1 Samuel 12-14
I’m always tempted when reading the Bible, the Old Testament in particular, to try and work out who the goodies are and who the baddies are. I should’ve learned by now – God’s the goodie and everybody else are the baddies! Of course its not quite that simple, not all the baddies are as bad as each other and occasionally one of them is a goodie most of the time. What I’m getting at is that Saul is a complex character who finds himself in complicated circumstances. But with all that said, Saul ends up a baddie because at key points in his reign he fails to honour God and obey his word, an then, even worse, fails to repent of his sin and seek God’s forgiveness (see how Saul tries to justify his disobedience to Samuel in 13:11-12) . It’s this final failure that is the worst.
God knows we will fail to be faithful to him. But in his grace he has made it possible for us to be forgiven for our unfaithfulness through Jesus’ sacrifice in our place. When we sin we need to acknowledge our failure and seek forgiveness in the only place available – the Cross of King Jesus – the place where all sin has been dealt with. And God will not only forgive us our sin but purify us from it and reckon us righteous.
Making excuses for our sin is just plain dumb.
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