King's Banner Podcast
Welcome to King's Banner Podcast. We got tired of the same ole answers when we started looking for help when it came to our walks with God. So together we go deeper than most would on topics that most people have heard or were taught but never fully understood. It is our way of simplifying concepts that we may have over complicated throughout our lives. Bringing theology and life experience into each episode. It is our hope and desire to help you in your Christian walk.
King's Banner Podcast
Saul And The Cost Of Self-Rule
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Saul is one of the most unsettling characters in 1 Samuel because he has real moments of clarity, real victories, and real encounters with the Spirit of God and still ends up unraveling. We unpack why Israel’s demand for a king “like the nations” sets the whole tragedy in motion, and how Saul becomes the kind of leader you get when image, fear, and control outrun obedience.
We also talk about the difference between spiritual experiences and spiritual roots. Saul can prophesy, worship, and be visibly moved, yet return to the same default patterns. That takes us into a blunt conversation about the slogan “it’s a relationship, not a religion” and why cutting yourself off from the historic church, discipleship, and long-term formation can leave your faith shallow when pressure hits. If you’ve ever confused adrenaline for maturity, this will recalibrate you.
Then we go straight at the hardest line: “the Lord sent an evil spirit to torment Saul.” We explore divine sovereignty, human responsibility, and spiritual warfare without turning it into a tie game between God and Satan. We connect it to David’s worship music bringing relief, why proclamation and praise matter, and how modern mental health language can sometimes hide spiritual realities we should be willing to name. We close with Saul chasing David, David sparing Saul, and why reconciliation is often the most costly kind of leadership.
If this helped you, subscribe, share it with a friend who cares about biblical leadership and spiritual formation, and leave a review with your biggest question coming out of the conversation.
Monsters, Banter, And King Saul
SPEAKER_01Hey everyone, welcome to Navigate Podcast. I'm here with Justin today. How are you? What's up, buddy? Not much. How are you?
SPEAKER_00I'm good, dude. I had a half a monster about 20 minutes ago. So I should be prime. White monster.
SPEAKER_01Well, naturally, you don't drink anything else.
SPEAKER_00It's the right, it's the right call. I had a peach monster once. Somebody was like, I'm hooked on those now. Not as good. But I don't I don't think there's enough poison in it. You know, the white monster is like pure really like I I made the mistake of looking up at one point all of the chemicals that are on the can, and I was like, this destroys your body, this destroys your body, this destroys your body, this destroys your brain. So if I glitch out halfway through, I'm sorry. It was the monster.
SPEAKER_01Maybe monster is the problem with the guy we're gonna talk about today.
SPEAKER_00I don't know, because I mean it's you know, depending on who you're talking to, it's got 666 on the can. So I'm already, if you listen to this podcast and uh and and you're already in that vein, I'm sorry. You can turn this off now and go with God. Best luck to you. Who are we talking about? We are going to talk about King Saul.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that that bloke. That weird pieces of scripture with this guy. Okay. Like King Saul is an interesting one. Okay. So um, I've been reading through 1 Samuel. Okay. Which is a great book. It's a fantastic book. There's so many stories in there that are just it's really weird to me that it's 1 Samuel and there is even a 2 Samuel because Samuel the prophet dies midway through 1 Samuel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So, you know, totally it's really named after the time that he was presiding as a judge. Like most people don't think of Samuel as a judge, but technically he was a judge.
SPEAKER_01But I mean, you could have called 2 Samuel the book of David.
SPEAKER_00He's also, I think, one of the last prophets that was called a seer, which is kind of cool. Because prophets used to be called seers and then they changed them exclusively to prophets. Question is, was there a separation? Was a seer and a prophet a separate way that they heard from God? One got like auditory and one just saw visions. I don't know.
SPEAKER_01I actually at some point want to talk about that too, because the old testament says, and then God said to him a lot of times.
Israel Demands A King
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Sometimes it's visions, sometimes it's like like uh write this down. I'm gonna tell you what I want to say. You know what I mean? So like Jeremiah got dictation, you know, which is crazy. It's wild. Yeah. Wish that would happen to me. Just tell me what to do, send me a text message. Yeah, I mean, it would be kind of the equivalent of that today. You know what I mean? Like they're using tablets and pads for us and be like, I sent God's like I sent you an email. Oh man. Downloaded it from the cloud. High priority. Urgent. God here. Yeah. Uh-huh. Just wanted to let you know. I'm so sorry. I I have derailed us. What's uh so talk to me about Saul. What's fascinating? What have you been? What did you want to chat about?
SPEAKER_01So Saul comes from a time when Israel is like, hey, we want a king.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And God's like, no, you don't. And they're like, no, no, we do. Um, we're ready. We're I promise we're ready. Everybody else has a king. We want to be just like that. Yeah. Yeah. Which don't do it. But they did. Uh so God anoints God has Samuel anoint Saul as king. Um, he has sends Saul out. Um basically gives them their way. Yeah, gives them a way. He tells them it's gonna suck.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And then it does.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Imagine that. Um they pick the the handsome, super tall, they pick Jason Mamoa to be their king, basically.
SPEAKER_01But God picks him. Like God does it by lot. Or so let's talk about that.
