3 Now Samuel was dead, and all Israel had mourned for him and buried him in his own town of Ramah. Saul had expelled the mediums and spiritists from the land.
Now is Saul's expulsion of the mediums a good thing or a bad thing? Was he doing it to honour God?
Then the Philistines come up. (again)
6 He (Saul) inquired of the LORD, but the LORD did not answer him by dreams or Urim or prophets. 7 Saul then said to his attendants, "Find me a woman who is a medium, so I may go and inquire of her."
So first he expels the mediums. Then when God doesn't answer in the manner that He had been when you asked him a question, he says to find a medium. Saul seems a bit on the confused side. Does he want mediums in his country or not?
So then it gets even wonkier as Saul dresses down, goes to the medium and has her 'conjure' up Samuel. As soon as she does, she knows he is Saul. Then Saul asks her what the spirit looks like and she says an old man with a robe and he knew it was Samuel. Well, ok then.
Samuel tells him that the reason that God wasn't answering by the other methods is because He had turned away from Saul. Now, that's not a good place to be in! Then Samuel tells Saul that he's going to lose the battle and die.
Saul is, of course, upset by this! But he still goes into battle and dies. It might have been he had no other options left but to fight. I don't know- I might have tried to create some more options!
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