Freddy Bafuka explores the tragic story of King Saul, who began his reign with promise but ultimately fell due to disobedience and a hardened heart. He emphasizes that while starting well is important, it is the end that truly matters, as seen in Saul's life where his initial humility gave way to pride and self-centered decisions. Bafuka warns against the dangers of ignoring sin, making selfish choices, and failing to repent, which led to Saul's downfall. He draws parallels between Saul and other biblical figures, highlighting the importance of waiting on God's timing and remaining faithful to one's calling. The sermon serves as a cautionary tale about the consequences of straying from God's commands and the need for genuine repentance.

Alright, continuing with 1st Samuel, we looked last week about how a person starts right, and how God called this man Saul, and in his life, in those early days of Saul's walk with God, we can see from Saul's life in those early days, the signs and the marks of a good person, of a good servant of the Lord. And today I want to look at the other side, which is how to start well, but not end well. What causes a person not to end well? Not to finish their race correctly. See, like, there's a sense in which only the end matters, right? It doesn't matter if you were able to take off from a plane with a lot of turbulence and trouble. If at the end you end up landing at your destination, but if you started very smoothly and the plane ran and took off and everything was showing, all the indicators were right and all the engines were turning correctly and the lift was smooth and all that, and the ride was smooth and you had maybe a nine-hour flight from, I don't know, from Boston to, I don't know, somewhere in Eastern Europe. And, but then a couple of minutes before landing, I don't know, something happened and the plane crashes. In that light, it's like only the end really matters. A person can, may not start well. He may start off an arrogant, hardened, sinful, immoral person, but along the way the Lord changes him and he becomes something else. He becomes a holy, humble servant of the Lord, not compromising. That person has ended well and that overshadows his beginnings. But it seems like the other way does not happen. Never does the beginning really overshadow the end. It's always the end. Never does a good beginning seem to overshadow a bad end. But a good end overshadows a bad beginning. And like I said last week, Saul is those, one of those sad examples in the Bible of someone who's begun well, who started okay. Started in a very exemplary way that everyone should try to emulate. But along the way, things began to go wrong. And I want us to look at that. So let's start with, let's start with verse 22 in chapter 10. We'll just go through it quickly. This is just so we make sure we cover the whole story. This is Samuel brings everybody in verse 20. If you look, it says, When Samuel brought all the tribes of Israel near, the tribe of Benjamin was chosen. Then he brought forward the tribes of Benjamin, clan by clan, and Matris clan was chosen. Finally, Saul son of Kish was chosen. But when they looked for him, he was not to be found. So they inquired further of the Lord. Has the man come here? And the Lord say, Yes, he has hidden himself among the baggage. They ran and brought him out. And as he stood among the people, he was a head taller than any of the others. Samuel said to all the people, Do you see the man the Lord has chosen? There's no one like him among all the people. Then the people shouted, Long live the king. Samuel explained to the people the regulations of the kingship. He wrote them down on a scroll and deposited it before the Lord. Then Samuel dismissed the people, each to his own home. Saul also went to his home in Gibeah, accompanied by valiant men whose hearts God had touched. But some troublemakers said, How can this fellow save us? They despised him and brought him no gift. But Saul kept silent. Two things to see in this little portion, as they're making Saul king, is the fact that he went to hide. He was not seeking for the honor. He was not seeking for the praise. He was not seeking for the glory at this time. He was not eager to come and say, It's interesting that they were casting. Samuel knew that God had chosen Saul, and Saul knew that God had chosen him. But they had to cast lots, because it was neither Samuel who said, Now I am making Saul king. The Lord spoke to me. It was neither Saul going to the people and saying, The Lord has made me king. Now accept me as your king. Both Samuel and Saul allowed the Lord to make him king before men in his own way. They cast the lots, and both Samuel and Saul had to trust God that the lot would fall on Saul. Do you understand? It's like they say you're applied to MIT, right? And I don't know, at the time used to be Mary Lou Jones. I don't know who it is now. And Mary Lou Jones tells you, You've been admitted. And you say, Okay, that's great. But then you're told, But now we're going to flip a coin to see if really you've been admitted. Like, Wait a minute, I got the admissions letter already. Why should we flip the coin? Well, we flip the coin to be sure you know that the admission didn't make any mistake, that God also approves of this and say, you know, so nobody disputes. So you flip, I don't know. In this case, they had to flip the coin four times or something like that to choose the tribe and then the clan and the family and then the person