SPEAKER_00I think he gives them what they want.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00You know what I mean? I think God's like, if if this is what you're looking for, you're looking at other countries, you're looking at the way that they do things. Here you go. Here's the here's the here's the you know, the baseball card player that you're looking for that you think is gonna be fantastic. He's taller than everyone, he's handsome, he's from a kingly tribe, you know what I mean? It's the they got, I think they got everything that they wanted on the baseball card. And um, he is exactly what you would get. He's even the first edition. Yeah, I mean, it's like the principle right off the bat, you know, just the poll for anybody is if you push God long enough, he'll give you what you want, and you're gonna find out that's actually like wrath, it's not a good thing, it's gonna suck. Like it doesn't get it doesn't get better, uh, it gets worse very quickly.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and so talk more about that. So God has Samuel anoint Saul, and it's refers to King Saul at that point as God's anointed several times throughout the book.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um even though he's God's anointed, you you would contest that he's really just the pick of the people overall.
Gifted Leadership With A Rebellious Heart
Saul Prophesies Without Deep Roots
SPEAKER_00I think that uh God's gifts and abilities and what he wants to give to somebody uh ultimately will amplify what's on the inside of a man. So if uh, you know, look, how many how many charlatans are out there? You know what I mean? And and you have to ask the question, how how much of it started maybe with something close to the real thing? How many people actually like had an experience with God? God gave them some gifts and some abilities, maybe they prayed for some people and saw some legit healings and things happen, and after a while, they started fabricating. It wasn't enough, so I have to do this, and this wasn't enough, so I have to do that. And I'll keep the mysticism and I'll keep the name and I'll keep saying the same stuff, but I've been doing it on my own power, you know what I mean, and in my own might for a very long time. Um, trying to make it work. You got the the kind of Wizard of Oz thing going on at some point with the Benny Hins of the world and uh the Sean Bowles of the world, and the you know, there's there's a lot of I mean we talked about false prophets just recently or false teachers just recently. So if you haven't listened to the episode, you can go back and give it a go. But uh, I do think um you see the spirit of God fall on messy people all the time. Uh some like one of the things that's hilarious is is Saul will do this thing. Well, randomly he's trying to go do something he shouldn't, and uh a worship service breaks out and the spirit of the Lord hits him, and he just has to stop what he's doing and worship and praise God, which is hilarious to me. Uh again, another reason to uh realize that um you your idea of your own supreme um free will uh maybe not the case in what you see in scripture frequently. But yeah, I mean, God gives him gifts, he puts his spirit on him to be able to lead and do stuff, but uh this this um the heart of Saul is one that ultimately uh wants to build for himself and do things himself. Um the the Bible talks about the spirit of rebellion being as the sin of witchcraft, or the sin of rebellion being as the sin of witchcraft, and you you end up seeing Saul starting in a place of rebellion in the way that he does things, and then he lands at the feet of the witch of Endor later on, right? Like it's that same rebellious spirit from Satan that doesn't want to do what God has told you to do that will land you snack dab at the hands of the king of rebellion himself, right? So you have this arc kind of going on, but it does start with God giving them what they want and giving Saul an anointing to be able to lead. And he sees some victories, he sees some good stuff happen, he he gets to get some, you know, he liberates the the people of Israel in a couple of different battles and does some cool stuff, but ultimately doesn't like waiting on God or allowing God to lead. And um, when you decide that uh your calling and your gifting is enough and you can take care of things, uh it's gonna go downhill quickly, man. Like even in my own life and in the life of other people I know, um when it comes to preaching, counseling, teaching people, discipling people, the second that you get really comfortable with it and think you're awesome and that I just got it in the bag, there's a there's a loss of the reliance on the spirit there that should make you concerned. Like the second you think I got this figured out, nah, I don't you know what I mean? Like I don't know how to explain this to you, but the first time I ever preached, man, I wanted to die. I was like, I'm gonna throw up. I think the first sermon I ever preached, I had 40 pages, you know what I mean? Oh my god. And I think it was five, maybe 10 minutes. You know what I mean? Like that was that was what I did. You know what I mean? And and I got done, and I was like, oh, it was awesome because a guy came up to me afterwards and he just got wrecked. And I got to pray for him and share with him, and I was like, man, God really made up the difference where I sucked at it. But even guys like Spurgeon, um, famously when he would walk up to the pulpit, would be saying, I believe in the Holy Spirit, I believe in the Holy Spirit, I believe in the Holy Spirit with every step that he took because he was living under the weight of his own ability to do this apart from God. You know, and there's a there's a reliance on the Holy Spirit that we're supposed to have. And the gifting comes um as a blessing when the reliance on God is there. But the gifts of God given to somebody who is not reliant on God will end up being curses to that person because they will be used uh for their own demise in the long game. Okay, so let's dig into that a little bit.
SPEAKER_01You mentioned, you know, Saul would be trying to go do something and then worship would break out and he would be forced to worship. So there's there's a spot early on, I think it's either just before or just after he's anointed king, where he's going to, I believe he's going to talk to Samuel, and several people before him go to talk and end up, um, there's like the spirit of the Lord is over that area, and they everybody who goes there starts prophesying in the name of the Lord. And it says, and Saul did the same, and he prophesied the name of the Lord, and he um I think it even it says something about him being a changed man from that day. Yeah. Um what I want to dig into that a little bit. What is it what does it mean when it says he was prophesying to the Lord? What does it mean when it says he was a changed man? Because he obviously wasn't not that much.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, so you you have uh a couple of times in scripture um where you see somebody is like the spirit of God comes on them and they begin to prophesy. Uh this usually isn't talking about in the prophetic sense, where they are suddenly uh foretelling something that's happening down the road, or he began to give prophecies about something that was happening. This is uh this is a declaration of the Lord's goodness, more like a praise and worship and and um giving God glory in in you know song and in prayer and everything else. Guy just got um man, I'm trying to think what the best way to say it is just wrecked by God.
