80. Tough Love: When God Says What We Need to Hear

G' day and welcome to Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

Dave here.

Have you ever been told off for doing the wrong thing?

I don't mean those times someone got angry with you and you were completely innocent.

I mean, when you did something naughty, someone found out about it and you had to have a very serious conversation with them.

It isn't very comfortable, is it?

Maybe you'd hoped you'd got away with it.

Maybe you hadn't even noticed that what you'd done was wrong.

And listening to someone tell you about it is about as fun as sitting on a sharp nail.

Actually, sometimes you might even prefer to sit on a sharp nail if it meant you didn't have to have that conversation.

Strange as it seems, when we get told off, it's usually because the person doing the telling actually cares for us.

They really want what's best for us.

They want us to understand what we did wrong and help us to do better.

It doesn't mean they always do it in the best way.

As a dad, I know I've told my kids off in really angry ways that weren't very kind.

Hey you.

You forgot to replace the toilet roll again.

As a punishment, you can't watch television or see any friends for 350 years and then you have to scrub the toilet with a toothpick.

That might have been an overreaction.

And on behalf of all grown ups out there who have ever overreacted, please forgive us.

It was wrong and we shouldn't have done it.

God, though, never overreacts.

Every feeling he feels is right, everything he does is right.

Every word he says is right.

What's more, he says and does those things out of love and kindness.

So whenever he tells people they've done the wrong thing, he's doing it out of love.

In today's story, there's something that God wants to tell the Israelites.

It isn't going to be comfortable, it isn't going to be fun.

But God's telling them out of kindness and love.

So get ready for our next episode of stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

At the end of our last episode, everything seemed brilliant.

The enemy army had been defeated and chased away.

All the Israelites accepted Saul as king and they gave thanks to God.

Everything seemed great unless you remember how they've treated God along the way.

Now God's like, whoa there, we're not just going to skip over all that massive sin you just did.

We're not going to pretend like everything's fine.

He knows that if he does that if he ignores what they've done wrong, they'll just keep doing it.

So while they're partying and celebrating the victory, Samuel calls them all together and has a little chat.

He reminds them how they asked him to make someone king and now he's done it before.

He tells them how bad it was for them to ask for a king.

He asks them a different question.

He asks if they have anything to accuse him of.

Is there anything he's done wrong they want to talk about?

He says in 1 Samuel 12, 1, I have done everything you wanted me to do.

I have put a king over you.

Now you have a king to lead you.

I am old and grey and my sons are here with you.

I have been your leader since I was young.

Here I am.

If I have done anything wrong, you must testify against me.

Do this before the Lord and his appointed king.

Did I steal anyone's ox or donkey?

Did I hurt or cheat anyone?

Did I ever secretly take money to pretend not to see something wrong?

If I did any of these things, I will make it right.

Those are really good questions to ask, especially since they're exactly the sort of things that the other leaders of Israel have done.

Unfortunately, even Samuel's own sons have done those sort of things.

So what about Samuel?

Has he been a really evil leader like that?

Thankfully, no.

He's been leading Israel from when he was young right up until now when he's an old man.

In all that time, people would have seen if he'd done things like that.

But after all these years, you know what they have to say in verse four?

They tell him, you have not cheated us, you have not hurt us.

You have not taken anything unfairly from anyone.

That is awesome.

What a great leader.

He's exactly the sort of leader you'd want, right?

And the reason he's been such a good leader is because he trusts God.

He serves God.

He wants to obey God.

Of course, he isn't asking them these things so they can make him feel good about himself.

He's not trying to say, hey, everyone, look how cool I am.

No, he's actually reminding them that he's a leader who can be trusted.

When he speaks, you should listen.

He's doing it because he's about to speak and they really need to listen.

He reminds them that what they've said is really important.

God is watching.

The king is watching.

Samuel kind of gives them another chance to say, oh, we didn't really mean that.

You're that good.

But they don't back down in Verse five.

He tells them, the Lord is a witness to what you have said.

His appointed king is also a witness.

Today they are both witnesses that you did not find anything wrong in me.

He is our witness.

They reply, okay, God's here.

He's heard them all just say that Samuel's a faithful leader, the sort of guy you have to listen to.

So now it's time to listen.

And what he has to tell them is not easy to hear.

He reminds them of what's happened in Israel's history, how God's been so good to them, how he's looked after them, protected them, cared for them, saved them.

He reminds them of Israel's past sin, how even though God did keep saving them, the Israelites in the past kept turning away from him, rejecting him.

He says in verse eight, after Jacob entered Egypt, his descendants cried to the Lord for help.

So the Lord sent Moses and Aaron.

They took your ancestors out of Egypt and brought them to live in this place.

He was the commander of the army of Hazor.

The Lord let them become the slaves of the Philistines and the King of Moab.

They all fought against your ancestors.

Then your ancestors cried to the Lord, they said, we have sinned.

We have left the Lord.

We served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, but now save us from our enemies, and we will serve you.

The Lord sent Gideon, who is also called Jerubbaal, and he sent Barak, Jephthah and Samuel.

Then he saved you from your enemies around you, and you lived in safety.

It's amazing, isn't it, just how many times God saved them.

Did you hear the pattern?

They were in trouble in Egypt, but God saved them.

Then they got in trouble again because they turned away from God.

They forgot God and worshiped other gods.

So God let them see what it's like without him, what it's like to live without his protection.

