Even when his army was victorious, Saul continued to be controlling. He imposed his own foolish impulses on others, and cost him, and those he loved. Jonathan continues to show us the way: he was willing to die for Saul’s foolish and hasty mistakes. That gives us a picture of Jesus, who did indeed die for our sins.

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Last time we looked at how Jonathan single-handedly attacked the Philistines. He acted out of faith, not fear, and God used that to create a huge victory for the people of Israel. The Israelites pushed the Philistines back to the edge of the hill country in fact, back to the previously held borders between the two peoples. But Saul, once again, showed his lack of real relationship with God. Because of his legalism and false religion, the victory was not as great as it should have been. Nothing spoils true good works like false religion and religious pretenses.

The situation was this: The Israelites had routed the Philistines, and were pursuing them back toward their own territory. This was in spite of the fact that the only two people who had iron weapons were Saul and Jonathan. Perhaps Saul remembered this fact. For whatever reason, even though the battle was going well – literally, miraculously well –  he became worried about the outcome, and so he made an oath and imposed it upon all the army. The oath was that no one should eat until the sun went down. It sounds very religious and impressive. The oath was supposed to show the soldiers that their mission was serious; it was supposed to motivate them. It was supposed to impress God, so that God would help them even more.

It backfired because it was a stupid idea that again came not from faith, but fear, selfishness and pride. By the way, I want to point out the fact that Saul was not content to make the vow for himself alone. Instead, he imposed his fake religion (which sounded holy) on everyone else. This is typical of people who do not live by relationship with God. Precisely because they do not have their own relationship with God, they feel that everything they experience must be a rule that everyone should follow. They don’t recognize the give and take and unique life experiences that go along with walking with God in faith. They live only by rules, and they must impose those rules on others in order to feel secure.

Saul’s oath is actually much more like a curse. He says: “Cursed be the man who eats food until it is evening and I am avenged on my enemies.” This doesn’t sound like the voice of the Lord. It sounds more like the devil. There is an Old Testament tradition of making vows that are associated with curses. However, such vows are also associated with blessings and promises from the Lord. Saul does not include any blessings in his vow. Neither is it associated with any promises from the Lord. To put it simply, there is nothing positive about it.

Notice too, how Saul sees this as his own battle, with the Philistines as his own personal enemies. This is in contrast to Jonathan, who clearly saw the battle as the Lord’s fight, with himself simply a tool in God’s hands.

Three negative things came out of Saul’s religious pretenses.

First, the victory was not as great as it could have been. In other words, the vow had the opposite effect of the one Saul wanted. The men were weakened by hunger, so they could not sustain their offensive against the Philistines. Saul’s vow proceeded not from faith, but from the flesh. It was all about self-effort. Because of that, it was as weak as the flesh. Flesh without food is weak. So the vow flopped. Jonathan’s act of faith energized and sustained the troops. Saul’s rash vow, based in self effort and the flesh, drained them, and robbed them of strength. Jonathan himself realized this. After he himself had eaten in ignorance of the vow, one of the soldiers told him of his father’s words. Jonathan said:

“My father has brought trouble to the land. Just look at how I have renewed energy because I tasted a little honey. How much better if the troops had eaten freely today from the plunder they took from their enemies! Then the slaughter of the Philistines would have been much greater.”

(1 Samuel 14:29-30)

Second, because they were so hungry, when sundown arrived, the troops began to slaughter the captured livestock of the Philistines and eat without regard to the laws of Moses. Specifically, they were eating meat that had not been properly drained of blood. Moses had commanded the people of Israel to drain the blood from any animal that was butchered.

For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes atonement by the life. Therefore I have said to the people of Israel, No person among you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger who sojourns among you eat blood.

(Leviticus 17:11-12)

The idea expressed in the Old Testament is that the life of an animal (or person) is carried in the blood. The life belongs to God, and so the blood must be given to him, not consumed by people. It is a way of saying, “Even as I take this food, I recognize that the life of this animal belongs to God, not to me. I receive it as a gift, and I give its life into God’s hands.” This was something that God still wanted his people to practice in the days of ancient Israel.