SPEAKER_01So we're not we're not gonna have a first and second Saul book come with all his prophecies, huh?
SPEAKER_00Not coming to theaters soon. Yeah, I mean it's an interesting thing, man. Um, like this this picture of somebody who's able to be in the presence of God, like the spirit of God is in this place. This person shows up and begins to do all the things that a real born-again believer would do. You know what I mean? He's singing, he's praising, he might have tears in his eyes streaming down his face and is declaring the goodness of God, but then leaves and like still falls off the wagon, isn't doing what he's supposed to be doing, isn't going the direction that he's supposed to be going. We brought up Hebrews uh six, four through six uh a couple of weeks ago. But this idea of this person who is tasted of the Holy Spirit, you know what I mean, is tasted of the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and still turns around and rejects God and walks the opposite direction.
SPEAKER_01Like, yeah, it's it sounds very much like you're talking about he, you know, worshiping God, praising God, having tears and all that. The other one that comes to mind is Esau.
Relationship Versus Religion Debate
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it says, you know, the Lord couldn't find repentance, he sought it with tears, right? Yeah, yeah. I think um, I think there's a lot of people who can be in the presence of the manifest, uh, the manifest spirit of God, if you want to say it that way, the the the manifest presence of God, where man, you can tell something is something is going on here that is real. God's presence has dropped in an awesome way. And some people don't even like that language because they're like, the spirit's with us all the time. Yeah, but there's specific times in scripture where it talks about the glory of the Lord descending or the manifest presence of God happening, which is why David says things in one psalm, like, where can I go from your presence? If I make my bed in Sheol or if I arise on the wings of dawn. And then in another psalm, he's like, Don't take your spirit from me, don't take your presence from me. What you know, where can I find you? I'm seeking your face. Where did you go? Well, we're what he's ultimately talking about is like the presence of God. That I want to be in the presence of God. I want to be in that place where my heart is just in fuego and I'm pursuing him and I'm making much of him. But I gotta tell you, it's not enough. Like, you don't need listen, young Christians, especially, you don't need more adrenaline. You need more heart. You don't need more monster energy drink. Okay, you need roots. Like, can I I'm gonna bring something up real quick. Okay, all right. A phrase that drives me insane that I understand that gets said all the time. It's not a religion, it's a relationship. Okay, and listen, it's well-meaning. This person is trying to say it's a personal relationship that I have with God that is truly changed who I am as an individual. It's not just structure, struct a structural religion that I'm walking into and participating in something that isn't personal to me. It's it's it's abstract. Um, the problem with that is what you're saying is the 2,000 years of roots and wisdom and writing and clarity and the blood of the martyrs and everything else that has gone to putting that book in your hand and this teaching in your church and this community that we're fighting for, and the glory of God that we're seeing, and the evangelism that went into that wasn't one personal's personal relationship with uh person's personal relationship with Jesus. It was the church. The religion is ultimately sharing the the roots of what we have and what has been built in the covenant community of God, the body of Christ that existed for all this time. And every time somebody wants to make it a personal relationship, which it is, it is what you're actually doing is undercutting thousands of years of blood, sweat, tears, and hard work to build good godly structures that would honor Christ, to make much of his bride and engage the world. And when we do this like personal Christianity thing um in isolation like that, what we're actually doing is disenfranchising the, I think, the rest of history and the church and everything that's come before us in the name of what means the most to me in this moment, which is very like Disney. It's very existential, it's very like um uh, you know, uh I'm I'm aerial, I'm not going to believe my dad, I'm gonna go find my own way. You know, you could say it's rebellious. Yeah. I mean, okay, it's it's not just rebellious. I think it's more like selfish and naive. Yeah. So when somebody comes to Christ and they've been part of an organization and they have a real moment where where, man, the Lord regenerates their heart and they get it. They're like, oh my gosh, I understand now. Like, I this is real. He actually wants a relationship with me. Like I'm growing this, praise God. But it has to grow from there. It's a bit like when you become a father, marriage was great. It's fantastic. Now I'm realizing, oh, it also means more. Yeah. Now I have multiple kids. Oh, it's even more. Now I'm actually active in this job, and I have people that work under me here. And I have, I have this church, and I'm serving on these teams and working with these people and doing these things. It's about responsibility that I have because what Christ has given to me to honor, build up, and pour into these different spheres. And now I'm fathering people. And if you want to be like, it's just a relationship, no, no, no, no, no. I don't think you understand. This relationship affects everything and has 2,000 years of roots, which is what makes it a religion. And I don't mean putting it in the spectrum of every other religion and it's all the same. No, no, this religion is fundamentally different and true, and it's been defended for all of this time. You can trust it, you can lean into it, you can grow from it, and you will never stop reading the content and the hearts of people who are on fire for God in this process. So I think sometimes when we say it's not a religion, it's a relationship. What we are talking to people about or communicating on accident is the dating culture that we have today, where I'm looking for sparks to fly and to feel really good, but I'm not really looking for something solid that's going to last and carry me through into marriage and into kids and everything else. So I bring that up to say Saul's whole relationship or this moment where he's prophesying and he's saying these things is not necessarily saying he was definitely saved and he got it and his heart was transformed. I think you can come into the presence of God with the people of God who are getting after it. And I think God can bring praise out of anybody that he wants to at any time, but that does not mean that person's heart was ultimately changed or they really wanted to go that direction. Sometimes, um, sometimes you're overcome by something that's happening and you can really feel like you're engaged in it and then just drop off entirely. And you go to the parable of the seeds or the sower or whatever and talk about it more if you want to. But um, this particular topic is one of those ones where it's worth reminding people just because you had a spiritual experience does not mean you have the roots that you need to actually sustain your relationship with God or something more. And if your relationship with God is only ever personal or autonomous in nature and not connected to the corporate body of Christ, it's probably not the real thing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00The the real thing takes its stand with the family, the real thing pours into the rest of the body, and the real thing is changed and transformed by the rest of the body. And so if your religion um uh is rooted in Christ, then you're fine. If it's a relationship that is not rooted in the religion that you're coming out of, you are uh you are at risk of being blown away with the rest of the chaff. So there's that's for free. Sorry for that rant.