in the family. So the odds and the probability of it coming on any particular individual is very small. They had to trust God that somehow that random process which God can control would fall on Saul and confirm him. And so here was a man hiding, not trying to make anything happen, not seeking the praise and the glory, but also fully trusting the Lord that what was promised to him would come to pass. And that's what happened. It means for you and for me, don't try to, if the Lord has shown you something that he wants you to do for him, if he's gifted you to do something, don't go grab it by force. And we're going to see this again later on in the in the passage, what the Lord has given you. Let him bring you to pass in his own way, in his own time. As the Lord promised you something, wait on him and let it happen in the way that is clear that it is the Lord that made it happen and that you were not the one who manipulated it into coming to pass. Yes, it is the Lord's will, but it will also be the Lord's way and in the Lord's time. Oftentimes, the bad thing is that we rush ahead of God and then we get into trouble. We either rush ahead of God or we do things in our own way, not in God's way. And we cause ourselves all sorts of troubles also. We extend our own borders rather than God expanding it. And in the course of time, I've learned to discern that when God is moving and when I'm just making things happen, whether it be in my own life, whether it be with a group, whether it be with other things, I'm careful to know when the Lord does things and when I'm manipulating them to cause them to happen. And so here you have those two things. So I wasn't seeking for the glory and so I wasn't trying to make anything happen either. He was hidden, they brought him out and he stood there before the people. And one thing that was a sign again that this was from the Lord. The Bible says in verse 26, He was accompanied by a billion men whose heart God had touched. When the Lord places you somewhere to do something for Him, He will in His own way raise people to work with you. He will raise people and send them. You will not have to manipulate them into coming. You will not have to force them. You will come and rally behind somehow because the Lord has touched their hearts to do so. Now there will also be people who are against what the Lord wants you to do. And there are some troublemakers and they say, how can this fellow save us? And I made a lot of parallels between Samuel and between this starting part of Saul's life and Moses' life. I mean, you will see this also. There was a time when Moses, like I said, knew that the Lord had called him to deliver the children of Israel. But at first, he had that sense in his heart because every man that God calls does have that sense deep in their heart of what God wants them to do. That God has called them to something. I say sometimes even before they are saved, they have a sense that there was something for them. And Moses must have sensed that God wanted him to free the children of Israel from slavery. However, at the beginning, he tried to make it happen on his own. He went and grabbed this Egyptian, killed him, and maybe thought, now these people are going to like me and say that I'm on their side. And the next day, two Israelites were fighting. He goes ahead and tries to be the Savior again and tries to break up the fight and say, hey guys, let me tell you what to do. You're not supposed to fight. The real enemy are the Egyptians. He was right, but they didn't listen to him. They did the contrary. They say, hey, you're the criminal, right? You killed somebody. You want me to hand you over to Pharaoh? You want to kill me too? You killed the Egyptians. And then he saw that his crime was exposed, and he was now a stench in Pharaoh's nostrils. So he fled to the desert for 40 years, till he came to that point where he too was willing to hide. God told him, go, he said. No, please send somebody else. He was not tempted by great things anymore. His heart became right. He was fit to go and lead the people, now that he no longer desired it in a carnal kind of way, now that his own self did not delight in it. There are times, and you might have read this in the Ministry of Supplication book, there's what God wants, and there's what man wants. The two of them may look the same at the surface, but they're not. Because God may want something to happen, and you may want the same thing to happen, but you may not want it for the same motives or for the same reasons. God wants it for his glory, but somewhere you might want it for your own glory. And until that's solved, it's never going to be, God's interests will not be able to be served in the way that he wants, so long as it's not being done for the reasons that he also wants them done, which is to glorify Christ and his love for people. At the beginning, Moses wanted to free the children of Israel, but there was still a lot of self alive in him. There was he trying to be somebody and trying to do something, and that wasn't right. When that died in him, and he was no longer tempted by those things, then God said, okay, now you can go. And it took him 40 years. Now, it doesn't have to take you 40 days. We now have a close relationship with Christ. Well, we can enter by faith into that deliverance from self, because Jesus did that work on the cross. And it's just that in our rebellion and in our sins, we can delay that time, but we can certainly enter into it by faith. But these are all other sermons. In the course of time, how did Saul not end well? We go to chapter 13 from verse 1. Saul was 30 years old when he became king, and he reigned over Israel 42 years. Saul chose 3,000 men from Israel. 