Read Exodus 17: 8-16 and 1 Samuel 15: 1-8 to start.
How often has it happened to you that you are assigned a task that you don’t really want to do? That probably happens a fair amount for most of us. At home, I tell my kids to empty the dishwasher, or load the dishwasher, or empty the dish rack, or other things that may not even involve dishes, and no one is jumping with joy because they were really hoping to do that. At work I ask people to do things, I assign them tasks, some more welcome than others, and I likewise am frequently asked to do various tasks, some of which are ‘sure, no problem, I’ll get right on that,’ and others are more of is there an option to apply a cheese grater to my face instead of doing that, because that would be preferable?
How do you respond when given an assignment, in particular one that is unpleasant, unwelcome, or one that might seem to be nigh impossible? Do you undertake it willingly, eagerly, or with great reluctance and delay, because if you do it too slow, or too poorly, maybe it will go away, and you won’t have to do it after all?
In the passage that I just read, King Saul received an assignment. He didn’t ask for it, certainly not. This was not a sought-after job, not an in-demand assignment, far from it. This was a tough and unpleasant responsibility, one that did not come with prestige or reward. This was an order to commit genocide.
That fact probably makes us a bit squeamish, maybe more than a bit. Frankly, it should. If that doesn’t bother you, then you aren’t paying attention. Genocide is a very bad thing, and while we like to think that we live in an enlightened and civilized society where such atrocities do not occur, there has been at least one genocide of some scale in every decade for at least the last century, there’s one going on right now in South Sudan. God asked Saul to go and kill all the Amalekites, to utterly destroy them, as well as their property. The first question that we need to ask is why would God require Saul to do such a thing?
Who were the Amalekites? They were descendants of Esau’s grandson Amalek, and they lived in the wilderness area just south of Canaan proper, the region that we now refer to as the Negev desert. And while you might have thought that they would be kin to Israel, given their common heritage, nothing could be further from the truth.
Earlier, we heard a reading from the book of Exodus where we saw the first interaction between the people of Israel and the Amalekites. It was not a happy or peaceful interaction, the Amalekites attacked the Hebrews while they were travelling in the wilderness. Later, we could also read from Numbers chapter 14 where we would see that when Israel first attempted to go into the Promised Land, after receiving the bad report from the 10 spies and ignoring the positive report from Joshua and Caleb, the Amalekites were some of the people that they fought, and who defeated them soundly.
There was unquestionably bad blood between the two groups. We see several times in the book of Judges that Amalek was involved in the oppression of Israel, usually along with a more established power, such as Moab or Midian. They were an opportunistic and predatory group, always ready to prey on the vulnerable. That’s why, in the book of Deuteronomy, when Moses gave his final instructions to Israel near the end of his life, specifically includes a command to deal with Amalek. In chapter 25, I’ll read from verse (17) Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt; (18) How he met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary; and he feared not God. (19) Therefore it shall be, when the LORD thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it.
By the time that Samuel came to Saul with this mission, Amalek had been a thorn in the side of Israel for centuries. They were an ongoing problem, a continual irritant in the southern wilderness that had to be removed.
We might look at this with our modern sensibilities and ask why could God not have dealt with Amalek another way? The answer is found in the text we just read, they did not fear God. There was no hope, no promise, no opportunity there. We don’t see prophets sent to preach to Amalek, we see zero examples of righteous or helpful Amalekites, we don’t see a single redeeming quality among them. They were not interested in negotiating, in changing, and certainly not in turning to God.
Their first attack on Israel in the wilderness, that took place only a matter of weeks after the Israelites had crossed the Red Sea, and therefore not long after the ten plagues had been inflicted upon Egypt. That had not taken place in a vacuum; word of what had happened surely had spread to the surrounding nations. Certainly the Canaanites had heard, they remembered and they were afraid. But the Amalekites didn’t care. God had judged Egypt for their mistreatment of His people, but the Amalekites decided that more mistreatment was in order.
This is who Saul was ordered to destroy. There could be no reasoning with Amalek. They had to go.
