Ep 375 | 1 Samuel 8-16, Come Follow Me 2026 (June 8-14)

**Bryce** (0:03)
Hey, everybody. Welcome to Talking Scripture, a podcast where we illustrate relevance and application of the Scriptures in Come, Follow Me.

**Mike** (0:10)
We also dive into the history and cultures of the text.

**Bryce** (0:13)
Thanks for taking the time to share and subscribe to this podcast.

**Mike** (0:16)
For show notes, head over to our website, talkingscripture.org. Welcome to Talking Scripture. I'm Mike.

**Bryce** (0:26)
And I'm Bryce.

**Mike** (0:27)
And today we're going to be covering 1 Samuel chapters 8 to 16

**Bryce** (0:31)
It would be nice if we could renumber these books. 1 Samuel should be the first king. 2 Samuel is really the second king. And then 1 Kings is really the story of the third king and then beyond. But this whole book is the story of Israel's first king, King Saul.
And we're going to learn a lot from King Saul. There's some marvelous episodes here that are very applicable.

**Mike** (0:56)
So, with that in mind, go to chapter 8 of 1 Samuel.
The sons of Samuel are walking in the same path that Eli's sons walked in. And it seems like the author of Samuel is trying to communicate this idea that because the person who should rise up and be a leader isn't, we've got a problem. We've got a power vacuum. And so the Israelites come to Samuel and say, we want to have a king.

**Bryce** (1:21)
And the problem with that isn't that they want to have a king. We've read in the Book of Mormon that if you could have righteous kings, kings would be a great form of government. But because you can't always have a righteous king, that's why we shouldn't have kings. However, the real problem here is the reason why they want a king. And this is worth pausing a little bit and saying, this applies so many ways to our lives. And this is the beginning of the downfall of Israel. This is kind of the turning point where we're going to see a major struggle. We will not see the glory days of Abraham. Or, we won't see Jacob, or we won't see Joseph as he rose to power in Israel. This is kind of the switch point that leads Israel to destruction. We're going to see a split in Israel, then the northern tribes are going to be taken captive, and then a hundred years later, the southern tribes will be taken captive. And I wonder if the trigger point is right here, when they say, we want to have a king. Now that's not the problem that they want to have a king. It's what they say after that. The end of verse 5 is the problem.
We want to have a king to judge us like all the nations. We want to be like everyone else. Now I'm going to remind you, I'm going to take you back to the Abrahamic Covenant, and the general failure of the Old Testament is to not live up to that Abrahamic covenant. You remember, we talked about why Abraham was placed right in the middle of the world with so many empires all around him. And as long as Abraham is influencing the world, it brings blessings and prosperity like Joseph in Egypt. Joseph went in there and made the Lord's name known. He influenced Egypt and he rose in power. Daniel is going to do the same thing in Babylon. As long as Israel is influencing the world, they are blessed and protected and preserved, and the God of Israel is with them.
When we are more influenced by the world than we influence the world, we lose that protective power of the Lord. His covenant to save us is tied to our covenant to make his name known to the world. So as we fail to live up to that covenant, we fail to qualify for his protective blessings. And here is where it begins, because they say we want to have a king to judge us like all the nations.
And this really is going to lead to Israel's ultimate destruction. So the Lord's going to refuse, we'll get to that, we'll come back to this in just a minute, but the Lord's going to say, they haven't rejected you, they've rejected me. Tell them all the things that kings are going to do, and he does. And then after warning them, they say, we don't care.
In verse 19 and 20, but we will have a king over us, that we may also be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles.
This is failure of the Abrahamic Covenant. So now we're going to watch Israel really struggle. Now, to the degree that they are faithful to God, you're going to have moments of glory.