When Hope Goes AWOL

06-15-08 message by Pastor Rich Doebler

Some friends were hanging out one day, and the conversation grimly turned to the issue of death. One of the friends asked the others, "What would you like people to say about you at your funeral?"

One friend answered, "I would want people to say, ‘He was a great humanitarian who cared about his community.'"

A second replied, "I would want people to say, ‘He was a great husband and father, an example for many to follow.'"

The third friend gave it some thought and answered, "I would hope someone says, ‘Look, he's moving!'"

Today I'm talking about hope—and what we do when it seems we have come to the end of hope. When it seems that hope has melted away to nothing. What do we do when hope is gone?

1 Samuel 13
5 The Philistines assembled to fight Israel, with three thousand chariots, six thousand charioteers, and soldiers as numerous as the sand on the seashore. They went up and camped at Micmash, east of Beth Aven. 6 When the men of Israel saw that their situation was critical and that their army was hard pressed, they hid in caves and thickets, among the rocks, and in pits and cisterns. 7 Some Hebrews even crossed the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead.
Saul remained at Gilgal, and all the troops with him were quaking with fear. 8 He waited seven days, the time set by Samuel; but Samuel did not come to Gilgal, and Saul's men began to scatter. 9 So he said, "Bring me the burnt offering and the fellowship offerings." And Saul offered up the burnt offering. 10 Just as he finished making the offering, Samuel arrived, and Saul went out to greet him.
11 "What have you done?" asked Samuel.
Saul replied, "When I saw that the men were scattering, and that you did not come at the set time, and that the Philistines were assembling at Micmash, 12 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."
13 "You acted foolishly," Samuel said...

The Israelites realized they were in a tight spot: "their situation was critical...their army was hard pressed." Message (v 6-7): "...they were way outnumbered and in deep trouble..."

Verse 2 says Saul had assembled 3,000 soldiers. Verse 4 says more people were summoned to join Saul. So when this episode began, we know Israel had at least 3,000 and likely many more. In 11:8 when Saul first called for men to gather, 330,000 showed up.

But the men became so discouraged and disheartened that they all began to sneak away. It's possible Saul's army went from hundreds of thousands down to a mere 600 (v 15)! He may have lost over 99 percent of his army. Even if he began with no more than 3,000, Saul still saw 80 percent of his fighting force disappear.

I can understand why Saul was so upset to see his army drifting away—he literally had thousands of soldiers going AWOL. But that was only part of Saul's problem, because only about 10 miles away, the Philistines were assembling their forces in huge numbers—a vastly superior army. They had 3,000 chariots (some versions say 30,000) with 2 charioteers in each chariot plus so many foot soldiers they are described simply "as numerous as the sand on the seashore." The Jewish historian, Josephus, writes that the Philistines gathered "with three hundred thousand footmen, and thirty thousand chariots, and six thousand horses" [Complete Works of Josephus].

On top of being grossly outnumbered, none of the Israelites except Saul and Jonathan had any weapons (see v 19-22). The Philistines had confiscated all the spears and swords and removed all the blacksmiths. The best the Israelites could come up with for fighting were farm implements—hoes, axes, ox goads, sickles and scythes. No wonder the Israelites were so frightened! No wonder they began to run!

Now I want you to put yourself in Saul's shoes. You're facing some big problem—a huge obstacle, some daunting task, some overwhelming situation. The problem is bad enough, but then your resources suddenly evaporate. You were hoping your meager resources might get you through the situation, but suddenly everything you were counting on has disappeared:

You're battling cancer, hoping that some medical procedure or some experimental drug will get you through—only to discover it isn't working after all.

Your marriage is falling apart. Your husband seems bored, distracted, uncaring. You talk him into seeing a therapist, hoping that marriage counseling will repair the problem and put the spark back in your relationship—but after only a couple of sessions, your husband walks out on you.

Major financial challenges (college expenses, house that won't sell) are stressing you out. Meanwhile, you're due for a promotion at work that comes with a hefty pay increase, so you're hoping that will tide things over. But just as you've reached your financial limits, someone else gets the promotion.

A family member has been acting strange, and you discover drugs or alcohol is to blame. You hope that detox and a 30-day treatment program will get things back on track. But two days after treatment, there's another binge.

When it seems like all our hopes are drained away, what do we do? When it seems like our best solutions are no better than putting a band-aid on a heart attack, what do we do?

We don't face Philistines, but we sure can relate to Saul. Who wouldn't be alarmed with such huge problems? Who wouldn't begin to worry about what to do when all your hopes ran away? Who wouldn't get scared waiting for God to show up—but he doesn't seem to be paying attention?