2,000 were with him at Michmash, and in the hill country of Bethel, and 1,000 were with Jonathan, Agabiah, and Benjamin. The rest of the men were sent back to their home. Jonathan attacked the Philistine outpost at Geba, and the Philistine heard about it. Then Saul had the trumpet blown throughout the land and said, Let the Hebrew hear. Saul, Israel heard the news. Saul has attacked the Philistine outpost, and now Israel has become essentially a Philistine. And the people were summoned to join Saul, and they were sent back to their home. Then Saul had the trumpet blown throughout the land and said, Let the Hebrew hear. Saul, Israel heard the news. Saul has attacked the Philistine outpost, and now Israel has become essentially a Philistine. And the people were summoned to join Saul, and they were sent back to their home. Then Saul had the trumpet blown throughout the land and said, Let the Hebrew hear. Saul, Israel heard the news. Saul has attacked the Philistine outpost, and now Israel has become essentially a Philistine. And the people were summoned to join Saul, and they were sent back to their home. Then Saul had the trumpet blown throughout the land and they were sent back to their home. some Hebrews even crossed the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilgal and Saul remained at Gilgal and all the troops with them were quaking with fear. He waited seven days, the time said by Samuel, but Samuel did not come to Gilgal and Saul's men began to scatter. So he said bring me the burnt offering and the fellowship offerings and Saul offered up the burnt offering just as he finished making the offering Samuel arrived and Saul went out to greet him what have you done? asked Samuel. Saul replied when I saw that the men were scattering and that you did not come at first and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash, I thought now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal and I have not sought the Lord's favor so I felt compelled to offer the burnt offering you acted foolishly, Samuel said you have not kept the command that the Lord your God gave you if you had, you would have established your kingdom over Israel for all times but now your kingdom will not endure. The Lord has chosen the Lord has sought out the men after his own heart and appointed him leader over his people because you have not kept the Lord's command. Then Samuel left Gilgal and went up to Gibeah in Benjamin and Saul counted the men who were with him they numbered about 600. Here you have the first episode of Saul's going downhill now sadly this began almost right after the right beginning, right after the first victory we did not read it but we will not read it but there was this one battle that they went to and the Lord gave them victory but then there was this new incident where Samuel had commanded Saul to wait for him before the battle and Samuel was to come offer the sacrifice and call on the Lord before the battle and Saul waited one day, two day, three day, four day, five days six days, seven days and Samuel wasn't coming and he decided to go ahead and offer this sacrifice and as he was finishing Samuel comes and tells him that because you did this the Lord has rejected you. Now that at first kind of sounds weird but here's the thing, Saul was commended something. He was commended to wait for Samuel and instead of waiting and obeying the Lord he decided to take things in his own hands. He told himself but why can I not just do this and he was not going to go ahead and do the thing myself and in not obeying that he made a very serious mistake the mistake was that he was king and Samuel was a priest dedicated from childhood. Now throughout the Old Covenant, throughout the Old Testament those two things in Israel were to remain separate the kingship and the priesthood were to remain clearly divided. No priest the priest could not be king and the king could not be priest and that had to be so because there was one to come who was going to be both priest and king that is Jesus. Only he is priest and king at the same time like Melchizedek Melchizedek was priest and Melchizedek was king at the same time. His name means king of Salem the king of peace and he is priest because he blessed Abraham and offered sacrifice and the Bible said that Jesus is priest in the tradition of Melchizedek whereas the other priests in the Old Testament were priest in the tradition of Aaron. They could not be kings they could only be priests and Saul was obviously just king Jesus was king in the order of Melchizedek where the people are both king and priests. Samuel was priest in the order of Aaron and that kind of service that was established for the Levite. He wasn't a Levite but he was consecrated from childhood to be a servant of the Lord now by not obeying the Lord Saul did not realize the gravity of the foolishness that he was committing. I don't know if he understood this entire theology or not but it doesn't matter. He was supposed to obey and keep himself out of trouble but by not obeying that first time Saul, Samuel came to him and said you have acted foolishly. Now I do not know what exactly led him to do this certainly there was some unbelief. He didn't believe that God would keep his promise that Samuel will come and