Now therefore stand still and see this great thing that the Lord will do before your eyes.

1 Samuel 12:16 ESV

I picked this verse because it sounded like others we talked about before, verses like stand still and see my salvation. Only here, it’s to see the Lord’s devastation. Or is it?

The word translated stand still is the same in both verses. It’s just one word meaning to take one’s stand or to station oneself. They were to plant their feet and watch the Lord work.

That idea of planting down one’s feet is one of the ways I talk about abiding. It’s a picture of a tree with deep roots. It’s not moving even if a storm is raging and pruning off branches.

The Lord is always working for the salvation of His people. Destroying the harvest humbles hearts to confession, what they needed for salvation. It’s immediately followed with an encouragement. They weren’t forsaken or forgotten. It was still theirs to follow the Lord and receive the blessing of that, though the warning remains.

And Samuel said to the people, “Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil. Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart. And do not turn aside after empty things…

1 Samuel 12:20-21 ESV