He let the enemies attack, the people asked for forgiveness.

He saved them.

Then they forgot him again.

They were attacked, they asked for forgiveness, and God saved them again.

Over and over and over again.

God didn't say, enough's enough.

I'm never going to save you again.

No, he kept loving and saving and caring.

By the way, you can read about all those stories that are mentioned there in the Bible books of Exodus, which we've talked about on this podcast, and the Book of Judges, which we haven't done yet.

I'm sorry I didn't go in the right order.

Anyway, you'd think that after all that time, after God saving them over and over and over again for 400 years, you'd think they'd learn the lesson.

The lesson's pretty simple.

God's the best king in the universe.

No one can look after you like he can.

As long as you stick with him, you're fine.

In fact, why would you possibly want anyone else?

Up until recently, it seemed like the Israelites had learned that lesson.

When the Philistines attacked, they turned to God.

They asked Samuel to pray to God for them.

And God thundered against the Philistines and defeated them.

Sadly, though, when the latest enemy attacked them, Nahash and the Ammonites, who we heard about in the last episode, the Israelites didn't say to Samuel, pray to God.

They'd said something completely different.

They'd said, give us a king like all the other nations.

What a disaster.

Or it would have been if the king really was a king like all the other nations, a king who didn't think he needed God.

Thankfully, Saul had trusted that it was God who would give the victory.

And that's exactly what happened.

So again, even though they've rejected their God, God's actually looked after them.

So Samuel says in verse 13, now, here is the king you chose.

The Lord has put him over you.

You must honour the Lord and serve him.

You must obey his commands.

Both you and the king ruling over you must follow the Lord your God.

If you do, it will be well with you.

But if you don't obey the Lord and if you fight against his commands, he will be against you.

He will do to you what he did to your ancestors.

Can you hear the warning?

Don't think, Israelites, that just because you have a human king, you don't need to listen to God anymore.

God is still the king.

In fact, even the human king has to listen to God.

Stick with God, things will go well.

If you fight against God, he will fight against you.

To show that God does something that no other king can do.

The time when all this is happening is the wheat harvest.

The time when they get the wheat in from the field.

These days, if something goes wrong with a harvest in one area, there's usually enough food around in other places that it means we don't starve.

In those days, though, that didn't happen so much.

So if anything goes wrong with their wheat crop, they are in serious trouble.

They might die.

But why do you think they have the wheat crop in the first place?

It's because God's made it grow.

All good things come from God.

He's given them this food.

He's given them this life.

But they've said they don't want God.

They want.

So I guess that means they shouldn't get all the good things that only he can give, right?

This is what Samuel says in verse 16.

He says to them, now stand still and see the great thing the Lord will do before your eyes.

It is now the time of the wheat harvest.

I will pray to the Lord to send thunder and rain.

Then you will know what an evil thing you did against the Lord when you asked for a king.

Then Samuel prayed to the Lord.

That same day, the Lord sent thunder and rain and the people became very afraid of the Lord and Samuel.

They said to Samuel, pray to the Lord your God for us, your servants.

Don't let us die.

We've added to all our sins.

The evil of asking for a king.

There it is again.

God's shown them what it means to reject him.

And again they've asked for forgiveness.

Surely this time God's going to say, no, enough's enough.

You didn't want me, now you can't have me.

God doesn't say that kindly.

Lovingly.

He does forgive them.

But he gets Samuel to remind them again of just how much they need him, how their whole life depends on him.

In verse 20 he says, don't be afraid.

It's true that you did wrong.

But don't turn away from the Lord.

Serve the Lord with all your heart.

Idols are of no use, so don't worship them.

They can't help you or save you.

They're useless.

For his own sake, the Lord won't leave his people.

Instead, he was pleased to make you his own people.

I will surely not stop praying for you.

If I did, I would be sinning against the Lord.

I will teach you what is good and right.

But you must honour the Lord.

You must always serve him with all your heart.

Remember the wonderful things he did for you.

But if you are stubborn and do evil, God will sweep you and your king away.

Even though they have been so evil.

God is not going to change who he is.

He's the God who loves to show kindness.

He wants the world to know that.

So once again, when they've repented, he forgives them.

You know, there are some things in the Bible that are kind of hard to hear.

Some people don't like them being in the Bible.

Some people even say that God's being really mean for putting them in the Bible.

But nothing could be further from the truth.

God tells us hard things sometimes because he loves us.

He cares for us.

He tells us what we need to hear so that we can do what's best.

In John 3:36, Jesus tells us what you get if you believe in Him.

But he also says, what you miss out on if you don't believe in him, it's life.

Jesus is the giver of life.

If you have Jesus, you have life.

If you don't, well, here's what John 3.

36 says.

It says, he who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will never have that life.

God's anger stays with him.

And some people might say, ooo, I don't want to hear about God's anger.

But God doesn't tell us that because he wants to be angry with us or because he wants us to miss out on life.

He tells us that because he wants us to have life.

He wants us to have eternal life.

He's like a loving parent who says, don't swim in that waterhole over there where there are crocodiles that are going to eat you.

Come and swim in this waterhole where you can have heaps of fun.

So let's make sure that we listen to God, that we hear his loving warnings.

Sticking with God is the best thing in the world.

Ignoring him is the worst thing in the world.

So stick with the kind, loving God.

Back in Israel, it's time to fight the Philistines.

Will the people stick with God?

Well, that's a story for next time.

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