everything will go alright he decided to take things in his own hands somewhere there is always an unbelief that starts in a man's heart. You read these kings. I was reading through the book of Kings and I kind of sometimes get angry at these people because you see in one case the Lord helps them in this battle and they completely win and there is a great victory and then the next time an incident happens they take all the money in the temple and send it to some pagan king and say hey come and help me against this person who is attacking me and you read that and you go wait why not call on the name of the Lord like you did the first time and believe him? How do you take out the treasure from God's temple and give it to some heathen king and tell him to come and help you out as if there's no God in Israel there's always that unbelief that starts somewhere but see unbelief always goes with sin you can have unbelief and cry out Lord I'm doubting but come and help me but usually unbelief comes with a sin the sin here was that he stepped over the boundary of his spiritual functions he started doing things that he was not meant to do he was king he was not priest this is another thing that destroys people they begin to take on things that the Lord never called them to do you might have heard of Branham or you might not he lived a long time ago last century there's a group of his followers now and they are considered a cult and for many reasons that's true their theology is very messed up that sort of thing yeah with theories about Genesis and Adam and Eve and that sort of thing that I won't get into but people who haven't studied this story don't know that Branham was actually a genuine man of God that the Lord called one of these people with a true healing ministry and the Lord used him to do mighty miracles he sought after God he was not learned if you read his biography I was reading it a few months ago he had a very humble beginning was not learned didn't know how to read very well but started reading the Bible and the Lord called him and gave him a very powerful healing ministry and just like with Saul God raised some people around him to do what he was not good at doing teach his ministry was to heal people not to go around being a Bible teacher but then eventually some people started gathering around him flattering him and that sort of thing he started preaching and doing all sorts of things one of his closest associates Gordon Lindsay came over and told him why don't you just stay, what the Lord called you to do earlier he had dismissed him because he was one of the people that told him the truth he dismissed him and gathered around him some people who told him yes to everything that he did whether right or wrong and they were basically all getting money behind using his fame basically to rebuild their own kingdom for that they'll say yes to him, to anything he wanted and he got warned God never just judges people, he sends down people to talk to them nobody just goes downhill without anybody I'm sure somebody went to Saul and told him hey look you're heading the wrong direction don't do this you're not supposed to do this and he probably was like huh whatever and eventually the Lord sent at the time Kenneth Hagin was a very young minister, he sent him to Brigham and said go ahead, stop this thing or I will take your life essentially, he did not listen and went on to do his thing one day they were driving, his son was driving a car in front, he and his wife were in the car behind a driver came in the opposite direction curved around his son's car and went straight to the car that he was driving with his wife and the car turned around they were out to the windows the son got out of the car saw his, well actually his stepmother his previous wife, his mother had died but he was over there dead and he was over here still alive he asked his son, his mom, okay she said no she's dead he said okay put my hand over her and he did, he put his hand over her and the lady came back to life his healing ministry was still with him even in God's last hour because God does not withdraw from his gifts and calling people can still manifest gifts of healing even after God's left them they can still preach and evangelists can still preach and people come to the Lord even after he's started living in adultery or what not but she lived and he entered into a coma and here Kenneth Hagin gathered people in his church to pray for him while he was in a coma, the Lord told him, I already told you I'm taking you in while you're praying to God and they stopped and that's how he died and after him came this whole movement it's kind of a denomination but he wasn't the kind of person who liked the denomination so he probably would not have been happy that people did that in his name and there are so many people you can go one after the other there's a man you might not have heard about, John Alexander Dowie a man of God from Australia at the beginning of the last century powerful man of God but he too kind of walked along the same sort of way if you know the city of Zion in Illinois you might know his story a little bit let me not get into that right now but what am I trying to say stay where the Lord has called you if your God has called you to be the church janitor, don't try to become the church husher if the Lord has called you to be the husher don't try to be the worship leader, if he's called you to be the worship leader don't try to become the pastor, if he's called