SPEAKER_01No, it was good, and it it builds on a point I have that I think we'll talk about at some point on a whole episode, which is okay, language and words mattering. And they matter specifically. This is this is my own soapbox that I like to get out from time to time. But pointing to the word religion and how the phrase it's a relationship, not a religion, kind of cheats the word religion out of its depth and out of out of its meaning. Yeah. And you know, you yes, you have false religions, yeah, but the word we often should use for those would be cult.
SPEAKER_00I believe the word religion means to to bind, right? To bind together. I think is that accurate? I think so. Positive correct. But yeah. Yeah, it's um it's again, uh, we're not I'm not uh I'm not saying all religions are equal, like completely the opposite. Yeah, I think in a world where everything is the next entertainment or the next big thing or the next explosion, all the movies have moved away from like good gritty dialogue and great storylines to explosion in CGI. We're getting more stupid and less roots every day in the name of the superfluous. And it it that's that's that cannot be your Christianity. And unfortunately, I do think a lot of people who get that um some of that gifting or some of that thing in the moment, uh, and then get put in a leadership position are perfectly positioned to plunge the entire thing into the depths of despair. Some sometimes, um man, I mean, this is why, you know, you don't lay your hands on somebody too hastily or put them in a position of authority too quickly, and you this is why an elder is supposed to be the husband of a wife and leads his household well, because if he can't run his household, he can't run the household of God. What is it saying? Why don't you wait and see? Yeah. Time tells all. And even in that uh text in Hebrews 4, verse 6, it's talking about the ground that gets the rain and the sun and like all this stuff happens. It's the same ground, different, you know, you can see seeds popping up, all of it looks good. Time is the thing that's gonna tell which one is bearing fruit and which one is producing thorns. Yeah, and uh we need to be thoughtful about it. So absolutely, yeah.
Saul’s Leadership Failure Before Goliath
SPEAKER_01Um digging back into Paul or Saul, yeah, there is a moment that we talk about as a church a lot, but we never talk about it in the context of Saul. And that's when Goliath storms in with this army of Philistines and he's giving this challenge. And we always see David coming in after after Goliath's been doing this challenge and jumping in and being the hero and all that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I want to talk about what the heck was Saul doing during this and why like hoping somebody would save him, bro. Yeah, like he's ostensibly king. Yeah, he's supposed to be leading these armies, doing something. What why are they why is he punting? Why? What is he doing here? And is there is there a good excuse for his apathy or lack of motivation here?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great um it's a great picture of poor leadership. You know what I mean? Everybody has the jokes about management, right? It's like they're on the sleigh um whipping the people to get them to go forward. You know what I mean? Uh everybody knows that good leaders go first. Everybody knows that good leaders are the example that we're supposed to follow. And this leader was on his laurels asking somebody else to do it, and lo and behold, the rest of the army of Israel is also on their laurels asking for somebody else to do it. Um I can't imagine Saul at that point uh feeling shameful or guilty of anything. I think he sincerely believed that it was somebody else's job, and he was really worried that somebody wasn't going to show up to make it happen. I mean, and even in even in the story with, you know, with Samuel and everything, or or even with David later on, he's relying on David to fight his battles for him. He's relying on Samuel to make sure that he feels this particular way. You know, it's it's always um it's always him relying on somebody else to make decisions. And uh it's it's important to note that, man, when you have to make a hard decision one way or another, the most important thing is that you actually make a decision.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I've felt the weight of that um in in the last year, year and a half, especially. Uh sometimes you're gonna be in a place where a decision has to be made. There may not be a clear this way or that way. Have the courage to make the call. Like sometimes you're just gonna have to make a decision. And the longer you wait on uh somebody else to try to come in and make that decision for you, the less of a leader and the less um you're showing other people your ability to lead. But in this moment, yeah, he's sitting on his laurels, and because of that, the rest of Israel is doing the same thing and acting like we're waiting for somebody, you know, somebody to come and save us. And uh that anointing, the the blessing, the spirit of God that God placed on his life ultimately goes to waste and doesn't get used, you know, because he's too afraid to show up and actually do something with it. Yeah. Which is, I think a lot of people.
SPEAKER_01Unfortunately, I think you're right. And you know, the back to your point about making a decision, you may not know what the right decision is, but not making a decision is the wrong decision.
