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King Saul Failed to Impatience

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1 Samuel 13:11-12 (NIV)

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,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."

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Israel and the Philistines were sworn enemies.
The Philistines were good at war.
The Philistines attacked the Israelites anytime that they could.

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The first king of Israel, Saul picked 3,000 men to fight in the war against the Philistines.
Saul had 2,000 with him and 1,000 were with his son Jonathan.

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Jonathan, Saul`s son won strongly in one of the battles against the Philistines.

The Philistines lost that battle because of a surprise attack.

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When the Israelites heard this, they were worried.
"Now, the Philistines will try to kill us all." So the people gathered to where Saul was. The Israelites really feared the Philistines army.

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As they expected, the Philistines army gathered like a cloud. With thousands of horsemen and countless chariots, they camped to fight for the war against Israel.
They were as many as the sand on a beach.

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When the Israelites saw this, they lost all of their courage. So they hid to where they thought was safe. Some hid in the caves while others hid in the deep forest.
Some even hid in the wells.

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Still others even tried to run away because they did not want to fight.
When Saul saw this he started to worry.
He felt like every man would go away if this kept up.

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Saul couldn't start the war immediately. That`s because they needed to wait for the high priest of God, Samuel, to perform the sacrifice to pray to God so that that could win the war. But Samuel did not come even after waiting for 7 days.

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"Listen, I will offer the sacrifice. Bring to me the burnt offering and the fellowship offering." Because Saul was in a hurry, he made a big mistake in that he offered the sacrifice that can only be done by the priest assigned from God.

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Just when Saul was doing the wrong sacrifice Samuel arrived. Saul who came to greet Samuel started to make lame excuses. "The soldiers started to leave one by one and you did not come. The Philistines tried to attack us, but we were not allowed to attack from God so I offered the sacrifice."

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Then Samuel made a scary prophecy. "You did a very foolish thing! You did not obey God`s command. If you had waited just a bit longer, God would have made your kingdom everlasting. But your country will meet an end. God will make another leader for this people. It's all because you did not obey God`s command."

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Samuel went back after saying this. The Israelites could not fight with the Philistines without God`s help. Only 600 soldiers were left and they only had plows, hoes and axes as their weapons.

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King Saul should have believed in God till the end.
He should have believed in God that even with a small amount of solders they would have led to victory.

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But instead King Saul did not obey God`s command. He did not believe in God but instead he did what God most hated because he was in a hurry. Therefore, God decided to abandon King Saul because of his lack of faith.

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Those who believe in God must have the faith firm enough to trust God till the end. Even though a certain situation seems bad they should follow God`s command. Trusting that God will help them.

(You can change the conclusion of this sermon best suiting to your listeners of this sermon. We want to make it clear that the provided conclusion is only a sample conclusion provided by CTM.)