The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-04-03

The International Sunday School Les
son for April Is saul Rejected by
the Lord. II Sam. Oh. Is.
(BY WILLIAM T. ELLIS.)
2 Not for a generation have people
been so ready as today to consider
In all lands the thoughts of mankind
are being called back by the present
crisis to the elemental truth of a SUI
preme Being, whose purposes are
somehow being worked out in human
history. This lesson story of royal
tragedy in old IsraeIs life will be
read with unwonted interest. For
we now are all eager to learn the les
sons which God has written in the
past for the present. What does Je-
hovah require today of nations and
their rulers?
A handsome big king had the Jews
the fashion of the times. Head and
Shoulders above his fellows was Saul
but the head was easily turned.
The son of Kish, who at his election
was so modest that he hid himself
among the baggage, had become a
thorough convert to the doctrine OF
the divine right of kings He felt
himself competent to revise the man
dates of Gods prophet, and the will
of the Lord himself Probably Saul
would have found our own times
ticularly fond of dismissing, with a
wave of the hand, all of the law of
God which does not please our fancy.
A popular pastime is to sit in easy
Judgment upon the judgment of Je-
hovah.
When the Powerful Patronize God.
The Golden Text of the Old Tesla
ment, found in this chapter, is the
key to the whole story: Behold, to
obey is better than sacrifice" Many
men in our day are patronizing the
Lord of Hosts, paying Him compH-
ments, making gifts to His causes,
favorable words about the Bible
but not for a moment yielding their
own lives in obedience to Gods re-
vealed will. They have fallen into
the blunder of King Saul, being, like
him, so self-inflated that they fail
to perceive the arrogance and inso-
lence of their assumption that God
can receive compliments from such
as they.
3 Over many a public subscription
to a righteous cause from a goddess
man; over many a benevolent insti-
tuition or foundation similarly estab-
lished, may be written these burning
words, spoken by Samuel, Behold, to
obey is better than sacrifice No
body can do any acceptable service to
God until he has first yielded Him
obedience. To attempt to honor by
word or deed the great God whom we
refuse to honor by discipleship is in
sufferable presumption.
Would that the image of foolish,
vain and overthrown Saul might
stalk amid the rich and self-compla-
cent non-Christian patrons \of re-
ligion in this generation: and would
that the heroic figure of the prophet
Samuel repudiating with blazing
scorn such insults to the Almighty,
might arise before the eyes of all
the sycophantic and time-serving
leaders in the Church who fawn for
favors upon the rich and the mighty.
Until a man has yielded himself to
the Lord, the Lord wants nothing
from him. Verify, this old story is
pertinent to our own times.
The King Who Did Not His Errand
The popular pastime of revising the
program of God is not new. The men
who would eliminate hell from reli-
gion and justice from Gods dealings
with man, making the Creator and
Ruler of the universe merely sort of
incarnate Good Nature, whom nobody
is bound to obey or respect or fear are
in line with some Old Testament fig
ures, of whom King Saul is con-
SpicuOuS sample.
Even our poor wisdom can see rea-
son and justice in the divine command
TO Israel to exterminate the Amale-
kites, those first prosecutors of the
Children of Israel. The same spirit of
large Justice which dooms a murderer
to the electric chair may decree the
punishment of a nation. As a sacred
duty, Saul was ordered to destroy the
Amalekites, making them and their
possessions a devoted" thing. That
prisoners captured. This was not a
mere military foray, to be rewarded
by loot and triumphal professions.
The expedition belonged in the high
realm of the execution of a holy de-
cree of Jehovah.
But Saul thought he knew better;
even as there are thousands of our
fellow countrymen who are today re-
Vising the Decalogue, so far as their
own personal conduct goes. The old
fogey notion of Gods just DEGREES
could not be held without modification
by such a wise and liberal and mighty
monarch as Saul! So he blue-pen-
ciled and interlined his instructions
from God. He would obey so far as
comported with his own pleasure and
dignity and discretion. Therefore, he
refused to Stay Agag, the Amalekite
king, reserVing him to grace as priS-
oner his own triumphal return to his
capital As for the spoils of war, why,
it was most "impracticaP' of Jehovah
to require that all be destroyed; so
Saul would have the best for himself
and the people. He would make a
sacrifice of portion, of course, but
only in the presence of the people,
that the full glory of his exploit might
appear to ALL
When the Doom Fell.
So it was a very self complacent
Saul who greeted condescendingly the
man who had made him king. 81 have
performed the commandment of Jeho-
vah,'' he said, thinking to himself
doubtless, "Of course, found it neces-
sary to revise the orders given me: but
then, you know, the practical worldly
wisdom of the laity, and of the sue
cessful man of affairs, must superseke
the absurd liberalism of you old-fogey
preachers and your rather out of date
God"
What meaneth then this bleating
of the sheep in mine ears, and the
lowing of the oxen which 1 hear?"
The stern mein of the prophet, and
diSnnncarfinO
penetrated even the thick shell of
Saufs pride and egotism. For his