Critique Culture And Courage To Act
SPEAKER_00Yeah, not making a decision is still uh in in a sense some kind of decision, right? It's just trying to remove yourself from the responsibility of being king in that moment, right? And um, yeah, man, I I think um when we're looking at the story of Saul, what we're looking at is a case study on ultimately what not to do both directions. For as a leader, this is what I should not be doing, and as a follower, uh, this is what I should not be doing. I should not be asking for other people to fight my battles. I shouldn't be looking to the world to give me examples of what a good leader is. Uh oh man. Ooh, Santa. Yeah, all right. Um our world today is obsessed with looking at case studies of leadership everywhere and then coming up with a hypothetical perfect person who should be the best leader. Um, look, the Bible is supposed to share with us uh ways to learn, ways to grow, and who we're meant to be. It's not supposed to be the thing that um helps us feel vindicated and roasting everybody else for being a poor leader. Um and whether it's the rise and fall of Mars Hill, whether it's um smoking any other pastor that's made mistakes, whether it's doing a whole hit piece on Robbie Zacharias or whatever it may be, I'm not saying that we shouldn't call out bad things when they happen. I am saying oftentimes our world is looking for Jesus and is amazed that we can't find him. You know, like I don't understand why, you know, this eldership structure or these pastors have this particular problem. It's like, well, uh, I think, I think we look at everyone in the world. You know, and I mean, we have access to see everybody's perfect life and the perfect way that they do things and the perfect picture they post only at these strategic times and these strategic places, because don't look at actually my whole life, or you might be horrified at this going on or that going on, and then are amazed when we see that something is off with someone else.
SPEAKER_01It's you know, it's that um mentality of people who've been hurt by the church over and over, and they're like, all these churches, they all have you know, I can't keep going to church because the people there are imperfect.
Did God Send An Evil Spirit
SPEAKER_00It's like no duh. I'll say it a million times, man. Um, those who don't do anything will always justify their inaction by critiquing those who do. That is always the case. It's I I I'm not going to put myself at risk, um, you know what I mean, or put myself out there or try to do what I know I should do, but I'll validate it by pointing at everybody else who isn't doing a good job. And that's my job is to point out everybody else's mistakes. And it's like, no, bro. Uh Doug Wilson has this quote I love about this. He says, the uh uh dangerous men come first, careful men come later, and write about what the dangerous men did. You know, and uh did the dangerous men do it perfectly? No. Like one of my favorite guys is uh Abraham Kuyper, and I just a fireball, amazing, such a great speaker, almost uh almost in some ways a Christian political figure at the time. Dude wrote some things that were outright contradictory at some points. He said some things that were kind of off in different areas, like I don't think that's right, or I would do it that way. That's okay. Yeah, more I'm not looking for him to be Jesus. I'm not looking for John Calvin to be Jesus. I'm not looking for John Wesley to be Jesus. I'm looking to see Jesus in that person and recognize that the rest of it may not be totally perfect and there's going to be some mess there, but you have to do something. You have to go out and do something. And so many people are afraid of going out and doing something and then justifying their lack of action by just critiquing everybody else in the process. I really don't like hit piece podcasts for that reason. I don't like the podcast that's just commentary on where everybody else went wrong. Look, no, let's go back. I'm gonna do this as a conception because I'm about to do the thing that I'm saying you probably shouldn't do. Um, but we're doing it from a, I guess. That there's uh okay, so um I think I think his name is Justin Peters. Do you know who Justin Peters is? Sounds familiar. Okay, so he's a guy who um is like cripple and true brother in Christ. All right, he loves Jesus, he loves the gospel, he's far more knowledgeable than I am about um a lot of the doctrines of grace and different things. He um he spends, I feel like the majority of ministry online just critiquing other people. Like I feel like he so he came out of it because he is like cripple. He started off, I think, in the charismatic movement and went from church to church trying to get healed and then realized that like this is a farce and then went a different direction entirely, which was this never happens, those things don't happen anymore. I'm gonna spend the majority of my ministry pointing at how other people do it wrong. And I'm just like, I just don't think that's I don't think that's what we're supposed to be doing. Now, again, I'm sitting here talking about a podcast and saying what we shouldn't be doing. So I'm I'm I'm outing myself a little bit right off the bat. The irony is now lost on that. But I do think it's important that um we're not looking for Jesus when we look, you know, uh we're not looking for the person of Christ when we look to a person. We're looking to see the work of Christ through uh a broken person. Yeah, and um, you know, so when we look at the life of Saul, we can still see, man, God gave him a lot. He did a lot of amazing things, and that dude just didn't show up for any of it or had his own heart the entire time and wanted to go a different direction. But that was ultimately what the people of Israel wanted, and God gave it to them. So yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, and then another thing that happened to him, and this one is an interesting one, um, is it says that um God sent an evil spirit to torment Saul. Yeah. Let's let's dig into that. Okay.
