Thursday Meditation - Time to Move On

Time to Move On

1 Samuel 16:1

Often in life we find ourselves stuck in neutral.  We get to a point in life where we think we can just coast and ignore the changes in life while everything around us is in an uproar.  This is where we find the prophet Samuel. He is still in denial and grieving that God has rejected Saul as the King of Israel. Samuel is experiencing tremendous grief because he was the one who anointed Saul as King (1 Samuel 10:1) and then he was the one to tell Saul he was rejected by God as King of Israel (1 Samuel 15:35). As we can see, Samuel is hurting as well.  He was there at the beginning of Saul's leadership and now he is at the end of his leadership.  Samuel was probably going through the second stage of grief process, pain and guilt.  Why? Israel wanted a king over them and Samuel felt they rejected him, but actually they were rejecting God.  

Samuel finds it hard to move on and accept that God has rejected Saul.  We all know how hard it is to move on after the death of a love one.  We can't help but to grieve, remain in denial and disbelief until we get to a point of acceptance.  We know Saul did not die physically yet, but his leadership suffered death because he rejected the word of God.  Because of this leadership death, Samuel wasn't able to let go and move forward, but God was ready. 

Why do we keep holding on to situations, positions and people when it is time to move on?  

We hold on because we really don't want to start over again or believe this will be the best we will ever get.  Imagine what life would be like if we really looked at all that God has rejected in our life as a change for the better.  Too many of us are walking around as stained cups because of the things that has happened in our past. We refuse to move forward because our cups will not be as beaming white as others.  We  must stop looking at the cups of other people and move when God says move.  The longer we hold on to situations, positions and people that reject us, the harder it will be for us to function properly and we will keep grieving.  Let us not drag our feet when God says move or we'll end up like Lot's wife a pillar of salt (Genesis 19) to remind us that we started to move on but we kept looking back to see what were leaving.  In order to prepare for our future we must be willing to let loose of the baggage, junk in the trunk, skeletons in the closets or what ever we call it, we must let it go.  God let Saul go when he told Samuel to fill his horn with oil and sent him to a place and a people where new leadership.  God has told us provision has been made and trying to move us into new territories of life, leadership, relationship and positions but first we got to let the rejected mess go.

Prayer: God, we pray when we are no longer useful in what we are doing, we ask you to give us the ability to move on and stop lingering around. Amen.