Many commentators see Amalek as being a picture of the flesh, of the sinful nature. It wants nothing to do with holiness or repentance; it seeks only opportunity for itself. Certainly we can take an application from that, because much as there was no negotiation with or repairing the relationship with Amalek, Israel was not able to peacefully coexist with them, so likewise as a believer we cannot have a peaceful coexistence with our flesh. Well, let me rephrase that, a believer can absolutely have a non-confrontational relationship with the flesh, just so long as the believer allows the sinful nature to do whatever it wants. Of course, that completely undermines and undoes any possibility of progress, and spiritual growth and development. The flesh isn’t interested in any of that. We are told repeatedly that we need to die to the flesh so that the life of Christ may flourish in us. If we seek to serve God, the flesh will surely push back. The flesh has to go, but it does not go easily or quietly.
And thus it was with Amalek, Saul was sent to exterminate them. A most distasteful task, but a necessary one to ensure the safety and security of Israel. So long as the Amalekites lurked on the southern border, they would remain a threat. This was the assignment, and unwelcome as it was, it was necessary.
We see from the passage that Saul gathered an army and went and did the task, he even made sure to avoid collateral damage by warning another neighbouring people group, the Kenites, whom had long been friendly with Israel. He got off to solid start with this, but the seed of failure was already present in verse 8, and we see the result in verse (9) But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but every thing that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly.
The task was clear, but the mission was unfulfilled. Saul left the king of Amalek alive, Agag being not a personal name but rather a title, like Pharaoh or Caesar, and he brought back the top tier of the livestock, the choice cuts as it were. Were this a normal situation, then this would probably have been acceptable. It was typical in that day and age for those who won wars to enrich themselves by taking spoils from those who lost wars. The Amalekites themselves were notorious for doing this, as we will see later. And taking the leader of a conquered group was a way of displaying your triumph over them, they would be brought back as a trophy to show the dominance of the victor. Doing so brought prestige to the conqueror.
But this was a divinely ordained mission of retribution for past atrocities, not an opportunity for glory and wealth. Saul was told to destroy everything, to bring nothing and no one back. This was not about making himself look good, this was not to bring riches or fame to Saul. This was about obedience and obligation, and Saul failed.
I won’t read the whole chapter, but Samuel received a fresh message from the Lord, and he went to confront Saul in person. I’ll read in at verse (13) And Samuel came to Saul: and Saul said unto him, Blessed be thou of the LORD: I have performed the commandment of the LORD. (14) And Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear? (15) And Saul said, They have brought them from the Amalekites: 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.
I don’t know if Saul really believed he had done the right thing here, or if he was trying to convince Samuel of something that they both knew wasn’t true. The fact that he started pointing the blame at the people suggests that he knew things were not entirely on the up and up. He quickly moved to suggesting that the livestock were for sacrifices, and wouldn’t God be happy with that? Even if he had convinced himself that he had obeyed and done it all properly, the back and forth with Samuel soon demonstrated otherwise, which culminates at 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. (23) For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.
Ouch. Rejected from being king. I can hardly imagine a stronger condemnation than this, and it must have devastated Saul. He immediately implored Samuel to come with him, that he might make things right with God, but Samuel refused, and reiterated the message of rejection. We are told later in the chapter that Samuel came no more to see Saul for the rest of his life, and in the next chapter, Samuel went to Bethlehem and anointed David to be the next king. While Saul continued to reign for a number of years after this, likely a decade or more, he was never the same, and he descended into paranoia, violence, and unchecked mental illness that continued for the rest of his days. Truly a sad ending for a king who had started so well.
Half my life ago, it feels funny to say when you’re talking about something that happened in the year 2000, a movie named Gladiator was released, maybe you’ve heard of it, it won the Academy Award for Best Picture. I mention this because there’s a memorable line in that movie, “What we do in life echoes in eternity.” Well, what we don’t do, what we fail to accomplish, that has an echo of its own. The tasks we avoid, the responsibilities we shirk, the jobs we don’t finish, those don’t just go away. There are repercussions.
Saul failed in his assignment to deal with the scourge of the Amalekites, and so they continued to be a scourge, an ongoing thorn in the side of Israel. That failure continued to echo, not just once or twice, but for centuries. We see the first one at chapter 27, which is the point during David’s time on the run from Saul where he goes and lives among the Philistines, and eventually ends up in a village called Ziklag. From there, we read how David and his men spent their time. I’ll read at verse (8) And David and his men went up, and invaded the Geshurites, and the Gezrites, and the Amalekites: for those nations were of old the inhabitants of the land, as thou goest to Shur, even unto the land of Egypt.
