The Deafening Silence of God
Introduction: The End of the Rope
We come now to one of the darkest and most instructive episodes in the life of King Saul. Here is a man at the end of his rope, a rope he braided himself. He is a man who began with great promise, anointed by God, but whose reign has been a long, slow-motion car wreck of disobedience, jealousy, and self-will. And now, the bill has come due. The Philistines, the recurring decimal of Israel's disobedience, are mustered for war, and Saul, who was chosen to deliver Israel from them, is terrified.
This passage is a stark illustration of a foundational biblical principle: God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Saul's entire career is a case study in what happens when a man refuses to humble himself. He wants God's blessing, but on his own terms. He wants God's guidance, but without God's government. He wants the benefits of the covenant without the obligations of the covenant. And what he gets in return is the most terrifying judgment a man can experience in this life: the deafening silence of God.
When a man has rejected God's Word repeatedly, a time comes when God stops speaking. This is not a passive silence; it is an active judgment. It is the judicial withdrawal of His presence and counsel. And when God goes silent, men do not become rational agnostics. They do not suddenly embrace stoic self-reliance. No, when the true God withdraws, men will frantically seek out false gods. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does the human heart. If you will not have God, you will have idols. If you will not consult the living God, you will, like Saul, end up trying to consult the dead. This passage is a warning to us all. Do not trifle with the Word of the Lord. Do not assume He will always strive with you. There is a point of no return, and Saul is standing right on the precipice.
The Text
Now Samuel was dead, and all Israel had lamented for him and buried him in Ramah, his own city. And Saul had removed from the land those who were mediums and spiritists. So the Philistines gathered together and came and camped in Shunem; and Saul gathered all Israel together, and they camped in Gilboa. Saul saw the camp of the Philistines and was afraid and his heart trembled greatly. So Saul asked of Yahweh, but Yahweh did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by prophets. So Saul said to his servants, “Seek for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” And his servants said to him, “Behold, there is a woman who is a medium at En-dor.”
(1 Samuel 28:3-7 LSB)
The Stage of Desperation (v. 3-4)
The scene is set with two crucial pieces of information.
"Now Samuel was dead, and all Israel had lamented for him and buried him in Ramah, his own city. And Saul had removed from the land those who were mediums and spiritists. So the Philistines gathered together and came and camped in Shunem; and Saul gathered all Israel together, and they camped in Gilboa." (1 Samuel 28:3-4)
First, we are reminded that Samuel is dead. The great prophet, the king-maker, the moral compass of Israel, is gone. For Saul, this is more than the loss of a public figure; it is the loss of his last link to the word of God, a link he himself had spent years trying to sever. Samuel was the man who anointed him, and the man who pronounced God's rejection of him. With Samuel in the grave, Saul is truly alone with his sin. The voice of God's prophet, which he had so often ignored, is now a voice he can no longer hear, and he is desperate to get it back.
Second, we are told of Saul's earlier, righteous purge. "Saul had removed from the land those who were mediums and spiritists." This is a piece of staggering irony. At one point in his reign, Saul had obeyed the clear command of God's law (Deut. 18:10-12). He knew that trafficking with the demonic realm was a capital offense, an abomination to Yahweh. He had been zealous, at least externally, in this matter. This was not a small thing; it was a righteous act. But this earlier act of obedience now serves only to highlight the depths of his current apostasy. He is about to seek out the very thing he had once righteously condemned. This is what legalism does. It cleans the outside of the cup, it performs the right actions for the wrong reasons, but because the heart is not transformed, it will eventually turn and devour its own professed standards when the pressure is on. Saul's righteousness was a political policy, not a heartfelt conviction, and policies can be reversed when they become inconvenient.
The external threat is the catalyst. The Philistines are gathered, and Saul musters Israel at Gilboa. The stage is set for a final confrontation, not just between two armies, but between a rebellious king and the God he has abandoned.
Fear Without Faith (v. 5)
Saul's reaction to the Philistine army is not the concern of a prudent general; it is the terror of a guilty conscience.
"Saul saw the camp of the Philistines and was afraid and his heart trembled greatly." (1 Samuel 28:5)
Fear is not always a sin. There is a righteous fear of the Lord that is the beginning of wisdom. There is a proper fear of genuine danger that leads to wise precautions. But Saul's fear is the fruit of his rebellion. It is the terror of a man who knows he is facing the enemy without God on his side. He had rejected the Lord, and now he feels the full weight of his isolation. His courage had always been tied to his position, his anointing, his sense of divine backing. Now that is gone, and there is nothing left but a hollow man in a king's robe.
