to be corrected. Now I'm going to show you two men in the Bible. If you would flip over
in your Bible to 1 Samuel chapter 15. I think the two men in the Bible who illustrate this
point the best are King Saul and King David. They were both kings of Israel,
and they were both men who were handpicked by God. God handpicked these men to be in charge,
but one of them ended up a complete failure and actually ended up committing suicide
after messing up his life and messing up his kids' lives. And then the other one, King David,
goes down as the greatest king in the history of Israel, and he's known for being a great success.
And people love to name their children David, but few name their child Saul. Why? Because
David was a great man. He's a great king. He's a man after God's own heart. Now what is the
difference between these two men? Well, if you look at their lives, Saul committed some serious
sins, but so did David. They both committed serious sins in their life, but the biggest
difference is that when Saul is confronted for his sins, he makes excuses, he blames other people,
whereas David, when he's confronted with his sins, he just admits it right away and gets
right with the Lord. That's the big difference between these two men, even though some of the
things that David did were worse than some of the things that Saul did. But God punished Saul
more severely because of his attitude of not receiving the correction, and that's what's so
important. Now look down at your Bible there in 1 Samuel chapter 15. We're going to see where
Saul is corrected by a preacher Samuel. Now God had given a clear instruction to King Saul.
He was to make war with the Amalekites, and he was to destroy the Amalekites, all of them,
and he was even to destroy their cattle and their animals. All the animals were to be killed.
Look at verse 13. The Bible reads, and Samuel came to Saul, and Saul said unto him,
Blessed be thou of the Lord. I've performed the commandment of the Lord.
Now he had not performed the commandment of the Lord because he only did a partial job.
It says in verse 14, and Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleeding of the sheep in mine ears,
and the lowing of the oxen which I hear? He said, look, if you perform the commandment of the Lord,
I wouldn't hear all these animals mooing and baying because they'd all be dead. And Saul said,
they. Notice just the first word. Saul said they. Notice it doesn't say Saul said I,
but when he says that he performed the commandment of the Lord, was it we?
Was it we performed? No, no, no. It was blessed be thou of the Lord. I have performed the commandment
of the Lord. I mean he was ready to own that. I did it, but then all of a sudden it's like,
whoa, what about the bleeding of the sheep? Oh, well, they. See the shift there where all
of a sudden he wants to point at someone else. As soon as it's negative, as soon as there's a
problem, the first word out of his mouth is to blame someone else. So he says, you know,
what meaneth this lowing of the oxen which I hear? And Saul said, well, they have brought
them from the Amalekites for the people. Notice him just always blaming others. He's the leader.
He's the boss. For the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen to sacrifice
unto the Lord thy God and the rest we have utterly destroyed. You know, but he's still,
he's not going all the way back to I though. It's like, well, we now. Then he says in verse 16,
then Samuel said unto Saul, stay and I will tell thee what the Lord had done, had said to me this
night. And he said unto him, stay on. And Samuel said, when thou was little in thine own sight,
was thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel? And the Lord anointed the king over Israel.
And the Lord sent thee on a journey and said, go and utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites
and fight against them until they be consumed. Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of
the Lord, but didst fly upon the spoil and is evil in the sight of the Lord. Now notice,
Samuel is putting the blame right back on Saul by using the word thou. Thou is a singular word.
Whenever you see thee, thou and thy in the King James Bible, that's singular. Ye, you and your
is plural. If it starts with a T, it's singular. If it starts with a Y, it's plural. He says, look,
thou has not obeyed the voice of the Lord. He said, thou didst fly upon the spoil. So he's
putting the blame square on one person, King Saul. Verse 20, and Saul said unto Samuel,
yea, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. See, he won't admit that he's wrong. He wants to blame
everybody else, change the subject and have gone the way which the Lord sent me and have brought
Agag, king of Amalek and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took of the spoil,
sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been utterly destroyed.
So now he's admitting, okay, yeah, that stuff should have been utterly destroyed,
but they kept it to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God in Gilgal. Verse 22, and Samuel said,
hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the
Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is
the sin of witchcraft. What's rebellion? Disobeying and doing wrong and stubbornness is as iniquity and
idolatry. The stubbornness is where he's told that he's done wrong and he won't admit it.
He will not get it right. He just wants to blame other people and make excuses.
Because thou has rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king.
And Saul said unto Samuel, I have sinned. Now at this point, it seems like, okay, finally Saul
is going to back down and he's going to finally admit he's wrong. He's going to finally take
responsibility. But if you read carefully, he's still not. He's still not receiving correction
properly because look what he says. And Saul said unto Samuel, verse 24,
I have sinned for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord and thy words.
But then look, the excuse, because I feared the people and obeyed their voice.
So again, he's still giving like a reason or an excuse and well, okay, but you know,
I was afraid of them. It was, it was really all their fault. They're the ones, you know,
the woman she gave me to eat of the fruit. Oh, the serpent beguiled me. Well, you know,
I was afraid of them. They got me to do it. You know, he still is not taking full responsibility
here. Even at this point. Now they're.