But Saul’s vow weakened the resolve of the people who had been running, fighting and marching all day long, and when sundown finally came, they were tempted to sin. They were in such a hurry to eat that they did not properly bleed out the animals. To look at it another way, Saul’s vow did not protect people from sin, but rather made them more vulnerable to it. As a result, Saul had to waste valuable time and energy getting the people to butcher the animals properly.

Third, Saul’s foolish vow led to strife when it came to Jonathan. Saul had bound everyone to his vow – even those who didn’t know about it. Jonathan, unaware of his father’s oath, ate some of the wild honey that was in the forest where they were passing through in pursuit of the Philistines. The Hebrew says that as a result his eyes became bright. This is one of those Hebrew expressions that is very obscure. The HCSB says, “he had renewed energy” which is probably pretty close to the meaning, though not the exact words. You might say, “brightened up” or “perked up.”

After the men had finally eaten and regained some strength, Saul decided to pursue the Philistines further – as he could have done earlier, if he had not subjected his troops to such hunger. Once again, Saul was simply moving ahead without regard to what God might have wanted him to do. He was acting not out of faith or his relationship with God, but rather out of a rash desire to make up for the loss of time that he himself had caused.

In the earlier part of chapter 14 we saw that Saul was indecisive. He wasn’t sure whether or not he was going to win the battle, and so he sent for the priest to inquire of the Lord. However, before the priest had finished asking God, Saul saw how things were going and told the priest to shut up while he charged ahead. In other words, he wasn’t asking God because he really wanted to hear from God, he just wanted to know whether or not he would win. Once he saw that winning was virtually a certainty, he didn’t bother to ask God. After the men had eaten he made a decision to continue the attack without even considering if it is God’s will or not.

It was the priest who had to stop Saul, and say: “Let’s ask God first.” But when they did there was no clear answer from the Lord. We know that the Israelites cast lots, trusting that the Lord would determine the result. However, we don’t know exactly how this worked. Obviously, there was some possibility that the Lord would not answer at all. In this case that’s what happened.

Sometimes – not always, but certainly at times – we can’t hear God because we are separated from Him by our own sin. If your heart is turned away from God, if there is un-repented sin in you, it will be difficult for you to hear what he wants to say to you. This was a physical demonstration of that fact. Again, I’m not saying that every time you fail to hear from God, it is because of sin. However, if you are asking God to speak and you are not hearing, the very first thing to do is to ask Him to show you if there is any sin standing in the way. We can at least credit Saul for recognizing this. Again, Saul is not 100% evil. He is a complicated man who had his good moments. On the other hand, though he was right to recognize that sin might potentially stop them from hearing God, he tried to make himself look good by declaring: “Even if the problem is Jonathan my son, I will kill whoever committed the sin.” Saul didn’t need to say this. There were certain sins that were supposed to be punished by death. But this was not one of them. In fact, eating on the day of battle was not actually a sin against God – it was Saul’s curse, not God’s. By making it into a sin punishable by death, Saul was taking upon himself more authority than God himself.

Now, a straightforward reading shows that Jonathan was the one who caused God not to answer. He was the one chosen by lot. And yet, as I just said, we know that eating honey is not intrinsically a sinful act. In addition, Jonathan was totally unaware of the curse Saul had called down on the army concerning food, so he did not deliberately or knowingly violate any oath. I don’t think the Lord chose Jonathan by lot to show that Jonathan was sinful. I think he did it to expose Saul – to impress upon Saul his own arrogance and foolishness and show him the results of it. God did not withhold his answer because Jonathan ate honey. He withheld it because of Saul’s oath. Without the oath, Jonathan’s eating would have had no significance.

So Saul’s oath weakened the army both physically and spiritually, it prevented them from hearing the Lord, and now it led to the condemnation of their greatest warrior. Let’s say it plainly: the result of Saul’s rashness was to condemn his own son to death for simply eating when he was hungry, even when that son was responsible for their great victory that very day.

Yet, even when his arrogance and insecurity were exposed in this way, Saul did not repent. He didn’t say: “I am so sorry, that was a foolish vow to make, let us ask the Lord for forgiveness and mercy.” No, he would rather kill his own son than admit that he was wrong. He continued his rashness and said, ““May God punish me and do so severely, if you do not die, Jonathan! ”

Remember those words. Nothing bad ever happened to Saul that he did not bring upon himself.

