If we make ourselves servants of an evil man, we should not be surprised that we are required to carry out evil instructions. Tyrants generally gather around them people who they know are prepared to cross moral boundaries in order to retain their position. They do not want men of principle in their service, but they want those with a self-serving loyalty, which is ready to trash conscience. There is a bargain to be struck, and everyone should understand the terms. But Saul got no mileage out of his lackeys. But how corrupt is the conscience of someone who allows another evil man to dictate his actions! He can try to convince himself all he likes that he is not to blame because he acted under instruction, but each man is responsible for his own actions, and in time his own conscience will condemn him.
We are so grateful that in New Testament times we have the doctrine teaching us that only the regenerate are to be members of the church of Jesus Christ. One of the sad drawbacks in Old Testament times is that they were always a mixed multitude. You could always have Doegs, people received into the company, worshipping, occupying high office. Who knows when they would become turncoats and act against the priests and the people? That is one of the reasons why a regenerate church membership is so precious. You think of our country, and how the denominations collapsed so quickly. Why did they collapse so quickly? Because there were so many members of churches – even Baptist churches and even ministers – who were not really saved. When I was a youngster, I was in a church in the Baptist Union for a time as a teenager, and one of the things I couldn't understand was that we were taught the necessity of a regenerate church membership, and yet the church received transfers, members transferring their membership from other churches elsewhere in the country. How did you know the standing of those churches? By this time there were many churches in the denomination that were not Bible believing at all; they were liberal churches. But if their members applied for membership of this evangelical church, they would get in without so much as an interview; they would be transferred. Why say we believe in a regenerate church membership, and take transferring members from liberal churches, no questions asked? One of the great things of value that the Lord has given us is that we expect people to have a testimony. Of course, it isn't a foolproof system. It is always possible that we take into membership people who think they have been saved, and it turns out they haven't been – it isn't foolproof, and we can't conduct a witch-hunt – but we pray to the Lord, and we do the best we can to make sure that, so far as human judgement can make it, we are composed of people who truly have come to Jesus Christ and love the Lord. Some churches don't do it this way; the Presbyterians, for example. If you don't do this, then you get lots and lots of people who are not really converted, and the church only lasts one or two generations. There are many, many fine Presbyterian Churches, but in Presbyterianism the churches tend to last so long, and then they all go liberal or something happens, and a new generation of Presbyterians has to start another set of Presbyterian churches. So it's most precious to have a regenerate church membership, and not to be exposed to the Doegs of this world. Tahe the Church of England for example: everybody on the parish role is entitled to be a member. They could believe anything; they could be Anglo-Catholics; they could be evangelicals; they could be anything. It's a mixed multitude. So where there are Bible believing Church of England churches, they are so unstable, inherently from generation to generation. We must always value the New Testament doctrine of the requirement for regenerate church membership.
So the priests are dead, but there is something else going on here. God uses even the actions of evil men to bring about his will. A prophet had been sent to Eli to reprove him because of his failure to discipline his sons when they corrupted the temple worship. Because of this Eli was told that the priesthood would be taken from him and from his descendants, and that his entire family would be cut off (1 Samuel 2:27-31). This prophecy is now going to be fulfilled. Ahimelech the priest was ‘the son of Ahitub’ (1 Samuel 22:11), and Ahitub was ‘Ichabod's brother, the son of Phinehas, the son of Eli’ (1 Samuel 14:3). Only Abiathar is going to escape (verse 20), and he will serve David for a time, but even he will eventually desert David, and be punished by Solomon after David’s death (1 Kings 2:26-27).