Verse 14 is straightforward enough to understand, but it is much more challenging to truly grasp. The Lord’s Spirit left Saul, and in its place, God sent an evil spirit to plague the rejected king. The transaction is clear, but God’s purposes behind it are cloudy. Why did God send an evil spirit? Why not just remove His Spirit from Saul? We have two options:

First, God may have sent this evil spirit to bring Saul to repentance. Perhaps this was God’s tool to break Saul of his pride and force him to depend on His God instead. Second, God may have sent the spirit as an act of judgment against Saul, much like He had hardened Pharaoh’s heart in the Exodus account.

While we cannot know what God’s specific purpose in sending this evil spirit was, we can know God’s ultimate purpose: God’s desire was, and always is, to bring glory to Himself and work all things together for the good of His people. God will never fail to go to any end He desires to bring this to pass, even if that end might be hard for us to understand.

What are some ways that God was glorified through sending this evil spirit to Saul? How has God been glorified through adversity in your life?