Scripture Never Contradicts Itself

# 186 - Today's Du-votional comes from: 1Sa 14:18,19, “And Saul said to Ahijah, "Bring the ark of God here" (for at that time the ark of God was with the children of Israel). 19 Now it happened, while Saul talked to the priest, that the noise which was in the camp of the Philistines continued to increase; so Saul said to the priest, "Withdraw your hand." (1 Sam 14:18,19) The Philistines are in a state of panic and King Saul has a decision to make. Should he and his rag tag army attack? So he calls the priest to him and asks for the ark of God to be brought to him. Hey wait a minute! How can the ark of God be in two places at the same time? Last we heard it was in Kiriath Jearim. Something doesn't make sense here. Let's see if we can sort this out: The ark of God, was as the text says with the children of Israel, but we know from 1 Sam 7:1 that it was located in Abinadab's house in Kiriath Jearim and remained there for twenty years: 1Sa 7:2 So it was that the ark remained in Kiriath Jearim a long time; it was there twenty years.” It stayed there until David called for it to be taken to Jerusalem in 2 Sam, chapter six. So how can this be? How can the ark be in two places at the same time? It wasn't. Saul didn't know what to do and his first panicky thought was to bring the ark to him from Kiriath Jearim. HoweverIn talking to Ahijah the priest, Saul realizes that the ark was not necessary, the decision to attack or not could be made by using the priest's ephod. The priest DID have the ephod with him as we read in v3. This ephod contained two stones (the Urim and the Thummim) in it's breastplate that were used for determining the Lords will. Ahijah explained all of this to Saul and was in the process of drawing out the decisive stone when Saul once again took matters into his own hands and said, “we don't have time for this, withdraw your hand.” Once again we see the impatience of Saul, and his unwillingness to wait on the Lord. This passage then is just another example of Saul's ineptitude as king. And it's another example of how Scripture interprets scripture. It cannot contradict itself, and sometimes we just need to roll up our shirtsleeves and wade thru it.