Bible notes
1 Samuel 8:4-11,(12-15),16-20,(11:14-15); Psalm 138; 2 Corinthians 4:13–5:1; Mark 3:20-35
1 Samuel 8:4-11,(12-15),16-20,(11:14-15)
Who was to be Israel’s king?
Who was to be Israel’s king? During the period of the judges, the answer was God. The judges emerged as charismatic leaders, often in times of crisis, but their authority depended on God’s validation. God had called Israel to be a unique nation directly under his care, a community bound by covenant, a ‘priestly kingdom and a holy nation’ (Exodus 19:6). But now Israel was asking to move away from this model and be ruled by a king, ‘like other nations’ (v.5). They were rejecting the special status offered by God and wanted to adopt the pattern followed by their neighbours. It’s possible to identify social and political reasons for this choice. They were under pressure from the military threat presented by the Philistines, who had kings. Samuel was ageing and his sons were not suitable to take up his role. The elders of Israel recognised the possibility of a power vacuum and took steps to avoid it.
Samuel was clearly opposed to this move. God’s words to him reassured him that they were not rejecting his prophetic authority but God, setting this in the long history of ambivalent relationships between the Israelites and God. Samuel shared God’s words of warning: a king would build a new kind of economy where the land and its produce was held centrally, and the people would be forced into forms of employment that created luxury and glory for the king and his courtiers, but left the sons and daughters of Israel demeaned and unprotected in servile roles. Yet God opted to allow the Israelites to make the choice for kingship. However, God set up a way of king-making that ensured the king was God’s choice, not the people’s. It was Samuel who would have responsibility for identifying Israel’s king, and he would anoint him in line with God’s direction. Elsewhere too it’s clear that God kept control of the process – Deuteronomy 17:14-19 restricts the wealth and wives of the king, who is to be chosen by God. 1 Samuel 12:14 is explicit: the king must follow the Lord.
Though kingship is not God’s preferred option for governing Israel, this passage describes a compromise in which God responds to the people’s wishes in ways that ensure ultimate control remains where it belongs – with the Lord, with whom they are in covenant relationship
Psalm 138
This psalm of thanksgiving may be linked to Israel’s return to Jerusalem from their exile in Babylon, providing words for Israel’s king to lead the community’s rejoicing within the universal expectation that all kings will join in God’s praise.
2 Corinthians 4:13–5:1
Paul moves on from describing hardship and oppression to reveal the strength and joy of life in Christ. Key elements include grace, God’s gift to Jesus’ followers, and glory. Paul evokes the ‘weight’ of glory – the Hebrew word kabod carries both meanings – imagining it as like the weight of rich robes that dignify the wearer. Faith and belief (the same word in Greek) are also core to his Gospel, and here he sums up their content as future-focused. God will raise us as Jesus was raised. This temporary home (cf. John 1:14) will be replaced by an eternal home with God. Trouble, then, can be endured for Jesus’ sake.
Mark 3:20-35
Where does Jesus’ authority come from? The crowds were convinced by the power of his many healings (v.10). His newly appointed disciples (vv.13-19) accepted his leadership. The religious leaders and his own family located his power elsewhere: in madness (v.21) or in demonic possession (v.22).
Mark’s readers know that Satan is already defeated (1:13) and that Jesus has power because he is God’s son (1:1). Jesus responded to the hostile assertions by stating the obvious conclusion from his healings: if people are being healed, Satan is finished, not acting through Jesus. He used two short parables to illustrate the point. The first (vv.24-26) draws from lived experience of interfamily fighting. Its three-fold repetition focuses attention on the last point: a divided Satan would inevitably collapse. The second (v.27) uses an early Christian image of the Lord coming ‘like a thief in the night’ (1 Thessalonians 5:2), and draws on older traditions that the Lord overcomes the strong (1 Samuel 2:1-10).
The religious leaders had accused Jesus of blasphemy (2:7). He ended his message by defining real blasphemy – naming the Holy Spirit as unclean. The enormity of this emerges when we recall that uncleanness implies separation from God. His new family included only those who acknowledged the spirit within him as holy.
See also: Scripture in context