you to be the pastor don't try to become, I don't know, something else John Gitchell speaks about how when they started the church he was trying to do everything, he was even the janitor sometimes and the Lord had to make him sick and nail him to a bed for a few years so that he would be constrained not to do anything it is one area of destruction which is people expanding their own borders I was, some people were well someone was telling me about some people from a ministry or somewhere and she was suggesting that at some point I might possibly go there and help them launch their assembly there, somewhere here in the US I won't say where I thought to myself when that day comes and those people call them, I'll tell them sorry I cannot come you know why? because there's someone who has been appointed to do that kind of things it's Pastor Calvin, if there are people in the US who want to start a church, the person who is supposed to go there and launch the thing is the person who is coordinating the work in the US, it's Pastor Calvin I have been appointed a missionary to Massachusetts and that's it, it's not my job to go where people are starting thingies, to go there and launch them sure Pastor Calvin is busy and says yeah I can all go and you go, sure of course I'll go standing there for him but I will not go there and say ah what a wonderful idea, I'll go there and then find something is to preach and the people probably feel very blessed and then the church will start and then I don't know the rest of the ministry, the rest will be very happy about it but I'll come back spiritually destroyed on a downhill gradient and let me say there are some people who are doing just that but I don't know if they realize that they're destroying themselves, I'm not going to name them but there are some people who have just that attitude God help them I hope that they somehow I hope that they somehow come back to their senses before they end up like Saul of course if it was that a church sent a missionary somewhere that's a different story but you know there was a time when Brother Joe came here to the US, he came for a chemistry conference, he's the second leader in our church, in our ministry at the Brother's side and he refused to preach pretty much anywhere except in the church in Durham where he had come to. He went to Maryland, the people had prepared a place and all that he told them sorry he just passed through, he went to New York, I was like please come and speak, he was like no I didn't understand, I was like wait, hold on that was two years ago or so three I don't remember but now I understand it's not his job to go around and do that sort of thing, that's Brother Zach's job and he was just trying not to step over he is the pastor of the church in Yonde and that's his thing he just came to the US for a chemistry conference and wanted to take time off to breathe a little bit because in Yonde he doesn't he was the only break he would have had for a long long time and so but if he was someone who likes to grab for a power, he would have gone here, jumped here and spoken and jumped here and did this and jumped here and done that and that's not, he probably didn't want people to mistake that that's what he was trying to do and that's probably why he didn't and it now makes sense to me okay, second thing that happened to Saul down this road, you have an interesting you have an interesting story in chapter 14 from verse 24, now the men of Israel were in distress that day because Saul had bound the people under a knot saying curse be any man who eats food before evening comes before I have avenged myself of my enemies so none of the troop tasted food, the entire army entered the wood and there was honey on the ground and when they went into the woods they saw the honey oozing out yet no one put his hand to his mouth because they feared the oath, but Jonathan had not heard his father had bound, that his father had bound the people with the oath so he reached out the end of the staff that was in his hand and dipped it into the honeycomb he raised his hand to his mouth and his eyes brightened, then one of his of the soldiers told him, your father bound the army under a strict oath saying, curse be any man who eats food today, that is why the men are faint, Jonathan said, my father has made trouble for the country see how my eyes brightened when I tasted a little of this honey how much better it would have been if the men had eaten today some of the plunder they took from their enemies, would not the slaughter of the Philistines have been even greater that day after the Israelites had struck down the Philistines from Mekmash to Ayalon, they were exhausted they pounced on the plunder and taking sheep, cattle and calves, they butchered them on the ground and ate them together with the blood then someone said to Saul, look the men are standing against the Lord by eating meat that has blood in it you have broken faith, they said, roll a large stone over here at once, then he said, go out among the men and tell them, each one of you, bring me your cattle and sheep and slaughter them here and eat them, do not sin against the Lord by eating meat with blood still in it, so everyone brought his oaks that night and slaughtered it there then Saul built an altar to the Lord, it was the first time he had done this Saul said, let us go down up to the Philistines by night and plunder them till done and let us not leave one of them alive, do whatever seems best to you, they