Notice the third group on that list, the Amalekites. If Saul had actually completed his assignment from chapter 15, then David could not have found more of them a decade or two later in chapter 27. Of course, it’s not like David got rid of them either, because if you flip the page to chapter 29 you will see that there were still Amalekites out marauding. (1) And it came to pass, when David and his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the south, and Ziklag, and smitten Ziklag, and burned it with fire; (2) And had taken the women captives, that were therein: they slew not any, either great or small, but carried them away, and went on their way.
David and his men had been away at the time, so the town was largely undefended, making it easy pickings for a predatory and opportunistic invader like Amalek. It fits with the pattern we see of them, attack the vulnerable, the unprotected, the easy target. I won’t read the whole account, but the chapter describes how David and his men pursued and caught this band of Amalekite raiders and destroyed most of them, but we are told that several hundred of them did escape, leaving more loose ends to deal with later.
And then two chapters later, in 2 Samuel chapter 1, let’s turn there and read the first part of the chapter. (1) Now it came to pass after the death of Saul, when David was returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites, and David had abode two days in Ziklag; (2) It came even to pass on the third day, that, behold, a man came out of the camp from Saul with his clothes rent, and earth upon his head: and so it was, when he came to David, that he fell to the earth, and did obeisance. (3) And David said unto him, From whence comest thou? And he said unto him, Out of the camp of Israel am I escaped. (4) And David said unto him, How went the matter? I pray thee, tell me. And he answered, That the people are fled from the battle, and many of the people also are fallen and dead; and Saul and Jonathan his son are dead also. (5) And David said unto the young man that told him, How knowest thou that Saul and Jonathan his son be dead? (6) And the young man that told him said, As I happened by chance upon mount Gilboa, behold, Saul leaned upon his spear; and, lo, the chariots and horsemen followed hard after him. (7) And when he looked behind him, he saw me, and called unto me. And I answered, Here am I. (8) And he said unto me, Who art thou? And I answered him, I am an Amalekite. (9) He said unto me again, Stand, I pray thee, upon me, and slay me: for anguish is come upon me, because my life is yet whole in me. (10) So I stood upon him, and slew him, because I was sure that he could not live after that he was fallen: and I took the crown that was upon his head, and the bracelet that was on his arm, and have brought them hither unto my lord. (11) Then David took hold on his clothes, and rent them; and likewise all the men that were with him: (12) And they mourned, and wept, and fasted until even, for Saul, and for Jonathan his son, and for the people of the LORD, and for the house of Israel; because they were fallen by the sword. (13) And David said unto the young man that told him, Whence art thou? And he answered, I am the son of a stranger, an Amalekite. (14) And David said unto him, How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thine hand to destroy the LORD’S anointed? (15) And David called one of the young men, and said, Go near, and fall upon him. And he smote him that he died. (16) And David said unto him, Thy blood be upon thy head; for thy mouth hath testified against thee, saying, I have slain the LORD’S anointed.
This young man had arrived at Ziklag bearing news of Saul’s death. And guess what? He identified himself as the son of a stranger, an Amalekite. This man claimed to have killed Saul at the wounded king’s request, and then brought the crown to David, likely hoping for a rich reward. David instead put him to death for murdering the Lord’s anointed.
Despite his detailed story, it is unlikely that this man actually killed Saul, we are told that Saul fell on his own sword to avoid capture by the Philistines. It is probable that this Amalekite found the body, looted it, and made up a self-serving story. And while there is a certain irony in that if he had simply said “I found Saul’s body, here is his crown” David most likely would have let him live, and perhaps even rewarded him, there is even greater irony in the fact that it was an Amalekite who found Saul and boasted of killing him.
