1 Samuel 9:15-10:9 · 5-day study

Called Into Your Future

Going deeper on Kris Vallotton's sermon at Bethel Church (Redding) (Redding, CA).

Week of Jul 19, 2026

The big idea

A true prophetic word does not invent something new in you, it wakes up the future God already planted in your heart, and staying close to the right people helps you actually become that person.

Day 1 · Free1 Samuel 9:15-21

First Impressions

When God sees what you can't see yet

Saul was looking for lost donkeys. That's it. Just a guy on an errand, probably frustrated, definitely not expecting his life to change. He wasn't seeking God. He wasn't even particularly spiritual in this moment. He was just trying to find some animals and get home.

Then he meets Samuel, and everything shifts. Samuel looks at this young man from the smallest family in the smallest tribe and says something wild: "Aren't you the one all Israel is waiting for?" Saul's response is perfect—he's basically like, "Um, you've got the wrong guy. Do you know who I am? Or more accurately, who I'm NOT?"

Here's what gets me about this story: God saw king when Saul saw failure. God saw potential when Saul saw limitations. God saw a future when Saul could only see his past and his family's reputation. The gap between how Saul saw himself and how God saw him was massive.

Maybe you're in a season where you feel like Saul—just trying to handle the basics, feeling pretty ordinary, aware of all the reasons you're NOT the person for whatever calling is stirring in your heart. But what if, like Saul, there's something dormant in you that you can't even see yet? What if the limitations you're so aware of are not the end of your story but just the beginning? What if God is about to tell you something about yourself that your heart knows but your head hasn't caught up to yet?

Sit with this

  1. 1What 'lost donkeys' are you chasing right now—what ordinary tasks or problems are consuming your attention?

Journal prompt

Write about the gap between how you see yourself and how you sense God might see you. What would change if you believed God's view of you more than your own?

Days 2–5 are in the app

Carry Kris Vallotton's sermon through the whole week.

  1. 2

    Look Closer

    The secrets your heart already knows

  2. 3

    What It Meant Then

    Why this nobody became a king

  3. 4

    The Hard Question

    What if you believed what God says about you?

  4. 5

    Carry It Forward

    Proximity changes everything

Start this study free

Free while in beta. Journal and ask questions as you go.

Where the passage connects

  • 1 Samuel 9:15-10:9

    Samuel tells Saul he will reveal what is already in his heart, and the moment Saul steps into the company of the prophets he is changed into a different man, showing that identity gets awakened, not manufactured, and that being near the right community can shift who you become.

  • 1 Corinthians 14:24-25

    Paul says real prophecy exposes the hidden parts of a person in a way that makes them fall down and say God is really here, which the pastor uses to correct his own younger habit of calling out people's sins and to argue true prophecy uncovers buried treasure, not shame.

  • 2 Corinthians 5:16-17

    Paul says believers should stop knowing each other by their old track record and instead see them as new creations, which explains why the church could welcome a drug-dealing teenager and later hear him prophesied over as a future pastor without holding his past against him.

  • Luke 4:18-19 (Isaiah 61)

    When Jesus reads this scroll in the synagogue he stops mid sentence, announcing the season of favor but leaving out the line about a coming day of vengeance, marking the shift from an old covenant bent toward judgment to a new covenant built on mercy.

“Except for the grace of God, we are”

Kris Vallotton. For

“It matters who you hang out with.”

Kris Vallotton. For

Get the Bethel Church (Redding) study every Monday

One email. Sunday's message, the points, and the verses. Free.

Unsubscribe any time. We never share your address.

More from Bethel Church (Redding)

All Bethel Church (Redding) studies →

This study is an original devotional inspired by Kris Vallotton's message “The Culture We Carry, Part Five” at Bethel Church (Redding).