Yesterday, I flat-out said that King Saul’s rulership was doomed to failure.
Do you remember why?
I said it’s because monarchies and tribalism CANNOT peacefully coexist.
It’s like pouring new wines into old wineskins.
Now, let me give you a modern example of why this is true.
Take a look at a picture of this man.
You know who that is, right?
That’s Osama Bin Laden, the villain who will go down in history as the mastermind behind the airplane attacks that occurred on 9/11.
However, what a lot of folks don’t know are the events in his life that turned him into a murderous rebel in the first place.
This may seem like a stretch but understanding how a man like Osama Bin Laden came to be will help you grasp why Saul was never able to bring peace to Israel and ultimately failed.
Again, it all has to do with the violent conflicts that erupt when a nation tries to transition from a pure tribal society to a monarchy.
See, this is exactly what occurred in the Arabian Peninsula (now called Saudi Arabia) in the early 18th century.
Here’s what happened.
The Saudi family in the mid-17th century arose to become the dominant tribe in central Arabia.
Naturally, this fueled their lust for power.
So they decided they wanted to rule over all of Arabia.
When they achieved that, they still weren’t satisfied.
They next decided they wanted to take over the entire Middle East.
As you can imagine, the other tribes fought tooth and nail against them to prevent this from happening.
This resulted in the Saudi tribe’s power rising and falling multiple times like a fluctuating stock market graph.
But finally, in the 19th century, the Saudi family openly tried to establish a monarchy…
And they succeeded!
Of course, they had to use brutal means to keep the opposing tribes in place who obviously had no interest in having a king rule over them.
So why am I sharing this with you?
Because again, this was a similar situation to what Saul faced when he became king.
He had to deal with all of those dissenters from the southern tribes.
Now, today the Saudi family rules over the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
But they are still at war with various tribes in the region who absolutely despise them.
The ruling Saudi family is seen as a bunch of hedonistic playboys who use their power and money for their own selfish pleasures.
It was this situation that gave birth to Osama Bin Laden and other militant rebels like him.
Osama was born to one of the rebel tribes in Saudi Arabia and when he grew up he founded the militant organization al-Qaeda.
Now here’s the thing…
And this is something a lot of Westerners don’t know.
It isn’t just the tribes inside the Saudi Arabian kingdom who hate the Saudi monarchy…
Muslims throughout the entire Middle Eastern region despise them too.
Why?
Again, it’s because the concept of royalty doesn’t jive with their tribal traditions and Muslim religion.
Never forget the religion of Islam is based on tribalism and warfare.
And consider that their hatred towards the Saudi royal family intensified even more when oil was discovered in the Arabian peninsula in the 1930s.
The tribal leaders knew this would bring vast wealth to the royal family further deepening their anger and jealousy towards them.
So if you ever wanted to know the real reason why the Saudi Kingdom allied with the United States, this is why.
America wanted and needed the oil
And in exchange, they offered not only money but powerful military protection which served to keep the Saudi king and thousands of his family members in power much to the dismay of all the tribes in the Middle East.
Although it seemed like a natural alliance, it was still an unstable relationship because the US was entering into a partnership with the sworn enemy of the traditional Muslim-Arab tribal nations.
This was your classic “the friend of my enemy is also my enemy” type of situation.
This is also one of the main reasons why Osama Bin Laden and thousands of other Muslim tribes hate the United States.
Because we’re supporting the Saudi royal monarchy whom they hate.
And again, I reiterate this was a very similar situation to what Saul faced when he became king…
Never forget the northern tribal leaders of Israel gladly supported Saul because they knew it would benefit them.
The irony of this situation is when things fell apart (which is inevitable when we’re outside of God’s Will), it was only Israel’s enemies who benefited.
There’s a huge lesson to be learned from this.
More often than not, the cause of a nation’s downfall is due to internal instability rather than attacks from the outside.
And I’d say the same applies to the failures in your life…
More often than not, the downfalls in your life aren’t due to some outside enemy but happen because of your own sins.
You were the one who committed adultery…
Or let your porno addiction get out of control…
Or went crazy buying a bunch of stuff you really didn’t need on your credit card…
And so on and so forth.
Ya, feel me here?
Done.
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