THE KINDNESS AND SEVERITY OF GOD
1 Samuel 11:14 - 12:25

In Ephesians chapter two, the Apostle Paul says, 
  You were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ … and raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus.

I think also of John three, sixteen: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life.” But is a very important word in Scripture. It is a very wonderful word. But we must not put a but where God puts an and. But, as you know, is what we call a disjunction and we can disjoin things that ought not be disjoined. And "what God has put together, let no man put asunder" applies to many things. For example, we’re inclined to say, “Yes, God is a God of love and a God of mercy but God is also a God of holiness and justice." The Bible says, “Behold the kindness and the severity of God,” Romans eleven, verse twenty-two. 

There is a very important and sometimes rather hard to understand doctrine about the unity of God. In the Belgic Confession, we say, “We believe with the heart and confess with the mouth that there is one only simple and spiritual being which we call God.” What do we mean when we say God is simple? The Westminster Confession puts it this way; it says, “God is without … parts.” That is what it means to say God is simple. God is one. God is completely united. God doesn’t experience conflicting emotions. There is no argument between his mercy and his justice. We might say, if we can speak of aspects of God’s character, and we can, that they are all integrated. 

Maybe you have heard book reviewers on the radio or read book reviews in the newspaper where the reviewer might say something like this: “Well, when the author says that he is obviously trying to resolve an inner conflict that arises in his character from, on the one hand, his extroverted mother and, on the other, his introverted, morose father," or whatever. We cannot say that sort of thing about God. God has no inner conflicts. He doesn’t suffer conflicting emotions. There is no tussle between mercy and justice in God. He is completely united. He is integrated in his being. For God is one. So Paul says, “Behold the severity and the kindness of God.” 

Congregation, we have to learn to keep these two together as well. And we have to remember to keep them together in our experience as Christian believers and that is what our text is talking about this morning. First of all;

1.	THE KINDNESS OF GOD 
Samuel is old. He knows it is time to hand over the reins of Israel to Saul, their own king, whom they have demanded. So he conducts this ceremony in which he lays down his office of a judge. He keeps his office of a prophet; he keeps his office of a priest and I’ll say a little bit more about that later. But he lays down his office of a judge. But it’s not just Samuel laying down the office of a judge. The whole idea of judgeship is being laid down. This is a major constitutional change going on here in the nation of Israel, of the order of New Zealand ceasing to be a constitutional monarchy and becoming a republic. 

It’s the end of an era and Samuel wants the people to understand how gracious God has been to them in the past and that their demand for a king was completely unnecessary and unrighteousness. So he calls them to judge his judgeship. “How have I performed?” he asks. "Whose ox have I taken? Whose donkey have I taken? Whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed? From whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes?” “You have not defrauded us,” the people reply, “or oppressed us or taken anything from any man’s hand” (vv.3-4). 

He then he goes on and gives them a little resumé of their history. “Let me remind you,” he says, "of all the righteous acts the Lord has done for you and your fathers." 
#	You were in trouble in Egypt. You cried to the Lord. And it was the Lord who appointed Moses and Aaron to rescue your fathers and bring them into the land of Canaan. It was all God’s initiative. It was all due to him that you are here in this land as a nation today. 
#	And since you’ve been here it’s been no different. Even though God delivered you from Egypt and Pharoah, you forgot the Lord your God. So the Lord sold them into the hand of Sisera and into the hands of the Philistines, and Israel fought against Sisera and against the Philistines to no effect. So again they cried to the Lord, “Oh Lord we have sinned. Lord we have forsaken you. Lord we have committed idolatry but deliver us from the hands of our enemies and we will serve you.” When it happened all over again the Lord sent Gideon and Barak and Jephthah and me, says Samuel, to deliver you "so that you lived in security" (v.11). 
#	And despite the Lord doing all this time and time again, when you did the same thing again, and Nahash of Amon, just over the Jordan, threatened you, what did you do? "No but a king shall reign over us," you said, "even though the Lord was your king" (v.12). "Now therefore, here is the king whom you have chosen, whom you have asked for, behold, the Lord has set a king over you."

There are two points Samuel is making here. 
The first is this: Whenever they got into trouble, which they always did because of their sin, the Lord always heard them and the Lord always saved them. 
And secondly: The Lord saved you, he says, by sending you these judges on an as-needed basis, no human preparations involved, no king with a standing army at the ready. Furthermore, and most importantly, Samuel says, these judges were men of integrity. 

When Samuel listed himself also as one of these judges after calling them to witness to his integrity as a leader and a chief justice, Samuel was making a point. He was saying “Not only have you rejected the Lord though he saved you every time; you have rejected a system in which the Lord only ever gave you men of integrity.” Now, some of the judges certainly had personal problems; sometimes because of their own sins: think of Eli or Samson; sometimes, on the other hand, because they were badly treated by their contemporaries: think of Jephthah. But not one used their judgeship to pervert justice in Israel. 

