Saul Rejected
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standard. The expedition was not to be entered upon for the purpose
of self-aggrandizement; the Israelites were not to receive either the
honor of the conquest or the spoils of their enemies. They were to
engage in the war solely as an act of obedience to God, for the purpose
of executing His judgment upon the Amalekites. God intended that
all nations should behold the doom of that people that had defied His
sovereignty, and should mark that they were destroyed by the very
people whom they had despised.
“Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah until thou comest to
Shur, that is over against Egypt. And he took Agag the king of the
Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of
the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the
sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that
was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but everything that was
vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly.”
This victory over the Amalekites was the most brilliant victory
that Saul had ever gained, and it served to rekindle the pride of heart
that was his greatest peril. The divine edict devoting the enemies
of God to utter destruction was but partially fulfilled. Ambitious to
heighten the honor of his triumphal return by the presence of a royal
captive, Saul ventured to imitate the customs of the nations around
him and spared Agag, the fierce and warlike king of the Amalekites.
The people reserved for themselves the finest of the flocks, herds, and
beasts of burden, excusing their sin on the ground that the cattle were
reserved to be offered as sacrifices to the Lord. It was their purpose,
however, to use these merely as a substitute, to save their own cattle.
Saul had now been subjected to the final test. His presumptuous
disregard of the will of God, showing his determination to rule as an
independent monarch, proved that he could not be trusted with royal
power as the vicegerent of the Lord. While Saul and his army were
marching home in the flush of victory, there was deep anguish in the
home of Samuel the prophet. He had received a message from the Lord
denouncing the course of the king: “It repenteth Me that I have set up
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Saul to be king: for he is turned back from following Me, and hath not
performed My commandments.” The prophet was deeply grieved over
the course of the rebellious king, and he wept and prayed all night for
a reversing of the terrible sentence.