Saul was waiting for the prophet to show up so he could receive God's help. But what do you do when you wait on God—and you wait and wait—and he doesn't show up. Not a word. Not a sign. It would be one thing if you heard God was nearby, in the vicinity, on the way—he'll be around before too long. But you've heard nothing! As far as you can tell, he's far away. There's no indication that he's going to be arriving any time soon.

Meanwhile, your problem is getting bigger, more menacing, more dangerous. And your limited resources are slipping away. You've been waiting for God, but the only thing you have to show for your wait is that the situation is growing worse by the minute. And still no answer.

Whenever we're facing some sort of problem... when things aren't going the way we want... when we need to be rescued... when we need an answer—now and not later... We can relate to Saul and his men.

What should we do when our "situation is critical"? When we are "hard pressed"? The Israelites responded in several ways, none of them good. (1) Some hid themselves; (2) others ran away; (3) still others quaked with fear; (4) and Saul, himself, felt compelled to do something—anything other than keep on waiting. When we are hard pressed, we will have to deal with temptations:

(1) The temptation to hide. This is avoidance. This is when you want to avoid people and retreat behind closed doors. This is when you pull the shades and refuse to answer the telephone. When you seclude yourself and isolate yourself away, you've given in to the temptation of avoidance. When you avoid activities or events or people because of fear or anxiety or nerves, then the enemy has gained the upper hand.

(2) The temptation to run away. This is escapism. This is when you want to leave town and run away from your problems. Going after substitute pleasures is escapism. Some escape with drugs or alcohol, illicit sex, pills, or other addictive behaviors. Some escape in books, TV shows, or other entertainment. Escapism doesn't do well dealing with reality. When fear or anxiety overwhelms you so you try to escape your troubles instead of facing them head on, you're already defeated. The enemy has you where he wants you.

(3) The temptation to quake with fear (NASB: trembling). I've heard some call this "awful-izing." Awful-izing is imagining the worst possible scenario—the most awful things can get. Awful-izing is surrendering to fear and giving in to pessimism. When you awful-ize, you put yourself into an emotional turmoil—you release a storm of feelings that shakes you. You become unstable. Maybe you have a breakdown. You can't function properly because you've allowed the enemy to paralyze you with fear.

(4) The temptation to feel compelled. This is self-sufficiency, taking matters into your own hands. This is giving in to pride and independence. This is being driven to do something rather than to wait on God. (NASB: Saul says, "I forced myself...") Even though Samuel had instructed him to wait, Saul felt like he couldn't wait any longer. With his army drifting away and the enemy threatening, he felt something had to be done! In such a dire situation, Saul felt he had to take matters into his own hands. When fear causes you to take matters into your own hands, the enemy has distracted you from trusting in God.

We can learn something from this time in Saul's life. When our problems threaten to overwhelm us, when our hope seems to disappear, when our faith grows weak and our fears increase, let's do what Saul did not do!

#1 - Put your problems in God's hands! You're in good hands when you're in God's hands.

We understand Saul wanting to take matters into his own hands. If you've waited until you can't wait any longer, it would make sense to assume maybe God was saying, "It's time for you to do something." Better to die trying to do something than to die doing nothing, right?

Mr. Lutz, my high school baseball coach told us, "Don't just stand there and watch the pitch go by. I don't want you ever called out on strikes. I'd rather have you swing at a ball outside the strike zone than to do nothing at all and let a good pitch get by you. Better to swing and strike out with a miss than to stand there and strike out doing nothing."

That may be good advice for baseball, but it's not always good advice for following God. That approach to discovering and doing God's will can get us into trouble, because it can get us ahead of God. It can cause us to miss his timing. To act when we should wait instead. To step out when we should kneel down. To move when we should stand still.

Not long before his death, Henri Nouwen wrote a book called Sabbatical Journeys. He writes about some friends of his who were trapeze artists, called the Flying Roudellas.

They told Nouwen there's a special relationship between flyer and catcher on the trapeze. The flyer is the one that lets go, and the catcher is the one that catches. As the flyer swings high above the crowd on the trapeze, the moment comes when he must let go. He arcs out into the air. His job is to remain as still as possible and wait for the strong hands of the catcher to pluck him from the air.

One of the Flying Roudellas told Nouwen, "The flyer must never try to catch the catcher." The flyer must wait in absolute trust. The catcher will catch him, but he must wait. [John Ortberg, from "Waiting on God," Preaching Today #199]

How often have you tried to "catch the catcher"? How often have you tried to control the outcome? How often have you tried to do God's work for him? If we're going to trust God, we must trust him completely and absolutely. We must let him catch us. We must not get ahead of God by doing our own thing—acting presumptuously.