The people protested. Jonathan was the one that achieved the great victory that day. He was ignorant of the curse. He didn’t deserve to die. Notice that Saul finally backed up. We can hope that he did so because he had a tender heart toward Jonathan, and really didn’t want him to die. But truthfully, that tender heart wasn’t enough. He didn’t back up until the people protested. What really changed his mind was popular opinion. Again, he shows his insecurity.

It is quite likely that during all these proceedings, which probably took several hours, the Philistines made their escape. In other words, again, it was Saul’s rashness, harshness and foolishness that made the victory less than it could have been.

A thousand years later, Saul’s namesake, who became known by his Roman name, Paul, wrote this:

 Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations: “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” (referring to things that all perish as they are used)-according to human precepts and teachings? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.

(Colossians 2:16-23)

King Saul’s oath, imposed on the entire army, did indeed have an appearance of wisdom. It promoted self-made religion and severity to the body. But it was of no value. Unfortunately, even today there are people try to impose their false sense of religion upon others. I’m not talking about people who speak the truth about what the bible says. I’m talking about people like Saul, who don’t really operate out of a faith-based relationship with the Lord. These are the folks who tell you that you cannot eat meat on Fridays, or wear blue jeans in church, or that you are not holy unless you sound like they do when you pray. You must worship in exactly the same way as them.

There are certain core things that all Christians believe and agree upon. I’m not talking about things like these. But apart from those core beliefs, when another Christian insists your faith must look and sound and feel exactly like her faith, she is operating out of a sense of law and false religion, not a sense of relationship.

I have fasted many times in my life. Often, fasting is a spiritually rewarding time for me. However, a few times, I’ve been in the middle of a fast and I realized it wasn’t doing me any good. At those times, I simply quit. This is because I’m walking in relationship, not by law. The whole point of fasting is to bless the relationship that I have with the Lord. When it doesn’t accomplish that, there is no point in doing it. Once or twice, I have fasted even when I didn’t feel called to, but only because others told me they wanted me to fast with them. Those times were counterproductive, spiritually speaking.

Most people don’t make vows like Saul’s anymore. Maybe we’re too fond of our food. But the truth is, we do sometimes make internal promises to ourselves. Sometimes we let our negative emotions control us, and we act or speak rashly, or make quick, impulsive decisions that somehow bind us. You might say something like “I’ll never do something nice for that person again.” You might have almost forgotten that you said that, but as the years have gone on, your relationship with that person has soured, and you have become bitter and unforgiving even in other relationships.

Or maybe you decide because of a certain incident that you hate and distrust all men, or all Asian people, or something like that. We may not think of it like a harsh or rash vow, but it is basically the same thing that Saul did. I think we should expect the same types of results, which are not good.

But, Jonathan gives us a kind of picture of Jesus. Though he did no wrong, and in fact, was the one who delivered Israel that day, he was willing to die. It wasn’t his own sin that he had to die for, but that of Saul. The Lord protected Jonathan and delivered him through the protests of the people. However, the Lord did not protect himself when it was time to die for the sins of others. He allowed himself to be slaughtered for our sins, mistakes and failings.

It seems obvious now what Saul should have done. He ought to have repented and asked the Lord for mercy and forgiveness. That would have involved humbling himself in front of his people. But everything might have been different for him if he had done those things. If there is some way in which we have taken Saul’s course, we can still correct that by doing what Saul was too proud to do. If we humble ourselves and ask for forgiveness and mercy, if we repent of our ungodly internal commitments, I am confident that the Lord will forgive us and help us.

All of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.⁶ Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that He may exalt you at the proper time, ⁷ casting all your care on Him, because He cares about you.

(1 Peter 5:5-7, HCSB)

Let the Lord speak to you right now. Maybe you need to give up an internal commitment or vow that you have made. Maybe you need to realize that you are free from the invalid religious expectations of others, so long as you continue to walk and true faith and in relationship with the Lord. Remember that Jesus allowed himself to be killed for our sins, our mistakes, which are as bad, in their own way, as Saul’s. Saul remained proud, and the Lord had to resist him. But if we will be humble, he will forgive us, and lift us up in due time.

Let him talk to you about this right now.