replied but the priest said, let us inquire of God here so Saul asked God, shall I go after the Philistines will you give them to Israel's hand, but God did not answer him Saul therefore said, come here all you who are leaders of the army and let us find out what sin has been committed today as surely as the Lord who rescues Israel lives even if it lies with my son Jonathan, he must die but not one of the men said a word Saul said to all the Israel, I stand over here and I stand over here do whatever seems best to you the men replied, then Saul prayed to the Lord God, give me a right answer and Jonathan and Saul were taken by lot and the men were cleared, Saul said, cast lot between me and Jonathan my son and Jonathan was taken, Saul said to Jonathan, tell me what you have done Jonathan said to him, I merely tested a little honey with the end of my stuff, and now must I die Saul said, may God deal with me be so severely, if you do not die Jonathan but the men said to Saul should Jonathan die, he who has brought about this great deliverance in Israel never, as surely as the Lord lives not a hair of his head will fall to the ground for he did this today with God's help so the men rescued Jonathan and he was not put to death, then Saul stopped pursuing the Philistines and they withdrew to their own land now, the Bible doesn't waste words for one thing, why are we given this story here what's the Lord trying to say, here was a man who disobeyed God, did he repent when Saul told him, you've acted foolishly, did he repent no, he just went on but now here was Jonathan, he was not put to death here was a man who just ate a little bit of honey and he said you must die, the same danger is when people start ignoring their own sins and point to the sins of other people, which are by far less terrible than their own was it disobedience to God that Jonathan ate honey, he didn't even know there was no command in the Bible, don't do that and he didn't hear his father say it it's picking out sin in other people's lives becoming critical, self-righteous and condemning of other people while ignoring your own sins, it's this whole thing that Jesus spoke about, how can you take this the little straw of dust in your brother's eyes when there's a plank in your own eye this man had a plank in his own eye but you can just feel the confusion rising he started taking selfish, self-centered decisions, why would he tell the people not to eat in a day of war, look at his reason, before I have avenged myself of my enemies, I myself and my, woe to any man who does not eat food before I myself and my, that's in verse 24, imposing unnecessary rules on people, based on self-centered reasons, it was no longer the Lord's war it was his war, it was not the Lord's enemy, it was my enemy, it was not the Lord avenging Israel it was he avenging himself, I was trying to ask the Lord earlier this year, about how do I not do anything for my own glory, because this sin of preachers is to do things for their own glory, it's like how do I do this, how do I make sure I do not do anything for my own glory, and the Lord gave me this answer for thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, thine is the kingdom it is God's work, it is God's ministry we get into trouble when we make it personal when it becomes my church and my thing, my interest, and then you no longer have the goals of Jesus, you have the goals of Jesus and the goals of myself, you no longer have the battle of Jesus against the devil you have my own battle against whoever else to accomplish my goals and you get in trouble for that now, in this thing here, if he had not done this if he had not been so selfish the people would not have been faint have people around you been faint? have the people who have been closest to you, have their eyes been bright or have they been faint? maybe you need to see if you have not been too selfish and too self-centered and you haven't been trying to lead their lives according to your own self-interest have you seen families where people look faint and unhappy it's because there's a lot of self there the father is trying to be selfish, looking for his own interest and so he makes his wife miserable and she's unhappy and she looks faint and she too is selfish maybe, and she's trying to lead his life also in the way that she wants and the whole thing becomes a whole mess and the children look faint and weary and tired they don't even want to go to church but when people are selfless and simply lead people into the words of the Lord and allow them to perform at their best then they will encounter that honey on their way when things get tough, and the Lord will brighten them let's go on how much time do I have here? I think I've maybe spoken enough for today let me give the last thing and we'll see that again next time it's this whole attitude of what I call sweeping things under the rug Samuel had come and told this man you've acted foolishly I asked the question before, what did he do? he said nothing of course he had explained that the people were deserting me he was afraid the philistines were here so I went ahead and offered a sacrifice and then Samuel tells him, God has ripped the kingdom from you because you've acted foolishly and what did Saul do? what did he do? no, no, no, we just read it yeah, he counted the men chapter 13 from verse 13, you acted foolishly Samuel, so you have not kept the command of the Lord and he gives him that word verse 15, then Samuel left Gilgal and