You would think that would be the final repercussions of Saul’s failure, but wait, there’s more. Apparently the Amalekites continued to exist and be a problem for the next three centuries, because we are told in 1 Chronicles, chapter 4, I’ll read the tail end of the chapter, this is at the close of a list of genealogies, specifically of the tribe of Simeon, and their related accomplishments. (41) And these written by name came in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and smote their tents, and the habitations that were found there, and destroyed them utterly unto this day, and dwelt in their rooms: because there was pasture there for their flocks. (42) And some of them, even of the sons of Simeon, five hundred men, went to mount Seir, having for their captains Pelatiah, and Neariah, and Rephaiah, and Uzziel, the sons of Ishi. (43) And they smote the rest of the Amalekites that were escaped, and dwelt there unto this day.
Hezekiah was king of Judah roughly three hundred years after the death of Saul, so the Amalekites persisted until that point. How many times they went raiding and pillaging over those centuries we are not told, but given their history I would imagine it was a lot more than zero. But even this was not the end of the story, because in the book of Esther we see one more echo, and it’s a big one.
The story of Esther is likely familiar, but if you need a refresher, the very condensed setup is this: A young Jewish woman, Esther, became the wife of king Ahasuerus of Persia. Her cousin Mordecai, who had raised her after her parents had died, advised her to keep quiet about her heritage. We are told that Mordecai was of the tribe of Benjamin, the same tribe as Saul, and so it is possible, even probable, that there may have been a direct family connection there. Things become problematic in chapter 3.
(1) After these things did king Ahasuerus promote Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, and advanced him, and set his seat above all the princes that were with him. (2) And all the king’s servants, that were in the king’s gate, bowed, and reverenced Haman: for the king had so commanded concerning him. But Mordecai bowed not, nor did him reverence. (3) Then the king’s servants, which were in the king’s gate, said unto Mordecai, Why transgressest thou the king’s commandment? (4) Now it came to pass, when they spake daily unto him, and he hearkened not unto them, that they told Haman, to see whether Mordecai’s matters would stand: for he had told them that he was a Jew. (5) And when Haman saw that Mordecai bowed not, nor did him reverence, then was Haman full of wrath. (6) And he thought scorn to lay hands on Mordecai alone; for they had shewed him the people of Mordecai: wherefore Haman sought to destroy all the Jews that were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus, even the people of Mordecai.
This is important because Haman is described as an Agagite. Remember the reading from 1 Samuel 15? Saul had saved alive the king of the Amalekties, whose title was Agag. It appears that Haman was a descendant of Amalekite royalty, and here he is centuries later, so angry with one Jew that he conspired to kill every Jew in the Persian Empire. Old hatreds don’t fade away, they merely wait for the opportunity to strike.
We know how the story ends. Mordecai reminded Esther that she may have come into her position for such a time as this, that she had the opportunity to save her people from a vengeful foe. And through Esther’s bravery, her willingness to act despite great personal risk, Haman’s scheme was unravelled and he was hung on the very gallows he had specially built to hang Mordecai.
Esther put her own neck on the line when she and her people were threatened, and in doing so she finally closed the loop on Saul’s failure to deal with Amalek 500 years before. It’s worthy of note that she did this, when Saul didn’t, David didn’t, all the kings that followed didn’t, they didn’t fulfill God’s command to deal with Amalek once and for all. After dozens of others failed, God instead found an orphaned Jewish girl to finish this assignment.
Things not done, not dealt with, not resolved, they do come back to haunt you. This should be a reminder to each and every one of us to deal with the flesh, with the sinful nature, which we might think is dead and buried, but still lurks, waiting for opportunity, like the lone Amalekite who looted Saul’s body, or Haman who plotted grand revenge. Try as we might to suppress it, it lingers and troubles the believer. Give it the inch, it will gladly take the mile.
This warning is not only limited to the flesh, the sinful nature. The lesson of Saul and Amalek is a reminder to deal with things left undone, obligations that we have ignored, relationships that we have allowed to falter. It’s an encouragement to tend to your spiritual condition, to move closer to your Saviour through wise choices, through spiritual action and obedience, through time spent in the Word and in prayer.
And if you don’t know the Saviour, if you don’t have a relationship with Him, if you lack that assurance of salvation, then this is a reminder that there is no guarantee of tomorrow. There is no time like today to resolve the state of your eternal soul. God has extended that offer to each and every one of us. Of all the things you might or might not do, that is most assuredly not something to leave unfinished.