SPEAKER_00Did God commit evil? Is the is the Bible serious when it says that? Yeah, yeah, that turns out there's not a cosmic wrestling or arm wrestling match between Satan and God. Um even evil spirits are uh unable to, let's say, worm their way out of the sovereign will of God and what he wants to get done. And if somebody is walking towards sin and walking towards stupidity, he will absolutely um he will absolutely allow spirits and even send things your direction to give you a wake-up call or remind you of what you should be doing or to give you over to the very thing that you shouldn't be doing. You want to go that way, you want to live that way, here you go. Go ahead. Yeah, help them get there, expedite the process. Now, I don't think God places evil into the hearts of men, um, but I do believe that uh God absolutely is able to command even wicked spirits to go do something if he wants them to.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And you see it um a couple of times in scripture. One one time you see it is in the story of Micaiah, and um there's uh there's a particular circumstance, and and uh there's some, let's say, uh I'm trying to think of the best way that you want to say this, some unsavory spirits that are um in the heavenlies, and God is saying, Okay, these guys want to go do something shady. Who uh who's gonna help them get that done? Who's gonna help give them over to the way that they want it done? And uh one spirit steps up and says, I'll do it. And God basically says, What's your plan? And he says, I'll go be a lying spirit in these false prophets to help reinforce the bad thing that he wants to do. And God says, Go for it. I think that's fascinating to me. I mean, like you get the you get the um the curtains pulled back a little bit a couple of times where you get to see into the heavenlies and what's actually going on. And if you think like it's God and it's the devil, and God is in some chess match with the devil, you're absolutely wrong. You have Satan, he's wicked, he's evil, he's fallen, and yet he is never able to do anything outside of what God ultimately is allowing to bring about his purposes. And if you're like he can't do that, well, Satan killed Jesus, and turns out that was part of the plan. That was part of what he wanted to bring out, and how he was gonna have that done. So if you're sitting there like, oh well, Satan fell into his trap, yes, but it was also part of God's process to bring those things about. Again, we have human responsibility and divine sovereignty, and everybody's ah, just here's what I want you to know: both are true, both things are happening, they're both going on at the same time. And uh, yeah, you have you have evil spirits that God uh will allow and send to those who are walking a different direction and doing wicked things that they shouldn't to torment them, which is wild. Yeah, like God's like, you know what you get a sight of with sin? Torment. Here you go. That's how that works. And what's what's more mind-blowing to me in that story is that David plays some some wicked, you know, riffs and uh the spirit stopped bugging him. Like that to me is more crazy.
SPEAKER_01You oftentimes love talking about music and the spiritual power that can be within it, the effects that it actually has.
Worship Music And Spiritual Authority
SPEAKER_00I mean, it's it's just crazy to me that it's like he had the ability to play music and and the um the spirit wasn't able to torment him anymore. Like I I tell people who got weird stuff going on in their homes and things, I'm like, I would be blasting worship music in your home all the time. I would just have it playing. You don't need a burn sage, you just need somebody proclaiming the name of Jesus with some with some sweet music. Play it, play the mortification of sin, you know, and you'll be fine.
SPEAKER_01What's funny to me is how often do you get people who resist doing that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And and like what what's the problem? Yeah, man why why would you like I need help with this problem? Okay, try this. No, I'm not gonna try that. It might work.
SPEAKER_00That when you first get saved, and even when you're not saved, Christian music seems like the most cringe thing in the world to you. Like, I don't know anyone who's a non-Christian who listens to Christian music. Yeah, I know lots of Christians who will listen to non-Christian music, but non-Christians won't listen to Christian music. It's not something that they're interested in. It's not it, it doesn't hit right. And I think that there's legitimately spirits involved in how these things are made. They are, you know what I mean? And it's like, this is uh, you know what I mean. When when um, you know, when when uh the disciples are asking Jesus, can we call down fire on these people and smoke them? And he's like, You don't know what spirit you're of. He's like, I don't think you understand where that thought is coming from. This is coming from somewhere else entirely. And I think the reason that a lot of uh music will do something for you, um, in one sense, is because it's written by people who are of the same spirit. And then you're trying to listen to something who that's from somebody who's not of that same spirit and it feels off or it feels corny or it's just not doing what it used to do. And I gotta tell you, there's a bunch of music that I used to listen to, I can't listen to anymore. Yeah. Not just because I shouldn't, it doesn't hit the same way. Yeah. Like it feels like this used to do something for me. It doesn't do it anymore. Why? Because I'm not driven by the same kind of thing. And I really do think there's something more uh more serious behind the idea of music and what it's actually doing and who's writing it that that produces something. We could have a whole long conversation because I do think there's um there's a lot of nuance there and a lot of different aspects of what we could talk about and lyrically and musically and all those different things. But um clearly, the music that David was playing, where it was coming from, and you have to consider this. It wasn't just that he was like plucking some strings on the harps and it went away. What is the largest book in the Bible? The Psalms. We have a massive, well, actually, I think I think it might be Jeremiah, might be the longest book, but the uh just a massive treasury of Psalms. Well, what was David working on? Poetry. He was singing. Everything that that guy did was praise and was worship, and so he's going in there and he's playing the harp and he's singing, and it turns out the evil spirits don't like the declaration and and you know, somebody giving glory to God and praise to God, right? And suddenly they leave him and go away. That's that's powerful, but that's wild.
Demons, Diagnosis, And Deliverance
SPEAKER_01Um the other aspect of this evil spirit I want to talk about. Yeah, and it's not just Saul here, but kind of the bigger topic of all right, the evil spirits that came upon Saul and he had these fits. Yeah, it very much seems like what the world today would call like schizophrenia. Yeah, bipolarism or bipolarism. Or like let's let's meddle. Okay, let's talk about that.
