Saul Is Acclaimed King

¹⁷ Later Samuel called all the people of Israel to meet before the Lord at Mizpah. ¹⁸ And he said, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has declared: I brought you from Egypt and rescued you from the Egyptians and from all of the nations that were oppressing you. ¹⁹ But though I have rescued you from your misery and distress, you have rejected your God today and have said, ‘No, we want a king instead!’ Now, therefore, present yourselves before the Lord by tribes and clans.”

²⁰ So Samuel brought all the tribes of Israel before the Lord, and the tribe of Benjamin was chosen by lot. ²¹ Then he brought each family of the tribe of Benjamin before the Lord, and the family of the Matrites was chosen. And finally Saul son of Kish was chosen from among them. But when they looked for him, he had disappeared! ²² So they asked the Lord, “Where is he?”

And the Lord replied, “He is hiding among the baggage.” ²³ So they found him and brought him out, and he stood head and shoulders above anyone else.

²⁴ Then Samuel said to all the people, “This is the man the Lord has chosen as your king. No one in all Israel is like him!”

And all the people shouted, “Long live the king!”

²⁵ Then Samuel told the people what the rights and duties of a king were. He wrote them down on a scroll and placed it before the Lord. Then Samuel sent the people home again.

²⁶ When Saul returned to his home at Gibeah, a group of men whose hearts God had touched went with him. ²⁷ But there were some scoundrels who complained, “How can this man save us?” And they scorned him and refused to bring him gifts. But Saul ignored them.

[Nahash, king of the Ammonites, had been grievously oppressing the people of Gad and Reuben who lived east of the Jordan River. He gouged out the right eye of each of the Israelites living there, and he didn’t allow anyone to come and rescue them. In fact, of all the Israelites east of the Jordan, there wasn’t a single one whose right eye Nahash had not gouged out. But there were 7,000 men who had escaped from the Ammonites, and they had settled in Jabesh-gilead.]^[a]