And when He had deposed Saul, He raised up David for them as king, to whom also He testified and said, I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man according to My heart, who will do all My will.
— Acts 13:22
The judges carried out their commitment before the Lord, but among them God did not find anyone who was after His own heart. Eventually, the priests failed, the judges failed, and even the prophets failed. That was the situation leading up to David’s generation. Eli, the last judge prior to Samuel, was also a priest, yet in some ways he seemed to be as blind spiritually as he became physically. Concerning this time, the Bible says, “The word of the Lord was rare in those days; there was no widespread revelation” (1 Sam. 3:1). Still, we are told that the lamp of the Lord had not yet gone out (1 Sam. 3:3). Praise the Lord for this! The situation was not totally hopeless, yet there was little, if any, of God’s speaking among the people.
Adapted from David: After God’s Heart, pages 14-15.
Monday: “The Degradation of Israel (1)”