[Saul] inquired of the Lord, but the Lord did not answer him by dreams or Urim or prophets. Saul then said to his attendants, “Find me a woman who is a medium, so I may go and inquire of her.”
1 Samuel 28:6-7 (NIV)

There comes a point in all good stories and movies when the events come to dramatic inevitability. Modern screenwriters sometimes call it “the point of no return.”

Michael Corleone shoots Sollozzo and McCluskey in the diner.
Aragorn leads a rag-tag army to the Black Gate to distract Sauron from Frodo.
Voldemort marches on Hogwarts, and Harry knows that he is the final horcrux.
Macbeth’s wife is dead and he realizes his candle is about to be snuffed out.

For the past few weeks our chapter-a-day journey has been wandering through the fascinating saga of two contrasting men. Saul, the first King of Israel, and David, the shepherd boy who is anointed to grow-up and take Saul’s place. It’s been just over ten chapters of text that cover about twenty-years of time.

Today’s chapter is the moment of dramatic inevitability. It’s one of the strangest and darkest chapters in all of the Great Story.

David, having been on the run from Saul, finds himself a war-lord and mercenary working for Israel’s enemy, Achish the King of Gath of the Philistines. As the Philistines gather for war against Saul and Israel, Achish believes David has fully turned on Israel and is completely loyal to him. David continues to play out his deception, and suddenly finds himself between a rock and hard place.

Saul gathers his army for battle, and realizes that the odds are completely against. In fear, Saul frantically inquires of God through every legitimate channel — but God chooses to remain silent. Saul, who once rid the land of all the occultists and mediums — now seeks one out. In desperation he disguises himself, sneaks through or around Philistine lines and begs the medium to bring up Samuel from the dead. Even the medium is freaked out when Samuel actually appears.

Making an appearance from beyond the grave, Samuel gives his final prophetic pronouncement. What he had prophetically proclaimed for decades during his life is now precariously present. This is it. The inevitable end.

• God has departed from Saul.
• The kingdom has been given to David.
• Saul’s disobedience regarding Amalek remains the decisive issue.
• Israel will lose the battle.
• Saul and his sons will die tomorrow.

As I mediated on the moment this morning, my heart continued to return to God’s silence. God is silent, but He is not absent. In fact, God’s judgment is unfolding exactly as Samuel had previously foretold. God’s silence does not mean God has lost control — or that He’s disinterested. Sometimes silence means God has already spoken.

Saul’s problem was not lack of revelation. It was refusal to listen to, believe, and obey the revelation he had already received.

I have struggled with what I perceived to be God’s silence in various seasons of my own journey. When God seems silent, my greatest temptation is to look for another voice. One that will tell me what we want to hear, promise certainty, and relieve my fears. I might seek that voice through superstition, through ideology, through outrage. or my own anxious imagination.

Saul’s story reminds me that the issue is often not that God hasn’t spoken. The issue is whether I am willing to trust and obey what has already been said.

The contrast between David and Saul continues to widen. David is confused, displaced, frightened, and imperfect. Saul is all those things as well.

The difference is that David keeps returning to God.

Saul keeps looking elsewhere.

And in the quiet this morning, I realize the most dangerous moment in my spiritual journey is not when God seems silent. It is when fear convinces me to seek guidance everywhere except from Him.

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