We've Got to Keep Waiting

I’ve been reading 1 Samuel and one thing that struck me is the contrast between Samuel and Saul. The book starts off with Hannah, Samuel’s mother-to-be upset that she can’t have any kids, so she makes a promise to God that if He gives her a son she will dedicate him into service, enter Samuel. Samuel grows up and becomes very close to God, as a young boy he hears God’s voice and delivers a message to Eli, a priest thus becoming a prophet. He then goes on the be very well respected and grows closer to God and wiser and eventually becomes sort of like a leader to the Israelites. Eventually that doesn’t do it for the Israelites though and they want a king, so Samuel finds one for them, enter Saul. Saul becomes filled with God’s Spirit and is a pretty good ruler until he falters and goes his own way. Saul was fighting the Philistines with his son Jonathan and his army and was told to wait for Samuel so that he and the troops could offer sacrifices to God before the battle. But Saul and his men panic, Samuel doesn’t show so Saul in an effort to keep people under control, makes the offerings himself and just as he is done Samuel shows up. Saul then loses God’s Spirit and his right as king and it all goes downhill from there. The point though is this, Saul didn’t trust God, he didn’t trust Samuel, and later on he doesn’t even trust David. Basically he tries to go his own way, he was brought up from nothing (literally, he came out of nowhere) but then left God because he didn’t trust him, he didn’t have the faith. Often times life gets that way, we wait on God for a response, an answer to a prayer and as soon as we falter, as soon as things get tense we leave and sometimes the answer was just on the way. It takes faith to wait, it takes faith to pray and hope for an answer but the thing is Samuel came, he didn’t fail Saul but Saul failed him. God is always there and He will come, He might not come on our schedule but He will come when we need Him and He never fails us. Faith is tough, but it is never unrequited.