12th June 2026

12th June 2026


Pray (ACts)


Read (1 Samuel 31 focus 11-13)


Message (Alan Burke)


In our lives, we make an impact on others that is often unknown to us. Think about it, we can all look back to how there are individuals in our past that have said or done something for us, and in that moment, it was either just what we needed to hear or it was the last thing that pushed us over the edge. Years later, they may have no memory of the help that they were or the pain that they caused to us, but we remember. While Saul’s reign had finished and he was fastened to the wall of Dagon’s temple, the valiant men of Jabesh Gilead remembered what Saul had done for them, and they went to Beth Shan, took the body and his sons, and went to Jabesh where they burned them and buried them and fasted for seven days (see 1 Chron 10:10).


They risked their lives, coming into enemy territory, taking down the bodies of Saul and his sons, and returning to Jabesh. It is all because of what Saul had done years earlier. In 1 Samuel 11, we are given the account of how the people of Jabesh-Gilead had been attacked by the Ammonites and the city had been besieged. Things did not look good; they asked for aid, and Saul, the newly crowned king, came to their rescue. They had not forgotten what Saul had done for them; they, in a sense, were paying Saul back for the rescue that he had provided, how he had saved them from their enemies. 


They bring Saul and his sons’ mutilated bodies back and they burn their bodies to prevent anyone from taking Saul’s remains again as a trophy, and he, with his sons, was buried under a tamarisk tree. Years before, Saul sat under a tamarisk tree, as king, but it was a sign of the end of Saul (1 Sam 22:6). For there, Saul was so consumed by hatred for David, he turned against those closest to him, accusing his servants of conspiring against him. While he was already the rejected king, he showed that he was not fit to be the king, massacring the priests of Nob, their families, and all that lived there. 


It is fitting that there he sat ruling under the tamarisk tree that he is buried under a tamarisk tree after his death. The people of Jabesh Gilead had been faithful to Saul, but you know we are reminded here at the end that even as this chapter finishes that the LORD will be done for he is faithful. How we see that is in what seems like a hopeless mess, the LORD was giving a signpost to his people, for the tamarisk is the signpost to the covenant fidelity of the LORD our God. In this moment it seemed that the LORD was defeated, and his covenant promises had failed, it was finished, but it wasn’t. 


As the people heard the account of what took place they would have recalled how in Genesis 21 there is another tamarisk tree, where we are told Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the Lord, the Eternal God (Gen 21:33). He did so in the confident hope in the promises of God that they would not fail, for the LORD their God was faithful even when his people were faithless, and it is the same today, the LORD our God is faithful even when his people are faithless, his will be done for he is faithful, the sovereign LORD and God over life and death. This was not the end of the promises of God, it was just another step in God’s plan of redemption to bring the king we need, the LORD Jesus Christ who died so that we might have eternal life, where we will dwell with our LORD and we will see another tree, the tree of life, a tree that is for the healing of the nations and no longer will there be any curse and we will reign with our LORD for ever and ever (Re 22:1–5).


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q92 What is a Sacrament?
A. A Sacrament is a holy ordinance instituted by Christ; wherein, by sensible signs, Christ and the benefits of the new covenant are represented, sealed, and applied to believers.
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