All the Kings Men, pt. 3

Saul woke everyone up at the crack of dawn. “Everyone up! We have some to Philistines to get rid of!”

All the soldiers groaned and pulled themselves out of their sleeping bags. Their stomachs were still empty and sleep had been the only thing that stopped them from thinking about it. Now that they were up, the entire camp was filled with the growls of hunger. But no one complained because no one wanted to make Saul angry.

All day they chased the Philistines. They found them in caves and bushes and trees and swamps, and Saul made them get every single one. At last, they killed the final ones that evening. They had been keeping all the supplies for the rest of the army at a small farmyard, but now that they wouldn’t need it anymore, the Israelites took it. There were enough sheep, goats, cattle and calves to feed an army, which was good, because a hungry army had been starving all day and was ready to EAT. They were so hungry that they killed the animals and starting eating them right there.

Saul stood over a fire, cooking his meat and watching his army enjoy a feast.

“Uh…Saul? Shouldn’t we…you know…drain the blood first?”

“Mmph?” Saul said, a huge chunk of steak hanging out of his mouth

“You know, drain the blood. Like what Moses commanded?”

Saul spit out the meat immediately. “Right! Drain the blood!” He looked down at the chunk on the ground, heard his stomach grooooawwwwwwl, and felt a little sad for a second. Then he shouted to his army,

“STOP! Don’t sin against God and eat meat with blood in it! Bring the animals over here to be butchered first!”

So the soldiers did what they were told. Then Saul built an altar to the Lord for sacrifices.

After everyone had filled themselves on food, they began to set up camp. Saul, his highest generals, and the priest were relaxing by the fire while their tents were being set up.

“Hey,” said Saul, “I head there’s some more Philistines to the south. Lets surprise them during the night and destroy and plunder the rest of them tonight!”

His generals glanced over at each other. “Is he serious?” They thought. But instead, they said, “Whatever you think is best.”

“Hey, I think we should ask God first this time,” said the priest.

So Saul asked God. “Shall we defeat the Philistines tonight? Will you help us kill them all?”

No answer.

Saul asked again. “My Lord, should we plunder and destroy the Philistines as soon as we are ready to? Will you help us?”

Nothing.

Then Saul became worried. “God’s not answering me! Something’s wrong!” He looked at his generals. “Go and figure out what was done. I want to know who sinned, what they did, why, and how. Every detail. I swear that whoever did this will die, even if it were my own son!”

The generals glanced over at each other and thought, “Is he serious?”, but they said nothing and simply followed orders. Everyone was woken up, but no one claimed they did anything wrong. The generals took this information back to Saul.

Saul had an idea to find out the culprit. “Jonathan and I will stand on this side, the rest of you on that side.” No one objected. Then Saul prayed, “God, show us who is guilty and who is innocent!”

The priest took 2 stones and scratched one side of each. He gave one to a general on the soldier’s side and he took the other. “Whoever’s stone shows the scratch, that side is guilty and the other is innocent”

He threw them in the air and when they landed on the ground, it was Saul’s stone that showed the scratch. It was either Saul or Jonathan. Then the priest cast the stones again to decide between them. Saul clenched his fists in anticipation. Jonathan swallowed hard.

The stones flew up in the air. Both men watched them fall to the ground. Then they hit with a soft thud.

Jonathan was guilty.

Saul glared at his son and crossed his arms. “Boy, what did you do?”

“I…I tasted a little honey when I was off fighting Philistines. But it was only a little! And I never heard your vow before? Does that deserve death” Jonathan was shaking, and he wiped sweat from his forehead.

Saul glared even angrier. “Yes.” He began to reach for his sword at his side. “May God strike me down if I don’t obey my own vows!”

Then his best generals burst out of the crowd. “Saul! Don’t do this!” They pleaded. Two of them stood in front of their angry king, while another reasoned with him. “Jonathan is the reason we did so well against the Philistines! Would you kill the hero of Israel?”

Saul paused. He opened his mouth to reply, “Y-“

“No, of course you wouldn’t!” His general continued. “As sure as the Lord lives, not one hair on his head will be touched! He is a hero! An instrument of God’s power! Three cheers for Jonathan!”

