The Passing of the Kingmaker Text: 1 Samuel 25:1
Introduction: The Hinge of an Age
History is not a long, flat, monotonous road. It is a series of mountain ranges and valleys, of great ages that rise and then give way to the next. God, in His sovereignty, orchestrates these transitions, and He often marks them with the passing of a great man. When a pillar is removed from a house, the entire structure groans and settles. The death of Samuel is just such a moment. It is the hinge upon which an entire era of Israel's history turns. With this one verse, the age of the judges finally, definitively, breathes its last, and the age of the kings, for good or ill, fully arrives.
Samuel was the last of his kind. He was a prophet, a priest, and a judge. He was the man who stood in the gap between the chaos of the book of Judges and the establishment of the monarchy. He was the kingmaker, the one God used to anoint both Saul and David. His life was a testimony to covenant faithfulness in a time of rampant apostasy. He was a man of integrity when integrity was a forgotten commodity. His sons, tragically, were not like him, and their corruption was the excuse the people used to demand a king like the other nations. But Samuel himself was a rock.
And now, that rock is gone. The verse is stark, almost abrupt. "Then Samuel died." There is no fanfare, no dramatic deathbed speech recorded for us. Just the simple, brutal fact of his passing. But the reverberations of this event are immense. For Saul, the king he had anointed and then rejected, it is the removal of his conscience, the final silencing of the voice of God that had haunted his reign. For David, the king-in-waiting, it is the loss of his mentor and advocate, the man who had poured the anointing oil on his head in Bethlehem. And for Israel, it is a moment of national reckoning. The man who had interceded for them, who had led them, who had called them back to God, is no more. They are left with the king they demanded, a man spiraling into madness, and the king God chose, a man hiding in the wilderness. The death of Samuel is the end of a chapter, and the stage is now set for the final, bloody confrontation between the house of Saul and the house of David.
This verse, then, is not a mere biographical footnote. It is a theological signpost. It forces us to ask what happens when a generation loses its great men. What happens when the voices of godly authority fall silent? And it forces us to look to the one who is greater than Samuel, the one whose death and resurrection would mark the ultimate transition in the history of the world.
The Text
Then Samuel died; and all Israel gathered together and lamented for him and buried him at his house in Ramah. And David arose and went down to the wilderness of Paran.
(1 Samuel 25:1 LSB)
The End of an Era (v. 1a)
The text begins with a statement of profound finality.
"Then Samuel died..." (1 Samuel 25:1a)
With these three words, the narrator closes the book on one of the most significant figures in the Old Testament. Samuel's life began as an answer to his mother's desperate prayer. He was given to the Lord from birth, and he heard the voice of God as a young boy in the tabernacle when "the word of the LORD was rare in those days; there was no frequent vision" (1 Sam. 3:1). He was God's man for a desperate time. He restored the law, he called the people to repentance at Mizpah, and he led them in victory over the Philistines.
But his greatest and most vexing task was to oversee the transition to the monarchy. He warned the people what a king would cost them, taxes, conscription, tyranny, but they would not listen. They wanted to be like the other nations. So, at God's command, Samuel gave them the king they wanted in Saul, a man who looked the part. And when Saul disobeyed, it was Samuel who had to deliver the terrible word of God's rejection. It was Samuel who had to hack Agag to pieces. And it was Samuel who, grieving over Saul, was sent by God to anoint a new king, a shepherd boy from Bethlehem.
His death means that the moral and spiritual anchor of the nation is gone. Saul is now truly untethered. As long as Samuel was alive, he was a living rebuke to Saul's compromised reign. Now, that rebuke is silenced. This is why, in his final desperation, Saul will seek out a witch at En-dor to try and call Samuel up from the dead. He is so lost without that prophetic voice, even a voice of judgment, that he will violate the very law of God he was supposed to uphold just to hear it one more time.
The death of the righteous is a judgment on the wicked. When God removes His faithful servants, it is often a sign that the time for repentance is over and the time for consequences has arrived. The restraining influence is gone, and the nation is left to the folly of its own choices.
A Nation's Lament (v. 1b)
The response of the nation is telling.