SPEAKER_00So I think um boy. Okay, I'll just go for it. So I think today um we don't uh see demons because we medicate them and we've given them names. Uh we have a taxonomy of behaviors that we've created around um, you know, the the let's say the the psychological system that exists so that we can try to cure it naturalistically by throwing chemicals at the brain that will counteract some of the behaviors that would come out of somebody otherwise. Um people often have this idea like people aren't really possessed by demons, or if it does, that that happens very, very infrequently or whatever. And do I think sometimes somebody's brain in a fallen world is just legitimately broken? Yeah, I do. I I think uh I'm not saying every case of something going on is the case, but I do think that there is a serious um problem where churches have handed over uh what's going on in some people's lives that probably in the past we would have said is that's probably demonic. Seems like there's something else attached to this, and basically said, no, this is definitely a medical, uh, this is definitely a medical condition. And it's almost a kind of Gnosticism. Yeah. You don't know. The church couldn't speak into this particular aspect of things. This is a this is uh this is a medical field industry thing only. You know what I mean? And and you work on people's souls, but if there's behaviors that are attached to some of these things, it has to be purely medical. And what's funny is you get this the other direction too, because some people are like, oh, the church used to, you know, do this and do that, and clearly this dude just had this problem. What's funny is a lot of people are like, oh, they used to say he had a demon. We now know it was bipolar. And I'm like, pretty sure he had a demon. Yeah. Yeah, pretty sure that was the case. Again, not every circumstance. I do think sometimes people's brains are broken, but I would go out of my way to say I think majority of the mental health world and what we talk about has far more to do with sin, far more to do with an addiction to darkness, and far more to do with uh spirits uh than anyone wants to give it credit for right now. And as a church, I feel like we are wholly unequipped to think about it that way because we have uh had our brains co-opted by a naturalistic way of thinking.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I would agree. And I would I would even push a little bit further and say, you're you're right. There's probably some people with broken brains, but I don't think it is ever necessary to prescribe Adderall to children to correct ADHD. Yeah, like I might I might get some people real mad at me about this one.
SPEAKER_00There's some people right now who are like ADHD doesn't even exist. It's not even a thing.
SPEAKER_01It's not a thing, it's not a thing. I do not believe it is a thing. And look, you can tell me, well, Adderall or or whatever these drugs really helped me. Yeah, because they completely suppressed you as a person, you know what else would have helped? Yeah actually going out and doing what you were made to be as like a child and there's a lady like doing all these things, um diagnosed with bipolar and schizophrenia.
SPEAKER_00And uh I got to take her through um kind of a deliverance process, man. It didn't start that way, that wasn't my intention. But um, eyes rolled up in the back of her head while we're working through some prayers and just praying through some stuff. Uh, some like another voice is coming out of her in the conversation. We work through that together. I want to be careful what I say because I think it's really important that we respect people in some of these circumstances. And I'm not into the let's make a massive show of it and try to prove to the world that this is the case. What I want you to know is uh she had a demonic spirit. She got freed from that. She didn't have to take any medication after that, and all the weird behaviors that she had immediately went away. She got baptized. It was awesome. That's awesome. That's so freaking cool when those kinds of things happen. So, any anybody who's skeptical or is like, I don't know about this or I don't know about that, I would say, man, I want you to know there's far more going on uh behind the scenes, and you can't medicate Satan. Yeah, you can't medicate demons. You can pacify some of the behaviors that they produce, but at that point, you're treating symptoms, not the actual problem. And again, I'll just reiterate sometimes, yes, there's legitimate things going on. So if you're sitting here super frustrated by the up by this episode, I want to encourage you to take a deep breath, pray through it, and think through the reality that when you look in scripture, you see these things happening behind the scenes all the time. You see that people have demons. These things are manifesting, this stuff is going on, and then we get into our world today and we're like, that would never happen in our society. Good night. Yeah. I mean, when you see the stuff that's happening, some of the people in our prison systems, and and we feel a better, you know, we feel better about things if we can give it a medical name, but that doesn't change the the reality of what I think Jesus would say that thing is if he was here right now. And and we should know things from their fruit when we look at it, and we should not neglect the spiritual reality that there are forces of darkness that exist in our world today. And when you remove the the term sin and just call it conditioning, and you remove the term spirits and you just call it uh and and you, you know, you you give um whatever medical term you want to it, and you remove the term for uh deliverance or freedom or casting out, and you replace it with medication. You shouldn't be surprised if you have long-term real serious problems that are going to continue on in society in light of those things.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So man, that was a we could probably do a whole episode on that, and I could be I could dig into even some statistics because there's a couple of really good books on this topic that are pretty solid.
Saul’s Cycles And David’s Restraint
SPEAKER_01I think we should. Listeners, if you would like to hear more on this subject, let us know. Let us know. Um one other thing, one or two other things about Saul that I kind of want to dig into. And yeah, this one might be related to that evil spirit or evil spirits coming upon him. But there's a couple of times where Saul goes after David to kill him. Yeah. And David has him in his grasp and lets him go and lets him go.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And what I want to dig into there specifically is Saul says, Oh, thank you for your mercy. I forgive you. I'll kill you later. I'm not I'm never gonna kill you. I'm not gonna kill you. And then two chapters later, he's doing what's happening there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You're saying what's happening in the mind of Saul? Yeah, what's happening in the mind of Saul that he's He's like, why isn't this actually changing?