This is the state of every man who builds his life on the sand of his own autonomy. When the storms of life come, when the enemy is encamped, when the diagnosis is grim, when the bank account is empty, the heart that is not anchored in the sovereign goodness of God will tremble greatly. Saul's fear is the natural consequence of his sin. He has sown the wind of disobedience, and now he reaps the whirlwind of terror.
The Closed Heavens (v. 6)
In his terror, Saul does what he should have done all along. He inquires of the Lord. But it is too little, too late, and for all the wrong reasons.
"So Saul asked of Yahweh, but Yahweh did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by prophets." (1 Samuel 28:6)
Here is the central terror of the passage. God goes silent. Saul tries all the approved channels of divine revelation. He seeks a dream, the common way God spoke to kings. He seeks a word from the Urim, the priestly means of discerning God's will. He seeks a prophet, the primary mouthpiece of God. And from every channel, there is nothing but static. The heavens are brass.
Why doesn't God answer? Is He being capricious? No. God is not obligated to answer the frantic, self-serving prayers of a man in obstinate rebellion. Saul is not coming in repentance. He is coming for strategic information. He is treating God like a cosmic 9-1-1 operator, a tool to be used in a crisis. He doesn't want God; he wants a battle plan. He doesn't want to submit; he wants to survive. As James says, "You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions" (James 4:3). God's silence is a judicial act. It is the confirmation of the verdict Samuel had already delivered: "Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He has also rejected you from being king" (1 Sam. 15:23).
This is a terrifying reality. A man can sin his way past the point of hearing. This is not to say that any truly repentant sinner will be turned away. But Saul is not repentant. His heart is hard. His inquiry is a foxhole prayer born of fear, not faith. And so God, in His sovereignty, gives him over to the consequences of his own choices. He has refused to listen, and now he is made unable to hear.
The Desperate Pivot (v. 7)
When the true God will not speak, a false god will have to do. Saul's next move is both pathetic and utterly predictable.
"So Saul said to his servants, “Seek for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” And his servants said to him, “Behold, there is a woman who is a medium at En-dor.”" (1 Samuel 28:7)
The speed of this pivot is breathtaking. The moment he concludes that God is not answering, he immediately turns to the forbidden, demonic alternative. He does not fall on his face in repentance. He does not plead for mercy. He simply changes channels. "If heaven is silent, I will inquire of hell." This reveals the true state of his heart. He is not a servant of Yahweh; he is a consumer of information. He will get his supernatural intelligence from whatever source is available.
And notice the hypocrisy. He asks his servants to find the very class of person he himself had outlawed. This is the final bankruptcy of a man-centered religion. His laws were for others. His zeal was for public consumption. When his own neck is on the line, the rules no longer apply. He is the classic tyrant: law for thee, but not for me.
His servants, it turns out, know exactly where to find a medium. "Behold, there is a woman who is a medium at En-dor." This tells you that Saul's purge was not as thorough as it appeared. The occult had simply gone underground. And it tells you that Saul's inner circle knew his heart better than he let on. They knew that their king's piety was a thin veneer, and when the crisis came, he would resort to the darkness. They were not surprised by his request. They were ready for it. When a leader is corrupt, he surrounds himself with men who know where the bodies are buried, and where the witches live.
Conclusion: The God Who Speaks
Saul's story is a tragedy, but it is recorded for our instruction. The path to the medium at En-dor begins with small acts of disobedience. It begins when we rationalize our sin, when we refuse to listen to God's clear word, when we value our own kingdom more than His. The silence Saul experienced is a real and present danger for any person or any church that trifles with sin and tunes out the voice of the Spirit.
But the gospel is the glorious good news that God is not silent. In these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son (Hebrews 1:2). Jesus Christ is the final and perfect Word from God. In Him, the heavens are opened. Through Him, we have access to the Father. Unlike Saul, we do not come to God seeking mere information or a strategy for personal success. We come seeking mercy for our rebellion.
The difference between Saul and a true believer is not the absence of sin, but the presence of repentance. David sinned grievously, far more than Saul had at this point. But when confronted by the prophet Nathan, David did not make excuses or pivot to an idol. He said, "I have sinned against the Lord" (2 Sam. 12:13). And the Lord heard him and forgave him.
If you feel that God is silent in your life, the first question to ask is not "Where is the nearest medium?" but rather "Where is my unconfessed sin?" Do not be like Saul, who in his desperation for a word, any word, turned to the darkness. Instead, turn to the one true Word, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one who entered the ultimate silence of the grave for us, who bore the ultimate judgment of being forsaken by the Father, so that we, in our repentance and faith, would never have to hear that final, deafening silence. He is the God who speaks, and His final word to all who will trust Him is grace.