For I know how rebellious and stiff-necked you are. If you have been rebellious against the Lord while I am still alive and with you, how much more will you rebel after I die!
But Samuel replied:
‘Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
For rebellion is like the sin of divination,
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has rejected you as king.’
God sets the lonely in families,
he leads out the prisoners with singing;
but the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land.
‘Woe to the obstinate children,’
declares the Lord,
‘to those who carry out plans that are not mine,
forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,
heaping sin upon sin;
All day long I have held out my hands
to an obstinate people,
who walk in ways not good,
pursuing their own imaginations –
Although our sins testify against us,
do something, Lord, for the sake of your name.
For we have often rebelled;
we have sinned against you.
I will spread my net for him, and he will be caught in my snare. I will bring him to Babylon and execute judgment on him there because he was unfaithful to me.