Would you like to read James McNaught’s novel Sinking Sand”? click here: Sinking Sand
(The views expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)
1 Chronicles 10:1–7, “Now the Philistines fought against Israel; and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines, and fell down slain in mount Gilboa. And the Philistines followed hard after Saul, and after his sons; and the Philistines slew Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Malchishua, the sons of Saul. And the battle went sore against Saul, and the archers hit him, and he was wounded of the archers. Then said Saul to his armourbearer, Draw thy sword, and thrust me through therewith; lest these uncircumcised come and abuse me. But his armourbearer would not; for he was sore afraid. So Saul took a sword, and fell upon it. And when his armourbearer saw that Saul was dead, he fell likewise on the sword, and died. So Saul died, and his three sons, and all his house died together. And when all the men of Israel that were in the valley saw that they fled, and that Saul and his sons were dead, then they forsook their cities, and fled: and the Philistines came and dwelt in them.”
After the Exile, when the Israelis returned from the Persian Empire, they needed to know who belonged to which tribe and where their inheritance was. However, it was also important for the new generation of pioneers to understand their heritage and their obligation to the Lord and His Law. Even though the entire nation had been slaves in the beginning and all the tribes had participated in the invasion to carry out the Lord’s justice on the Amorites for their sin, the nation was not united as a complete nation until they came together under king Saul at his ascension to the throne. After Saul’s death, King David ascended to the throne of the United Nation and they served the Lord under his wise and godly leadership. This was the beginning of the true history of the nation of Israel. The people who returned after the Exile needed to understand that the Lord was faithful and had kept all His promises in the past so that they could accept His sovereignty in their own time and, if they kept the terms of the contract, return to the national status that the Lord had promised. The final hours of Saul’s life were retold as a warning to remind the returnees of the importance of obeying the Lord.
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