went to Gibeah and Benjamin and Saul counted the men who were with him they numbered about 600 now what's wrong with this? what else is strange here? right, he swept it under the rug he was just pointing out sin that was clear, obvious and even pointed out consequences of it but the men just went ahead like nothing happened and he thought maybe God was going to forget and time was going to take it away this is one thing that very, very many people don't like to face and don't want to acknowledge and don't want to deal with and I pray that you who are here and anyone who listens to this message will not do this time doesn't take sin away time does not take sin away forgetting does not take sin away either even if you sinned against somebody and that somebody has forgiven you and he has forgotten about it his forgetting doesn't take sin away, your forgetting doesn't take sin away there's one thing that takes sin away it is repenting from it and repentance of course includes confessing to any man who was hurt and carrying out restitution people think, ok, I was mean to this person but he didn't say anything and he's still nice to me so I guess it's alright, no it's not, he's just being a good Christian he's forgiving you because he knows God he is not holding the sin against you because he's a righteous man but that doesn't mean that you are ok with God about that issue it just means that he is right and that he has forgiven you and forgotten about it but that doesn't mean that you do not need to repent to God and possibly repent to that person whom you hurt sin is not taken away by time sin is not solved by passing time, sin is not solved by forgetting a man who is told, just told you're a king and was not just told, God is so displeased with you he doesn't even want any of your children around ruling as king and this man just goes on this is one thing that destroys people a lot you're going through life and I don't know why this is so hard because we're all sin you know, it's like except for the Lord Jesus, but all of us, everybody you don't intend it but you might have said something to someone and realized that you were mean to them or you acted and you go to pray and something starts to tickle in your mind that something is wrong and then you wait before God and the Lord points out yeah, you didn't treat this person correctly you were rude, you were unnecessarily harsh you were too critical, you were not humble you displayed self-importance and instead of just saying, yes Lord, I acknowledge that I was wrong and if somebody else was there going and confessing you just say, okay, good whatever, I'm alright you slip it under the rug and you go on what will happen? Confusion will start coming into your life do you see how confused Saul was? he said to the people, don't eat when they're supposed to be fighting and they need strength, then he said, let's go pursue the Philistine but he doesn't consult God first, and then the priest said let's go, yeah, by the way, but let's consult God first he assumed that the king would have done that, he was confused and then they cussed a lot, and then he said, Jonathan should die but then he doesn't kill him, and then he's like, okay now let's not go after the Philistine anymore the confusion settled in his life, that began gradually because of this attitude of not accepting to face up to sin and repent, and I am sure if this man had repented to God truly, God would have overturned his judgment against him if this man had repented, God would have overturned the judgment against him he would have done something so that what he has said here would not come to pass for him now I want to ask you, when was the last time sin was pointed to you? either by someone or by the Holy Spirit of course, some people tell you that you've committed sins that you didn't commit that's not what I'm talking about but what's your general attitude when was the last time you did something that was wrong? did you repent, or did you sweep it under the rug? if you swept it under the rug, let me tell you, it's now gone away it doesn't matter who remembers it and who doesn't it doesn't matter who cares about it and who doesn't we know that from one of the bad things that Saul did one of the terrible things he did, left a curse letter on Israel and the judgment came in the time of David when David was king David consulted the Lord and the Lord said this is happening to you and your kingdom because of the sins of Saul who was long dead at that time his sin was not taken away even by his own death God did not forget the sins that he committed because he was dead the judgment came even when the man was gone sin is not taken away either because the generation that committed it is gone that's also something that many people have not confronted but we'll talk about it in another message I want us to pray and ask the Lord where have you been like Saul? in the things that we've talked about here where have you been like King Saul? are you going downward or are you doing well? now it's not too late to change things we have to be honest Father we ask O Lord in the name of Jesus Christ that you would show us O Lord how is it O Lord that we have been like this King of Israel whom you love so much but who progressively with time took steps in the wrong direction Father we ask in the name of Jesus Christ Father we pray that we will now resist the Holy Spirit that when he points things out that we will simply repent O Lord we ask this in Jesus name