1 Samuel 11:1 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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1 Samuel 11:1

Comments

This is going to be a terrible event. The Ammonite threat was what gave rise to the demands for a king in the first place. In 1 Samuel 12:12 Samuel will later chastise the people and say, ‘And when ye saw that Nahash the king of the children of Ammon came against you, ye said unto me, Nay; but a king shall reign over us: when the LORD your God was your king.’ Nahash the Ammonite had taken certain portions of the land and was threatening them, and that is the shadow that started the desire for a king originally. So he comes up, and he encamps against this particular region and city, Jabeshgilead. And the men of Jabesh say desperately – it is east of Jordan, a bit cut off from the rest of Israel – ‘Make a covenant [make a treaty] with us and we will serve thee.’ But the Ammonites are extremely cruel and they answer, ‘Yes, we will make a treaty with you; but only on condition you let us gouge out every man’s right eye so that you are utterly disabled for war: all your men, all your warriors, and then you can service us.’ That would mean they could never be warriors, they could never be soldiers; they wouldn’t have any depth of vision; they were disabled, and of course from their appearance it was obvious they had been disabled, and the nation which was fainthearted enough already, would say, ‘It's not only the Philistines; it’s the Ammonites we have to fear’, and they would be crushed and intimidated, and yield to them. So they lay this cruelty upon the people of Jabesh. The people of Jabesh: they have been given these terrible terms, and they give way to the Ammonites. ‘The the elders of Jabesh said unto him, Give us seven days' respite, that we may send messengers unto all the coasts of Israel: and then, if there be no man to save us, we will come out to thee.’ They accept these terrible terms, but they ask for time. And they get it from the Ammonites, no doubt because, cynically, Nahash believes that in seven days they will never stir the Israelites across the west of Jordan to come and defend them, and they will be humiliated in the process. Of course the men of Jabesh agreed to the terms supposing that they would either get help, or they would run for it when the time came. But they say, ‘If we don't get help, we will succumb.’ What a sad thing! Israel was so oppressed by Philistines and in this area by Ammonites, that there was no spirit in them, no desire in them for their exercise of national freedom under God.

Application

We have seen this in the last few years, constantly. We have seen pastors who have given way to modern things that have come in, to contemporary Christian worship, to the demands for novelties. When asked about this they have said, ‘We didn't want to do this; we didn't want to come this to come into our church, but we were forced.’ ‘How were you forced?’ ‘Well there were certain people, or there was a very influential deacon, or there were certain families that weren’t very spiritual, and they thought they would lose their children if they weren't pandered to. There were various pressures on us, and we gave way. We let it come in. We thought it could be controlled. We thought if it was just done a little, just with the odd modern song, just a few things, then we could to contain it. And it has swept everything away, and now I can't stay in my church, or they want to turf me out, or everything has changed, and I can't live with this.’ We have heard that many times over. Well, these things for our learning. We are warned. The people of Jabesh thought they could do a deal with the Ammonites. As soon as the Ammonites saw this – they are giving way; they are ready to give us terms, they are not going to fight us, they're not going to resist us – what do the they do? They say, ‘Make it even more difficult for them. We will take every right eye of every man, every warrior, to keep you in absolute submission.’ That is a picture of how the devil works. ‘All right, we will give way, just a little to this ungodly trend’, and before you know it, it has taken over. The devil has pushed it all the way. There are great principles contained in this literal history which set us on our guard.

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1 Samuel 11:1 Commentary and Bible Study