SPEAKER_00Like I think Saul in the moment um has a vivid clarity on what's actually happening and who he is, which quickly gets clouded by ultimately what he wants. In a lot of people's lives, they have this idea of who they want to be, um, the person that they want to become, the the hero that you have in your head, the best version of yourself that you have in your head that you're shooting for that you fall short of. Almost every person has this, but um also knows that they come radically short of that because they have a whole nother desire, which is the things that I want to do more than I want to become this particular person in the moment. The the uh the the motivation to become that particular person apart from the spirit of God, I think will always come up short. You don't have the ability to full on become what you were meant to be unless the spirit of God is producing that life and that truth in you that is going to produce that outcome. And I think with um any addict, any person struggling with something, you can kick something for about a month, maybe for really strong three months, and then you're gonna fall right back into the same sins and the same problems, unless you have um something greater driving and pushing you into the person that you're meant to be and what that's supposed to look like. And I think Saul is the perfect example of I'm gonna quit. Uh, I'm gonna be done with that, I'm not doing that anymore, or I'm finally gonna be this kind of person. Uh I'm not I'm not living that way anymore. I'm gonna change my life, I'm gonna do these things. And it's I went through these steps or I went through this program. But unless there's something real that you're anchored to that's producing life in you, you're gonna, you're going to fall back into your default, which is selfishness and comfort. And Saul, uh, as much as he has these high point moments where he has vivid clarity and reminds his heart who we wanted to be when he was a little kid, ultimately is going to be a byproduct of his habits. You know, it's that quote I love to say it, right? Like people don't decide their futures, they decide their habits and their habits decide their futures for them. I think it's James Clear. I also think Aristotle said the same thing. Um, but we we don't have the ability to rise above um who we are unless something that is bigger than us uh is working in us to produce that. And so unless you really have legitimate salvation, uh, I just don't think you're gonna be able to rise above um the things and the behaviors and the processes that you're walking through in your life that are taking you away from that. Now, here's what I would say selfishness is a great motivation too. So some people beat one aspect of selfishness by replacing it with another form of selfishness. Um, by this I mean, hey, I stopped um, you know, taking this particular uh whatever unsavory thing it might be, uh, because I'm making a lot of money now. Okay, great, good. You know what I mean? Like I've just replaced one addiction with another.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, I've I've heard of people who like growing up, especially like people who are cutting themselves. And it's like, well, you know, I'm gonna turn to alcohol because at least I'm not cutting myself, or I'm gonna turn to the weed because that means I'm not gonna be drinking as much.
SPEAKER_00And it's like you're you were you're just replacing the thing. Yeah, it's funny. People that have that now that I'm trying to think of the actual name of the chemical response, but your body actually produces chemicals when you cut yourself that help you feel better and help you feel relaxed. And it's like, yeah, if you stop doing that and you turn to something else, is it really fixed? No, I just found something else uh in the meantime, something else that's gonna help take the edge off, right? So yeah, I mean, I think what you see there is Saul having a lucid moment, followed by him falling right back into all the habits and patterns and and way that he's lived his life in the past. And it's sad to see because you want to believe. You want to believe that somebody's really gonna change. You want to believe that something's gonna be better. But I will tell you this, Casey, this is my experience. People don't change that much. Um, you want to see the best in them, you want to see them rise above this or do something else, but people don't change that much. The only time I've really seen legitimate true change is when somebody radically gets saved. My life is forever different because I gave my life to God. And whether that started happening in a slow process and you realized halfway down the road, man, I've been walking this out, he's been with me, or it was in a moment. Um, those are the only times where I've actually seen somebody really see lasting, legitimate change in their life that wasn't um uh simulated. So hope that helps.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Awesome. Um, one other thing. Okay. On the flip side of that. Yeah. Do you think David chose not to kill Saul because he kept saying, well, he's God's anointed. Yeah. Do you think the thing in the back of his mind was, well, I'm God's anointed, and if I kill him, that means the next yuts could come along and kill me? It's a great question, man.
SPEAKER_00So here's my answer to this. I don't know if it's true. All right. All right. There's a side of me that thinks David should have just smoked that guy and called it a day. I think David, throughout his entire life, was ultimately hoping for reconciliation. I think you see this with um with Absalom, even with his older, you know, his son later on when he's like, don't kill him. You know what I mean? He's so sad when his son dies. Why? He's so sad when Saul dies. Why? Because I think deep down he really believed or wanted to at some point make reconciliation, make things right, and have the peace that he hoped for. And I think that is the heart of any good leader is not ultimately that I would get my way or get the thing, even in the moment that should be done, but ultimately that there would be reconciliation and that there would be growth and hope and peace in a way where other people don't have to die in the process. And I think if there's one way where I would see David and I would say, how why was he a man after God's own heart? What's God's heart for us? Reconciliation, that we would be brought back in, that people who were enemies and running the opposite direction would ultimately be brought back and placed at his own table to eat his food and share his drink and celebrate with him. So I think um, I think David deep down, and this is my take, I think David deep down really believed and deeply hoped for one day this will be made right, and you're gonna see that this was ridiculous and that I've always had your back and I've always walked with you. One day you're gonna see that. And when that hope goes away, it's heartbreaking. I think that made David live his life a little bit differently. I think that's what kept his hand from falling, what it shouldn't have. Um, and I always think about uh I always think about the the Lord of the Rings there, right? You know, when he's talking, uh you know, um Gandalf is talking to Frodo, right? He has the conversation with Golem when he had the chance, and he's like, you know, you don't know. You don't know the story. Yeah, you know, he was like, it was pity that stayed Bilbo's hand in the first place, right?
SPEAKER_01Like well, and I love the way that's specifically in Lord of the Rings, what Tolkien does is he brings that back around.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And in the movies, we see Frodo push Gollum off the edge. Yeah, in the book, Gollum dances himself off the edge in glee, and it says, Sometimes you need evil to do the good that good cannot do.
Final Takeaways And Goodbye
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. And it's just such a such a fantastic turn of phrase. But I yeah, I I think when we look at that, we see his desire for reconciliation is ultimately what kept those things um from happening and made him lead in a little bit of a different way, which made his difficulty and frustration a heck of a lot longer and more irritating for him. It also reveals to us the heart of God, and I think uh what we should be shooting for as leaders as well. So, man, there's a lot in here. Yeah, it's like we probably have a ton of topics that we could cover on this we could this process. But dude, good topic today. Thanks for bringing it to the forefront and looking forward to the next one. Absolutely. All right, man. All right, have a great week, everybody. Take care.