There is a time for acting and doing and going—but only after we know that God has prompted us to move. There is a time to act and a time to go—but there is never a time when we should take matters into our own hands! We need to wait for God so we can act with God. We need to listen to God so we can go with God. Whether we wait or whether we go, our motivation should be faith in God. It's all about trust. Faith provides the strength to wait; faith provides the impetus to go.

The best place to be—whether we go or wait—is in God's hands. The best place to be—despite whatever threats or dangers we might be facing—is in the center of God's will.

#2 - Let go of your problems. If you've put your problems in God's hands, don't keep hanging on to them. Don't have a tug-of-war with God, trying to hold on to the problems you've given over to him.

Human nature wants to be in control. We feel very uneasy about losing control, so we keep trying to take our problems back. This creates a difficulty—because we can't let God be in control if we keep trying to have control ourselves.

We need to learn to relax. To rest in the Lord. To trust him completely. To surrender. We need to learn to let go. To release our problems into God's hands and not take them back again. Open your fingers. Pry them off one at a time, if need be. Relax your grip. Relinquish control to the Lord.

If God is truly in control, we don't have to have everything figured out. We don't have to understand all that's happening. We don't need to explain God's timing or God's purpose. If we can rest in God and trust him completely, we know he is working everything out for our good—even when we can't see what he's doing. That's the meaning of faith! If we can see or understand or explain, it's no longer faith.

"...we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28, NASB). All things: the Greek word is "pas"; it means (are you ready for this?) "all things...everything, each, every, any, all..." This leaves absolutely nothing in our lives that God cannot use for our good if we love God and are called according to his purpose.

This is hard for us human beings to grasp. It's hard to rest. It's hard to wait because we want bad things to change. We identify with Saul's feelings—with his need to be in control. He had heavy responsibilities as king. The whole nation was looking to him for help. To make matters worse, his leadership over Israel was still quite tenuous. A number of people had challenged his selection as king; they didn't want him as their ruler. (1 Sam 10:27: "...some troublemakers said, ‘How can this fellow save us?' They despised him and brought him no gifts.") Since those denunciations, Saul had had only one small success as king; he still hadn't proven himself to his critics.

Now, he was facing impossible odds and certain defeat. It seemed he was losing his grip on the throne and on his authority. And all this exacerbated his earlier feelings of inferiority. (1 Sam 9:21: "Saul answered, ‘But am I not a Benjamite, from the smallest tribe of Israel, and is not my clan the least of all the clans of the tribe of Benjamin? Why do you say such a thing to me?'" 1 Sam 10:21-22: "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 yet?' And the LORD said, ‘Yes, he has hidden himself among the baggage.'")

Now, he'd already lost most of his troops and seemed about to lose the battle. Such losses would prove he wasn't really a leader. It would prove he didn't have the right stuff. He didn't have what it takes to rally men to follow him into battle. Yet Saul felt he had a personal responsibility to hold all this together. Hadn't God selected him for this job? Wasn't this his assignment? Did he really have any other choice?

He explained the rationale for his actions to Samuel (v 11-12): (1) His troops were scattering; (2) his prophet was missing in action; (3) his enemies were increasing daily; (4) the threat was real and imminent—only 10 miles away; (5) he needed immediate help from God. All this seemed so logical!

So often in life the wrong choices make so much sense. They seem reasonable. They seem appropriate. Most of the time when I've gone astray, I can give you a good reason for it. I can rationalize my actions very easily. It's not usually that we deliberately want to rebel. It's just that our human logic becomes clouded and misdirected. We think we know what's best for this situation: Hasn't God given us a mind to use? Aren't we supposed to do something rather than miss an opportunity? Waiting for an answer is fine—up to a point. But after a while, waiting is the same thing as doing nothing. Right? And we're not supposed to do nothing! Waiting might even be disobedience.

What Saul needed to learn was that the issues he worried about were not his problems. It wasn't his reputation at stake; it was God's. It wasn't his nation at risk; it was God's.

Saul needed to learn to surrender his reputation and his position and the loyalty of his troops to the Lord. God had put him there; it was God's responsibility to make sure things worked out.

If you've relinquished your problems into God's hands, don't take them back again! Let them be God's problems, not yours. Don't have a tug-of-war to regain control.

#3 - Keep a close watch over your heart. Learn to be honest with yourself. Get in touch with your true, inner feelings and know the motives of your heart for what you are doing.

Saul thought he was doing the right thing. He excused his disobedience by dressing it up in religious sounding terminology. "The Philistines were coming," he said, "and I hadn't even prayed for God's blessings. I felt compelled to seek God. I forced myself to offer a sacrifice."

