1 SAMUEL 14

It’s a little disheartening to see what happened to Saul the further he traveled from the Lord’s plans. He began his kingship as a virtuous man, one who wouldn’t make a decree to destroy those who had spoken against him. But, not too far down the road, he bound his army under an oath, saying, "Cursed be anyone who eats food before evening comes, before I have avenged myself on my enemies!" (vs 24) He had obviously had a change of heart regarding revenge.

Thus, in this chapter, we see Saul forcing his soldiers into a ridiculous oath. Then, he is distressed when (after building his first ever altar to the Lord) he doesn’t receive an answer from God as to the continuing war with the Philistines. Immediately, Saul decides that there must be a sinner in the camp. But he is too blind to see that it is him. In the previous chapter, he was just rebuked by Samuel for his unfaithfulness to God and told, because of it, that the kingship would be taken away from him. And he’s wondering who hasn’t been true to the Lord?

In contrast to Saul is Jonathan, who trusted implicitly in God and thus delivered the Israelites from the Philistines at Gibeah.

Simply put, God is the author of reason. And the further we go from Him, the more irrational and blind we become. If we continue along that course, we will find ourselves unable to think straight and even unable to see what’s staring us right in the face. It makes me think of the time Jesus had to tell the Pharisees, "You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye." (Matt 7:5)

Without God, we become unreasonable, blind hypocrites. We may think we’re making sense, but without Him, it’s impossible. And in time, we will reveal ourselves to be fools. He alone is the author of reason.