But you’ve asked for a king! You’ve chosen a king and the Lord has rubber-stamped him. It was completely unnecessary, sinful, for God was the very best king you could ever have had. Even as the Lord saved time and again in the past when they got into trouble because of their sin, so even now he had just given that king, demanded in sinfulness, a very great victory over Nahash the Ammonite and he had delivered them. Furthermore, verse fourteen, “If you will fear the Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God.” 

Do you see the kindness of God? He has just listed all this sin. God has just given in to them and given them what they wanted, what they demanded in sin, but still, “If you fear the Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and rebel not against the command of the Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God.” 

It is no different with us, congregation. I was talking to somebody a little while ago and as I recall the conversation, he said to me, “Why are we dealing with sin all the time, in Church and in the Bible?” The simple answer to that question is: because we sin all the time. And the person I was talking to said, “Well then, are we to keep beating ourselves up about it?” No, because God doesn’t. Listen. Samuel had just listed how God had constantly delivered them and they had constantly sinned and then he had even given them a king and he’d given him a great victory, “And if you will fear the Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the Lord then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God.” 

The fact is, congregation, we will sin and we will sin often because we are sinners. We still have that old sinful nature. But look how constantly the Lord forgave Israel every time they confessed their sin. Look how constantly he delivered them from the hands of their enemies and got them out of trouble. The Lord does exactly the same for us, time and time again. And it is for the very same reason that God chose grace, that he shows severity – because he hates sin; he loves righteousness; and therefore he loves confession for that is righteousness. Secondly; 

2.	THE SEVERITY OF GOD 
There is an important point we often seem to forget. We tend to think of the Gospel as a message of salvation from the consequences of sin. After all, John three sixteen says, “You shall not perish but have everlasting life.” And that is true but it’s not the whole truth. So, for instance, we read in Ephesians chapter two, verse ten, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God has before-ordained that you should walk in them.” The message of salvation is a message of salvation from sin; and therefore, necessarily, from its consequences. So Paul says in Galatians, “You were called to freedom, brethren, only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh.” Salvation is about deliverance from the consequences of sin – but not just so that we may go back to it. It is about deliverance from sin, for sin offends God and arouses his anger and his hatred. God wants a people for himself who are holy and righteous. God wants a people who really are his image-bearers, who are more and more, day by day, being conformed into the image of Christ. And that is why he is both kind and severe. And it all comes out of his holiness and righteousness. He is going to have a people for himself and they are going to be a holy people and therefore we read in verse thirteen, 
  Now, therefore, here is the king whom you have chosen, whom you have asked for, and behold, the Lord has set a king over you. If you will fear the Lord and serve him, and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God. And if you will not listen to the voice of the Lord, but rebel against the command of the Lord, then the hand of the Lord will be against you, as it was against your fathers. 

And this severity is precisely to discipline us into his holy people. When Israel forgot the Lord, "he sold them into the hand of Sisera," and so on. "And if you will not listen to the voice of the Lord but rebel against the command of the Lord then the hand of the Lord will be against you as it was against your fathers." 

And to demonstrate how serious God was about this he enabled Samuel to do a miracle. It was at the beginning of the wheat harvest. It wouldn’t rain for many weeks and Samuel brings a thunderstorm and pouring rain. “See how completely you are in my hands,” God is saying. “Are you going to live for me in righteousness or are you going to break my covenant in unrighteousness?” They got the point. "Then all the people said to Samuel, Pray for your servants to the Lord your God so that we may not die for we have added to all our sins this evil by asking for ourselves a king" (v.19). 

People say we mustn’t use fear as a motivation. It can certainly be used wrongly. But God uses it and sometimes we need it, to get the point. As American politicians say, "When we feel the heat, then we see the light." "And Samuel said to the people, Do not fear. You have committed all this evil, yet do not turn aside from following the Lord but serve the Lord with all your heart" (vv.19, 20). 

The kindness of the Lord. The severity of the Lord. Thirdly,  

3.	THE KINDNESS OF THE LORD AGAIN 
Verse nineteen indicates that the people understood the enormity of what they had done. They plead with Samuel to pray for them and Samuel responds with three points that show the Lord’s grace. 

He assures them, first of all, in verse twenty, of the Lord’s forgiveness. “Do not fear,” he says. Brothers and sisters if we have truly confessed our sins to the Lord and asked his forgiveness, leave them. Don’t pick them up and turn them over again. Don’t beat yourself up with them and wallow in guilt. That is not God’s way. True repentance he always readily accepts and the sin he forgives. 

Secondly, after exhorting them again to serve the Lord with all their hearts and not turn aside to other gods, he says in verse twenty-one, “For then you would go after futile things which cannot profit or deliver because they are futile.” You could say that he appeals to them here on a quite utilitarian basis. Not only is it not right to turn aside from God, which in our day would mean 
- following after humanistic solutions: to preach love without holiness, for example, like the minister of the Presbyterian Church on the Terrace did at the ‘Enough is enough’ march;
- or it might be finding yourself in a difficult situation at work and doing something underhand instead of just admitting your mistake or simply being prepared to take your loss honestly;
- or it might mean cheating in school projects or university essays. 
All of these things amount to not trusting in God, not believing that if we live righteously, God will bless us, as and how he will. 

