way forward and it turns out to be a dumb decision. Ignoring God can lead to dumb decisions.
Ignoring God and then telling Samuel that they want a King is in effect dictating to God what you want. The thing is that dictating to God has consequences. Three kings later when Solomon hands over to his son Rehoboam you can see how the Israelites felt by reading 1 Kings 12:4. (While you’re there, consider how good Rehoboam was as a king!)
Finally, the Tribal Elders seem to want to blend in with the countries around them. But that is not why God had chosen the Israelites to be his people. He wanted them to be an example to others, showing how to live as the creator of this world intended. They were to be distinct and different, a ‘light to the nations’ and like salt and light to the world. And of course, there is a descendant of King David who did provide and example of living in this world as God intended. Even though He is no longer here, He sent us the Holy Spirit and the Bible as the inspired word of God to be our guide. We need to keep our eyes fixed on Him.
Time to reflect:
1. It’s easy to make dumb decisions if we don’t include God in our decision making.
2. Sometimes we’ve worked out the best solution as we see it and then tell God what to do.
3. God calls us to be distinct and different and doesn’t expect us to blend in with others in our community
Questions to think about and discuss:
1. Think back at some of the dumb decisions you may have made in the past. In the light of this passage, think about what we might learn from them and apply for our lives today.
2. Clearly God expects us to make decisions and has given us minds to do that. Where is the boundary between everyday decisions and those where we should be involving God? How to we get the right balance.
3. Reflect on things happening in your life at the moment where we are praying for God to act. Are we sharing them with Him, or are we trying to nudge Him into acting the way we think is best?
4. We are called to be distinct and different in our lifestyles. Is it obvious in the way we behave that we have a Christian faith? Perhaps by the things we do or may be more obviously by things we will not do. How good are we at blending in? Do we want to be, not so much like other nations, but the same as others in our community?
5. Also think about the time and space we make for God. The Israelite Elders failed to do this and took no heed of your message to them from Samuel. Are our lifestyles so loud that we can’t hear when you are trying to speak to us?
