1 Samuel 8 Devotional

When We Want Another King

“And the LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you. For it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected Me as their king.”1 Samuel 8:7 (BSB)

Samuel's sons take bribes and twist justice, and the elders have a real complaint (8:3-5). But their solution reveals more than they intend. They want a king like all the other nations have, one who will go out before them and fight their battles (8:20). Samuel takes it to the LORD in prayer, and the answer is striking. It is not Samuel they have rejected, but the LORD himself as their king (8:7), a pattern going back to Egypt (8:8).

God has Samuel warn them plainly. A king like the nations' kings will take. He will take sons and daughters, fields and harvests, servants and flocks, until they cry out for relief (8:11-18). They refuse to listen, and the LORD gives them what they ask for (8:22). Sometimes the hardest answer God gives is yes. Yet through this very kingship he would one day send a King who came not to be served but to serve and give his life (Mark 10:45). He is the King worth wanting.

To think about: What are you tempted to look to for security in place of God, and what has it been quietly taking from you?