Binding the Strong Man…for good

June 9, 2024

Scriptures: 1 Samuel 8:4-11 (12-15) 16-20 (11:14-15), 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1, Mark 3:20-27

We are at an inflection point in our common history…it is not the first one to be sure, and probably will not be the last…however there are indicators that it may be increasingly difficult moving forward for the foreseeable future.

Throughout recorded history there have been many such points…when all seemed to be so foreboding, when the common feeling among the majority, was that we needed to find a better way…that in fact the course of the immediate future needed to be wrestled away from chance, needed to be forcefully grabbed and melded into something of our own…that the future needed to become something over which we felt we had better control, something in which there was less risk, and perhaps for some of us at least, less conflict, and more comfort.

The Israelites wanted a King to be their new leader and military ruler. The prophet Samuel had been a beloved and well respected leader for his whole life…ever since he said, as we heard last week, ‘here I am Lord, your servant is listening’. For so many years, Samuel had been all they thought they needed as a leader, but he was getting on in years and his son was nowhere near the measure of his father. They wanted to take back and shape their own destiny, they wanted to insure their future, and so they went to Samuel and asked him to anoint a King to lead them, a strong man to guide them into what they say as an increasingly uncertain future.

They were clearly warned of the extremely dire consequences that would follow such an action…that would result from such a departure from all they had known and followed up until that point. Samuel warned them of pending troubling and oppressive consequences, which ultimately did prove to be the result of that decision…consequences with which we all are now so, so familiar. They were warned that war, personal hardship and loss, subservience to Imperial power, and rule by unequal and unfair taxation would come…and indeed, they have.

However, at least for the Israelites that day, trusting solely in God through the voice of Samuel was no longer sufficient to allay their fears of what the future might hold…they were filled with fear, and had lost faith in the power and grace of a God who in truth had carried them and nurtured them up to that point.

Now, if we really look closely, and are honest, we see that there is not really all that much difference between ancient human or even pre-human responses to certain of life’s circumstances, than from many of our own responses today. The difference between rational and orderly cultural and social behavior, and complete chaos, is always just one radical breakdown away.

Now, in order to live within this tension, in order to function socially on some level, we have devised, and consequently agree to be governed by a set of unwritten rules, rules which we all strive to follow…or at least which we all used to follow pretty consistently.

However, that common and previous agreement to follow those rules and norms seems less and less binding of late, and the line between what was or is acceptable, versus unacceptable behavior or policy, seems to be far less clearly defined, and far less commonly accepted than it was even in the quite recent past.

Now, this is not a study recommending any particular solution, or an affirmation of any particular set of beliefs, understandings or personal or political viewpoints…rather, it is an attempt to look beyond the flash and bang, beyond all the rhetoric of dismay, and/or the rising anger at just what we are all up against…and…who it is that is actually pulling those strings of social control and behavior.

 The Israelites insisted upon and forced a sea-change in how they lived, and in how they chose to allow life to be lived out amongst them. They insisted upon, and then were given a King to rule over them. They asked for and received a King who in fact began to do all that they were warned he would do. Out of fear over what the future seemed to hold, they rejected God and put a King of their own choosing in his place. They told Samuel that they wanted and needed a Strongman Leader,  specifically, a leader who could lead them into battle and successful conquest…and…they got just what they asked for…just what they thought they needed…

For them, God had somehow become insufficient as the guiding force over their common future, and they insisted on wrestling it back and taking it into their own hands, insisted on anointing one of their own to be the new lord and guide over their common future.

And my friends, the through line from then until now, clearly shows the consequences of what that decision meant, and unfortunately, what it still means in our day. God was rejected then, and God is still competing with ‘kings’ of our own choosing…

The Israelites forcibly overthrew everything they had known and followed up to that point in their history in order to set up a ruling order…of their own…and by their own. They came to believe that all that had carried and guided them to that point was no longer going to work. All of the blessings of their entire history were put on the scale to be weighed…all that God had done for them…in fact the very definition of who they were was put one one half. On the other side of the scale was an imagined future within their own control, a future where they could decide who was entitled to receive blessings, a future where they could decide who it was they would follow, a future where they could decide who it was they would believe in…and perhaps most importantly, who of their own was best suited to lead them through increasingly perilous and fearful times.

And somehow, all of their past history, all of that which God had so blessed them with…was found wanting, as that scale tipped towards rejecting the past, rejecting order, rejecting truth, and in fact rejecting the Lord God himself.

Now, as we look around us and consider all of this in terms of what we hear and what we see…it seems that some among us may feel that over time God decided to become comfortable within this human construct, and has chosen a side on which to play. Both teams in the contest feel that in fact they have God on their side, and yet neither one often speaks or acts in the ways, or on the words that were given to them by the Son of God. Neither side in fact seems all that ‘holy’, as both are still very much governed by the quest for the ‘tin trinkets’ of worldly wealth and power. It seems that almost everyone dreams of having their own share of the treasure they have heard so much about…and yet, so few are truly happy.

I feel strongly that there is only one way to return to the vision, only one way to go back to that place where the Israelites confronted Samuel that day. Only one way to go back to the original biblically stated plan and desire of God, only one way to find our way back to a place where the good and blessed future we hear the prophets speak so much about, can begin to become visible once again.…only one way.

And it is not through any one of the still very human solutions being shouted out each and every day…

Rather, it is only possible through a conscious decision and effort to ask the Lord to once again be the Lord over our lives…to ask and then to submit to the Lord as the guiding force over our common life together…to look to God to be the source of our purpose and for all our efforts.

But to get there…we must be willing to humble ourselves, asking for forgiveness for the original sin and separation that occurred when we first asked for a King of our own choosing, rather than trusting in the leadership of our God. And from there, we must turn back to the words of the Son of God, to the words of our Lord Jesus, to listen once again to his words…to hear them, and then, to begin to practice them daily…

…to risk it all…

…in the practice of truly loving one another…

…and, finding our way back to the place of believing that doing so is the only true and genuine commandment we must follow.

We don’t really need a king…rather, we need to follow the One who first loved us…

…amen