He waited seven days, the time appointed by Samuel. But Samuel did not come to Gilgal, and the people were scattering from him. So Saul said, “Bring the burnt offering here to me, and the peace offerings.” And he offered the burnt offering. As soon as he had finished offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came. And Saul went out to meet him and greet him. Samuel said, “What have you done?” And Saul said, “When I saw that the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come within the days appointed, and that the Philistines had mustered at Michmash, I said, ‘Now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not sought the favor of the Lord.’ So I forced myself and offered the burnt offering.” And Samuel said to Saul, “You have done foolishly. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God, with which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever – 1 Samuel 13:8-13.

Panicking drives us to make hasty and foolish decisions. This was essentially the issue with Saul. Samuel promised to come but did not show up early enough for Saul. The people started panicking and scattering from Saul, and he was convinced that Samuel was not coming, he “forced himself” to offer the sacrifice that only Samuel was allowed to do. Samuel condemned him for being presumptuous and taking privileges that he had no right to take. He described his choices as foolish.

I watched the end of the Women’s NCAA Championship game on Sunday. It was fun to see some great basketball and lots of highlights. But you could tell when things came down to the wire, that the team that was down started to “panic” and take more reckless shots to try and catch up. They fumbled the ball a few times, started to rush their playmaking, and they started to feel the pressure from the opposing team; time was running out. There were a few anxious and frustrating moments when they took some low percentage shots because they needed to rise to the occasion or lose.

Samuel not only condemned his presumptuous act of offering the sacrifice, but then proceeded to point out the incredible opportunity Saul squandered because he panicked in the moment. Talking about running salt in the wound, his haste undermined his future. If he obeyed God, He would have established his kingdom over Israel…forever! Instead, God was gong to find a man after His own heart to take Saul’s place (13:14). One moment of panic, the fear of missing out, torpedoed his future.

Saul’s excuse was to blame the people around him. The Philistines were amassing a large, intimidating army and Israel was scattering from him. He also tried to blame Samuel by accusing him of not coming when he promised. Instead of taking personal responsibility to keep focused on what God called him to do, he used the apparent failure, or abandonment of the people around him to provide an excuse to take matters into his own hands. But again, he demonstrated that trusting the Lord and being faithful was far more significant than taking charge.

I wonder how many of us lose future opportunities because of making panic decisions because we were afraid of missing out or looking bad. He was looking like a poor leader since everyone was panicking and scattering from him. I suspect most leaders would have commended Saul because he saw things were starting to fall apart and he took matters into his own hands to rally the troops. Unfortunately, that was the last thing he needed to do. Clearly a tricky situation but when God commands things need to be done in a certain way, He expects us to trust Him to stand in the gap. We need to learn that panic decisions often lead to peril.

Pastor Brad.