1st Samuel 3 -- Hearing From God For The First Time

These were really sad words about a nation, but they were turning into hopeful words:  “Samuel serve the Lord under Eli … Samuel did not yet know the Lord … In those days the Lord did not speak directly to people very often; there were very few visions …”

 

That says a lot right there.  Samuel was serving in the Tabernacle a God he did not KNOW.  His mentor wasn’t obedient to God, and neither were the religious leaders, “and God’s people weren’t obeying His law anyway, so why should God say anything new to them?  …. The silence of God was the judgment of God,” my commentary noted.

 

It also said that, like Paul, “Samuel’s call and conversion occurred at the same time.”  Though he had not known God, God spoke to him anyway, causing him to become a believer, and God immediately told him His plans for him.  The message was quite a lot for a young boy to take in, I’ll bet.

 

Rather than being prideful at having heard from God and been given a commission, Samuel simply woke up at the same early hour and continued doing his duties, “opening the doors to the tabernacle so that people could come to sacrifice, and he said nothing to Eli about what God had told him,” my commentary said.

 

Eli pressed him about the message, and Samuel faithfully related it to him.  Eli’s family would lose the priesthood for their failure to obey the Lord.  Rather than fighting God to keep his position, Eli resigned himself to his fate.  God had already told him that both of his sons were to die on the same day.  He said, “He is the Lord.  Let Him do what He thinks is best.”  My commentary added, “Though Eli and his sons were priests, they could offer no sacrifice that would atone for their sins!  Their sins were deliberate and defiant, and for such sins no sacrifice COULD be offered. (Numbers 15:30)”

 

God remained with Samuel, making sure that none of Samuel’s messages failed to come true.  Everyone in Israel came to accept him as a prophet of God.

 

Father, I remember a time, which I readily admit to the youth I teach, when I didn’t hear from You.  I asked those in the adult Sunday School class I was teaching how they knew if they’d heard from You.  My question was met with deafening silence.  Yet You drew me to Yourself and You began to show me regularly more and more about Yourself.  You answered my questions and my prayers.  You allowed the light of Your Word to dawn on me and in me.  I’d given You my heart, but I hadn’t let You be Lord of my life, and finding that out made all the difference.  Thank You for Your patience, Your grace, and Your mercy.  Thank You for letting me hear You.  Now I can’t imagine what it would be like if You stopped!

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford