Here’s today’s Q-Tip (quick tip) for picking the grit in your heart, brought to you by the WordPress for mobile app, King Saul, and the Holy Word.

So you’re pressured to make a move. You’re either supposed to make a decision, grab an opportunity, or simply waiting for something to happen. People around you, though they are not exactly putting it out there, and their expectations add to the weight.

It’s unbearable. It’s scary. It drives you nuts. You’re not alone. It’s you and a million others, plus an ancient king famous for his rise to and fall from the throne.

Saul was thirty years old when he became king… and he had been leading his troops against his countrymen’s oppressors, the Philistines.

He was defeating them one by one, so All Israel heard the news that Saul had destroyed the Philistine garrison at Geba and that the Philistines now hated the Israelites more than ever.

The pressure mounted in a region where territory is king and then The Philistines mustered a mighty army of 3,000 chariots, 6,000 charioteers, and as many warriors as the grains of sand on the seashore!”

Talk about intensity. You feel that, don’t you? Sometimes it’s school work, for some it’s work deadlines, or career progression, or the need to provide for your family.

It will always be there, I tell you, in one form or another. So what do you do to cope? Do as the Israelite army did.

The men of Israel saw what a tight spot they were in; and because they were hard pressed by the enemy, they tried to hide… Saul stayed at Gilgal, and his men were trembling with fear.

Or as King Saul did.

He was supposed to wait for Samuel, God’s prophet. And wait he did. But Samuel was late. Saul realized that his troops were rapidly slipping away.

So Saul decided to take matters into his own hands: And Saul sacrificed the burnt offering himself.

Cue ominous music. If you don’t know yet, only ordained priests were allowed to offer burnt offerings to God in the Old Testament and to disobey that is sin against God’s commands.

You plow ahead with your decision/s, without counting the costs. You offer up a half-baked plan. A premature plan. a rushed plan. An un-consulted one. A mash-up.

“What is this you have done?”

What is it, really? What’s wrong? It can either be your motives, your methods, your timing, or your attitude. Take your pick. Plans go awry when one or more of those are even the slightest bit askew— because you’re not willing to wait or correct.

“How foolish!”

So how do you check? Against the best standard there is— the living, breathing, dynamic Word of God. Or be like Saul, being scolded like a 5-year old caught with his hand in the cookie jar:

“You have not kept the command the LORD your God gave you. Had you kept it, the LORD would have established your kingdom over Israel forever.

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All texts in bold are lifted from the Book of 1 Samuel 13, NLT.

Photo by: Feldore

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