James tells us, “We all stumble in many ways.” We all do. But maybe you have sinned in a life-changing way – as Israel had – and the consequences of that sin will be with you all your life. So it was for Israel here. Sometimes when people do that they say, “Oh what’s the use?” and they throw in the towel. But brothers and sisters, "with the Lord is forgiveness" (Psalm 130). The consequences of that sin may have to be lived with the rest of your life. Israel had to live with King Saul for thirty-two years. But that doesn’t mean that we cannot, within those changed circumstances, still live on in obedience to the Lord. “Now therefore, here is the king whom you have chosen, whom you have asked for, and behold, the Lord has set a king before you. If you will fear the Lord and serve him, and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God” (vv.13-14). Sin is also futile. It doesn’t profit. It doesn’t deliver. Why go for it? 

Then, thirdly, the Lord gives them a wonderful promise, verse twenty-two, “For the Lord will not abandon his people on account of his great name, because the Lord has been pleased to make you a people for himself.” 

Isn’t that a wonderful promise? “The Lord will not abandon his people because the Lord has been pleased to make you a people for himself.” If we are his, the Lord will not abandon us; not because we are sinless; not because we make a pretty good fist of being righteous and living up to God’s law; not because we make great strides in sanctification, but "because the Lord loved us" (Deuteronomy 7:7), "because the Lord has been pleased to make us a people for himself." And that involves God’s honour, God’s name. It involves his reputation. 

This is just how Moses prayed for Israel after they sinned with the golden calf at the bottom of Mount Sinai. God threatened to destroy Israel and he said, "I am going to begin all over again with you and your children Moses." "Oh Lord, but if you do that, what will you do for your great name? Think, God, how that would reflect on your reputation! The nations around will say, 'Hah! he could take them out of Egypt but he couldn’t bring them into the Promised Land. So much for Yahweh. He couldn’t follow through; he couldn’t complete the job; Yahweh doesn’t have staying-power.'" 

As John Newton taught us to sing a long time ago, “’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far. ‘Tis grace will bring me home.” It must congregation because God’s honour is at stake. 

Maybe you ask, “Am I a Christian? Am I saved? Am I worthy? I can’t live up to this.” Of course you can’t! And of course you are not worthy. That’s exactly the point. And you were never saved because you could live up to something. We were all only able to live down – to and in sin. But do you love your sin or do you agonize when you fall into it again? Do you feel dirty or defeated or ashamed to lift your face to God? Do you feel inadequate and lousy? You may even say things like, “I hate myself.” And you know you deserve God to cast you out, and you pray, desperately, but you’re not even sure whether you should pray it, as David prayed in Psalm fifty-one, “Lord, do not take your Holy Spirit from me.” 
  Then all the people said to Samuel, 'Pray for us to the Lord your God, so that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil by asking for ourselves a king.' And Samuel said to the people, 'Do not fear. You have committed all this evil, yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart…. For the Lord will not abandon his people on account of his great name, because the Lord has been pleased to make you a people for himself.'

Then maybe you look at verse twenty-five, “If you still do wickedly, both you and your king will be swept away,” and you wonder how to tie this up. That did of course happen to Israel. But not all Israel. And after the exile God brought many back to Canaan. 

We have to understand this promise of verse twenty-two in the light of verse twenty-three. “Moreover, as for me,” says Samuel, “far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you.” We know that God’s promise is given to all his people but it’s not brought to reality in every individual born and baptized into the covenant. So perhaps it is in this sense that Samuel meant that God would not abandon his people. He had handed over the kingship to Saul but he would still remain as a prophet and as a priest. Here he talks about his priestly role. 

Congregation, we have exactly the same in the Lord Jesus Christ. “I must go away,” he said to the disciples before he went to the cross, “so that the other comforter will come, the Spirit of Truth." "And it’s better this way,” he said, “for through the Spirit I will be able to be with all my people everywhere in the world even to the end of the age" and "I myself will be praying for you.” He gave a lovely example of that just before he went to the cross. He knew it would be a time of terrible temptation for the disciples, so he said, “Satan has desired to have you Peter but I have prayed for you that you may not fail.” And Peter didn’t fail, did he? He stumbled, but, "he was not cast headlong," to use the words of Psalm thirty-seven. And he did not fail to the point, when it came to his martyrdom, he said, “Do not crucify me right-way-up. I am not worthy to be crucified as my Lord. Crucify me upside-down.” 

“Who is he that condemns?” asks Romans chapter eight, “Christ Jesus is he who died, yes rather, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for you.” “If anyone sins,” says John, “we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous.” He is our Samuel, not ceasing to pray for us. 

"Behold the kindness and the severity of God." Yes even severity with his own people at times, but that to be kind to us yet again. “For when we are judged,” says Paul in one Corinthians eleven, “we are disciplined by the Lord in order that we might not be condemned along with the world.” “Far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you,” said Samuel, “but I will instruct you in the right and good way.” So says our mediator, the Lord Jesus Christ. 
Amen.
John Rogers, Reformed Church of the North Shore, 5th September, 2004