The crowd of soldiers surrounded Jonathan and carried him away, cheering him and God’s power. Saul was left all alone, in silence, sword in hand, glaring at the departing crowd.

He looked around at the abandoned camp and clenched his jaw. “Fine,” he said and sighed. “But I’m going home,” and he crawled back into his tent and fell asleep.

Back at home, a letter waited on Saul’s desk of a new threat against Israel and God’s final test of its king. 

All the Kings Men, pt. 2

Saul and Samuel had just gotten back to Saul’s home and started to do some fieldwork when they heard someone shouting, “King Saul!” Way out in the distance, they saw an army messenger running as fast as he could directly toward them.

“Oh, good,” thought Samuel. “A test for Saul.” He looked around and smiled. No piles of bags to hide in anywhere.

“King Saul!” he cried when he reached them. “I have terrible news! King Nahash of Ammon has captured the town of Jabesh-gilead! He is threatening to gouge out all of their right eyes for a truce, like he did to all the Israelites east of Jordan!”

Saul was silent for a few minutes. When Samuel looked over at him, his face was completely red, and Samuel swore he could see steam leaking from his ears. Suddenly, he grabbed his two plowing oxen, killed them right there and cut them up, and then gave a bunch of pieces to the messenger.

Samuel was terrified.

“Ew,” said the messenger.

“Suck it up!” yelled Saul. “Take these pieces all over Israel, and tell everyone you see that if they don’t join me against these monsters, they’ll look like my ox too!”

The messenger was so afraid that he picked up the pieces and ran off as fast as he could. Samuel stared at the rage mountain of Saul. “Impressive,” he thought. “Scary, but impressive.”

The next day, Saul traveled to Israel’s barracks in Jerusalem. When he got there, there was 330 000 men waiting for him, but no one would look at him because they were so scared of his anger. With his generals, he devised a sneak attack on the Ammonites and the next morning, secretly marched to the captive down and defeated them with ease. When Samuel heard, he knew that God had caused Saul’s anger and the people’s fear. “Humph,” he sighed. “I guess God knows what he’s doing. Maybe he won’t be so bad after all,” he grumbled.

Then came the Philistines.

The Philistines were very powerful and had for a long time hated Israel, but when they heard that this new king Saul was winning battles and threatening their power, they decided to destroy Israel for good. Saul and his men marched out to battle, but when they saw how many Philistines there were, they panicked and ran and hid in caves and holes and anything else that would fit a trembling soldier.  

Samuel had told Saul to wait seven days before they attack so he could get there and offer God a sacrifice to bless the battle, but after 7 days, there was still no Samuel and Saul’s soldiers were beginning to run away. This made Saul mad. He demanded, “Bring me the sacrifice stuff! If Samuel won’t do it, I will!”

Just as Saul finished, Samuel walked up over the hill. Samuel stopped, looked around, and saw the smoldering fire and smell of cooked meat.

“Saul…” he growled. “What…did…you…do?”

“My men were scattering, and you were no where to be seen, so I did the sacrifice and asked for God’s help to save my men, like a good king.”

“You idiot!” screamed Samuel. “You disobeyed God! And to think, I was beginning to like you! Now your kingdom will end and God has even already chosen someone else to take over, a man after his own heart. Not like you!” Then Samuel left the battlefield.

But Saul was determined to fight. “Never mind him!” yelled Saul. “We are ready to fight! Who’s left with us?”

“600, sir! And you and you son have the only swords!”

“Oh my.”

“How are we going to beat an enemy so big?” asked his soldiers.

“I have no idea,” Saul admitted, “But from now on, no one eats until we get our revenge!”

However, Saul failed to realize that there were only 598 soldiers around him. His son, Jonathan, and his armour bearer, had gone off to spy on the Philistines. While they were hiding, God gave them a sign that they could fight and win, because Jonathan had faith that God could.

Suddenly, the ground shook!

“Earthquake!” cried the soldiers, and they began to panic. 

“Wait!” yelled Saul. “Do you hear that?”

In the distance, there was the sound of fighting. The soldiers creeped closer and saw that while they were busy running around, someone had freaked out the Philistines so much that they were killing each other.

“Charge!” cried Saul, and everyone rushed in and scattered the massive Philistine army, saving Israel once again.