The Bible says that "All a man's ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the Lord" (Prov 16:2). In other words, we can come up with all kinds of excuses and explanations for our actions—even spiritual reasons, but God knows what's really going on deep inside our hearts.

We might be able to fool others. We can use spiritual language. God-talk. We might even fool ourselves sometimes. But if our hearts aren't in the right place, we can't fool God. Nothing is hidden from the Lord.

He "...searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts..." (1 Chron 28:9). He is "able to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart" (Heb 4:12, NASB). If God knows us so well—inside and out—then we should try to know ourselves better. We should keep a watch over our heart.

Why didn't Saul realize he was doing wrong? Why didn't he appreciate the awful significance of what he was doing? Why didn't he see he was yielding to temptation when he felt compelled to offer a sacrifice? He was being presumptuous to take on a role God had not given to him. He was overstepping his bounds as king and acting like a prophet. Probably most damaging, he was trusting in himself rather than waiting for God's timing.

It's difficult for us to see why this was such a big deal. Because of Jesus, his work on the cross, and his resurrection from the dead, we have been made into a "royal priesthood" (1 Pet 2:9). We take it for granted that we can come into God's presence. We don't offer sacrifices of animals on altars of stone, because Jesus' sacrifice opened the way for us to enter the "holy of holies"—the presence of God—at any time. So we don't appreciate the gravity of what Saul did.

Samuel...kept his word, for we find him there before the day was ended; but as Saul found he did not come at the beginning of the seventh day, he became impatient, took the whole business into his own hand, and acted the parts of prophet, priest, and king... [Adam Clarke's Commentary]

Saul ignored God's explicit instructions that only a priest from the tribe of Levi could offer a burnt offering.... Saul was not willing to wait for Samuel. He was impatient and presumptuous.... Saul was rationalizing, of course. He was blaming everything and everyone else. [J. Vernon McGee's Thru The Bible]

Saul...did not understand his proper position as king of Israel; and although aware of the restrictions under which he held the sovereignty, he wished to rule as an autocrat, who possessed absolute power both in civil and sacred things... Saul...knowingly transgressed by invading the priest's office and thus showing his unfitness for his high office... [Jamieson- Fausset- Brown Bible Commentary]

[Saul] presumed to offer sacrifice without Samuel, and nothing appears to the contrary but that he did it himself, though he was neither priest nor prophet, as if, because he was a king, he might do any thing, a piece of presumption... So self-sufficient Saul was that he thought it not worth while to stay for a prophet of the Lord, either to pray for him or to advise him. This was Saul's offence... [Matthew Henry Unabridged Commentary]

What motivates us? What moves us to act? We need to keep a close watch on our heart! The Bible says, "Above all else, guard your heart..." (Prov 4:23). We need to guard our heart so our motivation will be from faith.

Sometimes, however, we're motivated less by faith than by fear.

Fear and faith compete with each other. Fear erodes our faith. Fear drains our courage. Fear robs us of trust and confidence. Fear clouds our vision. Fear distorts our thinking. Fear leads us astray—away from God's plan and purpose.

Saul and his men were motivated by fear. They ran away from the battle and hid from the Philistines and acted prematurely. Fear does that to us. Fear leads us into dark caves. Fear traps us in uncomfortable circumstances (thickets). Fear puts us in damp holes in the ground (cisterns). Fear pushes us to act presumptuously.

Faith, on the other hand, holds us steady! Even in the face of great adversity, faith builds our confidence in God. Faith helps us see God's final outcome. Faith gives us the stamina to stand. Faith empowers us to face the enemy in battle instead of hiding out in caves. Faith helps us see God's ways are best. And faith ultimately will lead us to victory!

Presumption—what Saul had—looks a lot like faith, but it's really only fear dressed up in religious clothing. Presumption acts like it's doing the right thing, but it's really taking matters into its own hands. Presumption acts like it is bold and courageous, but really it's too scared to wait for God. Presumption pretends to want God's will, when it really is only insisting on getting its own way.

Since presumption looks so much like faith, and since fear can dress itself up in religious sounding words, we need to know our hearts!

David prayed, "Search me, O God, [NCV: examine me] and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts [NCV: my nervous thoughts]. See if there is any offensive way [NCV: any bad thing] in me, [NLT: point out anything you find in me that makes you sad], and lead me in the way everlasting. (Psalms 139:23-24)

This is a good prayer for us when we're tempted to take matters into our own hands or when our problems threaten to overwhelm us or when our faith and hope seem to be slipping away.