"...and all Israel gathered together and lamented for him and buried him at his house in Ramah." (1 Samuel 25:1b LSB)
"All Israel gathered." This was a national event. From Dan to Beersheba, the people recognized what they had lost. They lamented for him. This is the proper response to the death of a righteous man. There is a great difference between the sorrow of the world, which leads to death, and godly sorrow. Here, we see a nation grieving the loss of a man who, though he had opposed their foolish desire for a king, had never stopped loving them and praying for them. Even when they rejected his leadership, he said, "Far be it from me that I should sin against the LORD by ceasing to pray for you" (1 Sam. 12:23).
They knew, even if they didn't always like it, that he was their connection to the living God. He was the one who spoke for God. Now there is a terrifying silence. Their lament is a tacit admission of their own folly. They had rejected the man, and in so doing, had rejected the God who sent him. Now, faced with the reality of his absence, they feel the full weight of their decision. They are left with Saul, and they know in their bones it is a bad trade.
They bury him at his house in Ramah. This is his home, the place from which he judged Israel. It is a burial of honor. But it is also a burial of finality. The era is over. The voice from Ramah is silent. This gathering of "all Israel" is significant because the nation is on the brink of civil war. Soon, "all Israel" will be a divided concept. But for this one moment, in their shared grief over the man of God, they are united. It is the last time they will be united under the old order.
David's New Reality (v. 1c)
The final clause of the verse shifts our focus to the future king.
"And David arose and went down to the wilderness of Paran." (1 Samuel 25:1c LSB)
The connection is deliberate. Samuel's death directly impacts David's situation. "And David arose." The news of Samuel's death is a signal to him. As long as Samuel was alive, David had a powerful, if distant, ally. Samuel was the one who held the legitimacy of the anointing. He was the living witness to God's choice. With Samuel gone, David's claim is now based solely on a past event and a future promise. His position is more precarious than ever.
He goes down to the wilderness of Paran. This is a move of strategic retreat. The wilderness of Paran is a vast, remote, and dangerous region in the south. David is moving further away from Saul's reach. He understands that with Samuel gone, Saul will feel emboldened. The last restraint has been removed. Saul's paranoia and hatred will now have free rein. David is not being cowardly; he is being prudent. He is waiting on God's timing and refusing to take matters into his own hands. The death of his mentor does not cause him to despair, but to act. He moves deeper into the crucible that God is using to forge him into a king.
This is a picture of the Christian life. We are often called to the wilderness. The death of a spiritual guide, the removal of a comfort, the collapse of a familiar structure, these things can drive us into a place of seeming desolation. But the wilderness is where God prepares His kings. It was in the wilderness that Israel was tested. It was in the wilderness that John the Baptist preached. And it was into the wilderness that our Lord Jesus was led by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil. David's descent into Paran is not a detour; it is a necessary part of his coronation.
A Greater Prophet, A Better King
The passing of Samuel leaves a great void. Israel lamented because their intercessor was gone. David retreated because his earthly anointer was gone. Saul was unhinged because his accuser was gone. The whole nation felt the loss of the man who stood for God in their midst.
But this void, like all the voids in the Old Testament, is meant to make us long for the one who fills all things. Samuel was a great prophet, but we have a greater one. "For Moses truly said to the fathers, 'The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you'" (Acts 3:22). That prophet is the Lord Jesus Christ. Samuel spoke the word of God, but Jesus is the Word of God.
Samuel died and was buried in Ramah, and all Israel lamented. Jesus Christ died and was buried in a borrowed tomb, and his disciples scattered in fear. But the story does not end there. On the third day, He arose. Unlike Samuel, death could not hold Him. And because He lives, we have a permanent Prophet, Priest, and King. We have an intercessor who never dies. "He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:25).
When our earthly Samuels die, when mentors and leaders pass from the scene, we are right to lament. We should honor the righteous and grieve their loss. But we do not grieve as those who have no hope. David had to retreat to the wilderness, but our King has ascended to the right hand of the Father. He has not retreated. He is ruling and reigning now, putting all His enemies under His feet. The death of Samuel created a power vacuum and led to instability. The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ established a kingdom that cannot be shaken.
Therefore, we are not left with a mad king like Saul. We are not hiding in the wilderness like David. We are citizens of a heavenly kingdom, and our King, the true David, the ultimate Samuel, will never die. His voice is never silenced. His intercession never ceases. And His reign will have no end.