At the end of the day, everyone was tired and weak from not eating. Since they hadn't killed ALL the Philistines yet, no one was allowed to eat yet. When Jonathan and his servant got back to the main group, he was confused at why no one was eating. He had found a bunch of honey in the forest and eaten some, but wondered why no one else had.

“Because your dad told us we couldn't until all his enemies were dead.”

Jonathan just shook his head. “Seriously? He’s going to screw over all of Israel with those kind of ideas.” 

All the Kings Men, Pt.1

(A brief intro: This is the first part of a story I wrote for the AWANA children's church during the school year. It follows the the Biblical narrative of Samuel and Saul, with my own twist on it. Each week, I ended on a cliff hanger, which I hoped would keep the kids enthralled and help me avoid finding a new story each week. The title, however, is one I created now. Unlike my other story posts, this is already written, so I'll actually finish the story arc...eventually)

Samuel had been a pretty good prophet and ruler for Israel, but now he was old and his sons, who he had appointed as rulers, made a mess of things. So one day, the people of Israel came to Samuel and asked, “We want a king!”

Samuel was not impressed with this. Raising greedy sons had made him a grumpy old prophet. “What do you need a king for, huh? Why you doing this to me? I’m not good enough for ya?”

“We want to be like the other nations, who win battles and stuff with their king!” They whined.

So Samuel humphed and grumbled, “Fine! I’ll go ask God.” And he left, grumbling under his breath.

“These stupid Israelites don’t know what’s good for them, asking for a king! What about God as a king? Huh? Stupid Israelites…”

So Samuel prayed and asked God what he should do. And God said…

“Give them what they want.”

Samuel was shocked. “Wh…what?”

“Give them a king. They forgot that I’m their king a looong time ago. So do what they want you to do, but warn them how bad a king will be.”

When Samuel returned to the leaders, he said, “Alright, you hooligans, you can have a king, but be warned! A king will take away your sons for his army and personal service, your daughters for his cooks and cleaners, you best food, fields, slaves and livestock for himself and favourite generals. You’re gonna BEG to be free from a king when he comes.”

“Pff, whatever, just give us a king.”

“Ya! Lets win wars and stuff!”

Samuel just shook his head. “What ever you want.”

The next day, Samuel departed to find a king. Around supper time, he found himself in the land of Benjamin. Just as he was going to go eat, a huge, handsome man with a servant appeared. They looked out of breath and a little dazed from the heat. The man was the biggest man Samuel had ever seen; at least a head and shoulders taller than the tallest Israelite. “Excuse me!” said the tall man. “Do you know where the prophet is? We’ve been looking for our donkeys all over Benjamin and can’t find them and hoped you would help us.”

And then Samuel heard a voice.

“This is the guy. This is Israel’s new king.”

Samuel knew it was God, so he looked at the man, and asked, “What’s your name, son?”

“Saul”

“Well, Saul, you look tired. Come up and eat with me, and I’ll tell you where your donkeys are.”

Saul go all excited and ran off ahead. When Samuel met up with him, he told him to get on his knees, then he poured oil on his head.

“What are you doing?” asked Saul

“God says you’re the new king of Israel. Now you’ve just been anointed.”

Saul was completely silent. He was so shocked, he had nothing to say.

“Be at the temple tomorrow, and we’ll officially declare you king.” After supper, Saul went home, still in a daze from what he just learned.

The next day, Samuel stood at the front of the temple with a white envelope in his hand.

“Listen up!” he shouted. “God rescued all you ungrateful poopheads, from Egypt and lots of wars and pretty much everything else, but now you want a king. Fine! His name is in this envelope!”

All the tribes became dead silent. Samuel slowly opened the envelope…

“From the tribe of Benjamin…from the family of Matrites…son of Kish, your new king, Saul!

Everyone cheered, especially the Benjaminites. Then the cheering stopped, but Saul was no where to be seen. Samuel cleared his through and called again, “Your new king, Saul!” Again, the people applauded, but still no Saul. Then someone called out, “Here he is! In the baggage!”

Everyone turned to the pile of bags and coats, to see an embarrassed mountain of a man slowly stand up and shuffle to the front to accept the crown.

“Oh no” though Samuel. “Israel’s screwed.”