But we're talking about Saul here.
He still finds a way to mess it up.
And of course, this is going to be the beginning of a series of: "what are you thinking?!"
How are we to think about Saul, in the School of the prophets
and Saul prophesizing and people being surprised by that?
And is that, in part, qualifying him as you know, as you note in Unseen Realm,
the qualification of the Prophet?
The tension there depends on what kind of a spiritual mess was Saul at the beginning?
Is he just cowardly? Is he just a little chicken-hearted?
Is he apostate? I mean, what is he?
And I don't know that we can really answer that question.
You know, initially at that point in Saul'slife.
The patterning still works for Saul. I want to see if maybe you can tell me.
I'm trying to remember if Saul was specifically anointed,
because the question actually is worth bringing up here.
We got an ESV here. Yep. So it's 1 Samuel 10. So he gets anointed.
There was typically a 3-step process for kingship.
Anointing was part of the first step; you would designate someone.
And then they would have to do something.
We actually did a podcast episode on this about how Old Testament kingship patterns
relate to Jesus.
So there was first some kind of appointment event, usually anointing but not always,
that designated someone as you're the candidate for the king.
And then the second step was, okay, now we expect you to do something kingly.
Like let's go see you do something now.
And oftentimes, the Spirit of God would be the enabling agent to do that kingly thing.
And this is what's going on with Saul, but Saul still manages to mess it up.
See if I can remember the exact passage here, it's kind of interesting.
Okay, yeah, 1 Samuel 10. Okay. So we get the passage, where we have this,
we have the anointing, we're going to get the prophesying and all this stuff.
Look at what Samuel tells him.
So he anoints him, "Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on his head and kissed him
and said, 'Has not the Lord anointed you to be prince over his people Israel?
And you shall reign over the people of the Lord and you will save them
from the hand of their surrounding enemies.'"
Who's the enemy at the time? This is Saul, the big enemy is Philistines, okay?
So you're going to deliver your people from the hand of the enemies.
And he says, gives him a little details, "you shall go on from there farther
and come to the oak of Tabor. Three men going up to God at Bethel will meet you there,
one carrying three young goats, another carrying three loaves of bread,
and another carrying a skin of wine. And they will greet you and give you
two loaves of bread, which you shall accept from their hand.
After that you shall come to Gibeath-elohim"
So he's given him a series of signs, you know, that God's in this.
"After that you shall come to Gibeath-elohim, where there is a garrison of the Philistines."
Okay, so now we have two clues.
You're anointed, now, you're going to deliver your people from their enemies.
And as you're on your way, you're gonna run into some Philistines. Okay?
Then he says, there's a garrison of the Philistines there, "and there, as soon as you come
to the city, you will meet a group of prophets coming down from the high place
with harp, tambourine, flute, and lyre before them, prophesying.
Then the Spirit of the Lord will rush upon you, and you will prophesy with them
and be turned into another man."
So again, this is part of the same series of God is with you.
"Now when these signs meet you", here's the cryptic phrase,
"do what your hand finds to do, for God is with you."
Okay, so you're delivering your people from their enemies,
you're going to go to this place and there's a garrison of the Philistines there.
The Spirit of God is gonna come upon you. And when all this stuff happens
that I've just listed out for you do what your hand finds to do.
Now there are a number of scholars that think that what Samuel is getting at
and he's not telegraphing it completely, because he wants to see what Saul is going to do,
is you go out and you kick some Philistine butt.
And we're gonna know that the Lord is with you. And you're the king.
Is this what he does? No.
You know, he goes off and you know, we have the episode with a prophesizing.
He goes in, he gets somebody else. He attacks some other locations.
We're trying to find it here.
Well, the Ammonites down in chapter 11, he leaves the Philistines go.
And he goes and picks on the Ammonites. Like, did we ever see the Ammonites again?
Like, why are they even in the picture? Again, we don't know.
Did Saul take the easy path?
Did he actually disobey Samuel? could he not read between the lines?
Those are all good questions. So when it comes to your question about the anointing,
I think, yeah, this legitimized Saul's position.
It was God's way of saying "I am with you". But we're talking about Saul here.
He still finds a way to mess it up.
And of course, this is going to be the beginning of a series of "what are you thinking?!"
episodes in Saul's life. But it doesn't really invalidate the fact
that God would have, had he turned around and said,
Hey, the Philistine garrison over there. That's toast.
You know, I think you can read 1 Samuel 10 and think this is what Samuel wants to see.
He sees something. I mean, Saul does something meaningful.
But he misses the point. He misses the mark.
And this is going to be sort of his track record.
He thinks he's doing the Lord's will when he's doing something else.
Until finally Samuel is just had it,
like with Agag and the Amalekites and all that kind of stuff.
It's a pattern that shows up in Saul's life, but I don't think it delegitimizes
the fact that God would have been with him.
I mean, Samuel is telegraphing all this stuff to him. So