Becoming Another Person Louis G. Hulsey July 22, 2012 Casa Grande, Arizona

1 Samuel 10:6 “And the Spirit of the LORD will come upon thee, and thou shalt prophesy with them, and shalt be turned into another man.”  Every conflict has two fronts of battle: the inward conflict and the outward conflict.  Before any person goes into battle he or she must decide if the conflict is worth the fight. Is it a loss worth fighting for? Or is it not worth the conflict? Or is the risk of defeat too great?  Are we so compromised with sin that we choose not to fight?

1 Samuel 10:9-10 “And it was so, that when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another heart: and all those signs came to pass that day. 10, And when they came thither to the hill, behold, a company of prophets met him; and the Spirit of God came upon him, and he prophesied among them.” Saul seemed to be a care-free young man wandering around the country looking for his father’s donkeys.

Saul Becomes King God told Samuel to anoint Saul to be the king of Israel. Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon Saul and he became a different man. When the people were searching for the man God had chosen to be the king, Saul was hiding among the baggage, I Samuel 10:22. Then Samuel publicly presented Saul to Israel as their first king.

Nahash Attacks One month later Nahash the Ammonite besieged the village of Jabesh Gilead. The men of Jabesh had no defenses so they tried to make a treaty with Nahash. Nahash said that the condition of his treaty was that he would gouge out the right eye of all the village of Jabesh and so bring disgrace upon all Israel. The men of Jabesh asked Nahash to give them seven days to reply.

News Arrives to Saul Nahash did not believe Israel could bring anything against his army in seven days so he agreed. The men of Jabesh sent a fast runner to Gibeah where Saul was. 1 Samuel 11:4-5 KJV, “Then came the messengers to Gibeah of Saul, and told the tidings in the ears of the people: and all the people lifted up their voices, and wept. 5, And, behold, Saul came after the herd out of the field; and Saul said, What aileth the people that they weep? And they told him the tidings of the men of Jabesh.”

A New Saul Emerges Saul could have reasoned that Jabesh was a small, insignificant village, and that it would not be a major loss to Israel. But Saul knew that this was a direct insult to the whole nation and that if he did not stop Nahash at Jabesh he would have to fight him somewhere else. The Spirit of the Lord had come upon Saul and he had become another man.

1 Samuel 11:6-7, KJV 6, “And the Spirit of God came upon Saul when he heard those tidings, and his anger was kindled greatly.” 7, “And he took a yoke of oxen, and hewed them in pieces, and sent them throughout all the coasts of Israel by the hands of messengers, saying, Whosoever cometh not forth after Saul and after Samuel, so shall it be done unto his oxen. And the fear of the LORD fell on the people, and they came out with one consent.”

1 Samuel 11:8-9, KJV 8, “And when he numbered them in Bezek, the children of Israel were three hundred thousand, and the men of Judah thirty thousand.” 9, “And they said unto the messengers that came, Thus shall ye say unto the men of Jabeshgilead, To morrow, by that time the sun be hot, ye shall have help. And the messengers came and shewed it to the men of Jabesh; and they were glad.”

I Samuel 11:10-11 10, “Therefore the men of Jabesh said, To morrow we will come out unto you, and ye shall do with us all that seemeth good unto you.” 11, “And it was so on the morrow, that Saul put the people in three companies; and they came into the midst of the host in the morning watch, and slew the Ammonites until the heat of the day: and it came to pass, that they which remained were scattered, so that two of them were not left together.”

Saul Remembered After the Philistines killed Saul and his sons they fastened their bodies to the wall of Beth Shan in Philistia. It was the men of Jabesh Gilead who traveled all night and took down their bodies, returned to Jabesh and buried them under a tamarisk tree.

Crises Change Men On March 4th, 1978, Arizona Governor Wesley Bolin died and Arizona Attorney General Bruce Babbitt became governor of Arizona. Babbitt had always seemed to me to be the rich kid whose parents’ money had sent him to Harvard Law School. He had always seemed to be a little over-confident to me. But a few days after he became governor, Arizona suffered a number of terrible forest fires.

Trial By Fire I recall Mr. Babbitt coming on television looking like he was scared to death. His whole demeanor was changed. He looked like he knew he was responsible for the lives and property of many Arizona citizens. He had been changed into another man.

Trial By Fire Babbitt was never quite the same after that. He served as the governor of Arizona until 1987 and then ran for President, but dropped out of the race early. From 1993 to 2001 he served as the U.S. Secretary of the Interior during Bill Clinton’s administration. In 2001 he returned to private law practice.

Be Transformed Romans 12:2 KJV, “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Ephesians 4:23-24 23, “And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; 24, “And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.”

Be Transformed Many pastors are frustrated by trying to get bad guys to be good, but there is no frustration when those bad guys are transformed by the power of God. We are transformed into the Kingdom of the Son. We are delivered and are no longer part of the kingdom of darkness.

We Are Transformed Colossians 1:12-13 KJV, “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: 13, Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:”  Ephesians 5:8 KJV, “For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light:”

We Are At War When we are transformed into the Kingdom of Light, then we can effectively transform the world. We are in a real war. We must first win the war within ourselves. Then we can win the war for our families and our city.

In Christ We Prevail We must go to war and prevail. It all happens in the prayer closet. Paul lists the weapons of our warfare in Ephesians 6. Paul says we use those weapons by, “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints;” Ephesians 6:18, KJV.