1. Disobedience
1 Samuel 15:22-23

2. Talk is not Obedience
Then Samuel went to Saul, and Saul said to him, “Blessed are you of the Lord! I have performed the commandment of the Lord.”
1 Samuel 15:13

3. Talk is not Obedience “If you love Me, keep My commandments.
John 14:15

4. Talk is not Obedience
But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? 18 My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.
1 John 3:17-18

5. Talk is not Obedience
“But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do the things which I say?
Luke 6:46

6. Partial Obedience is complete disobedience.
A. Saul “obeyed” God with just two exceptions:
1. Agag the King
2. The best of the flocks and herds.

7. Partial Obedience is complete disobedience.
Saul’s partial obedience was complete disobedience.
“I greatly regret that I have set up Saul as king, for he has turned back from following Me, and has not performed My commandments.” And it grieved Samuel, and he cried out to the Lord all night.
1 Samuel 15:11

8. Partial Obedience is complete disobedience.
Saul’s partial obedience was complete disobedience.
But Samuel said to Saul, “I will not return with you, for you have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you from being king over Israel.”
1 Samuel 15:26

9. Partial Obedience is complete disobedience.
If one does many good works, but never obeys the gospel, is that obedience?

10. Worthy objectives do not justify disobedience
And Saul said, “They have brought them from the Amalekites; for the people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen, to sacrifice to the Lord your God; and the rest we have utterly destroyed.”
1 Samuel 15:15

11. Worthy objectives do not justify disobedience
But the people took of the plunder, sheep and oxen, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.”
1 Samuel 15:21

12. Worthy objectives do not justify disobedience
B. In matters of worship we:
1. Encourage people to “dance to the glory of
God?”
2. Shall we use mechanical instruments of music
to “God’s glory?”
3. Shall we let trained chords to the singing?

13. Worthy objectives do not justify disobedience
What does God want?
So Samuel said: “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, As in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice,
And to heed than the fat of rams.
1 Samuel 15:22

14. Majority action does not justify disobedience
Then Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned, for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord and your words, because I feared the people and obeyed their voice.
1 Samuel 15:24

15. Majority action does not justify disobedience
You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; nor shall you testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after many to pervert justice.
Exodus 23:2

16. Conclusion 1. The root cause of Saul’s disobedience
a. An inflated opinion of himself
b. No feeling of a personal relationship with
God.
But the people took of the plunder, sheep and oxen, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.” Samuel 15:21

17. Conclusion
2. The rebellion of 1 Samuel 15 is not an isolated event in Saul’s life. It is part of a pattern.
3. Saul’s own disobedience had severed his relationship with God!

18. Conclusion 4. Disobedience is evil.
Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you swoop down on the spoil, and do evil in the sight of the Lord?”
1 Samuel 15:19