Of Kings and Prophets: Samuel’s
Call
June 14, 2015
BMC- I Sam. 3:1-21
VBS Sunday - Through the Bible in a Year
Introduction: VBS
For those who worship with us on a
regular basis, it may feel a little odd this morning to back track in the
Biblical narrative. As a congregation, we
are on a journey through the Bible chronologically and over the last few weeks,
we have been reflecting on Solomon and his writings. Solomon was the third king of Israel whereas
Samuel was the last judge of Israel and the one who anointed both Saul and
David as kings long before Solomon came onto the scene.
So yes, talking about Samuel this
morning and especially about his call after already talking about three of the
kings is clearly anachronistic. And yet
as we have heard, this week was Vacation Bible School and the theme was,
“Message Received: Hearing God’s Call.”
The first day was the story of Samuel’s call and how he first heard God,
because of this it does seem fitting to dwell with that passage this morning.
Additionally, while our focus
through these recent readings has been on the kings and their writings, the
prophets also had a very important role in their day as well. So it seems appropriate to step back and
consider the prophet Samuel in our journey through the scriptures before we
move too much further.
Samuel
Samuel was
the last judge of Israel. He also served
as a priest and as a prophet. To his
disappointment, God told him to anoint a king over Israel, Saul. And then later to anoint David as king to
take Saul’s place. But we are getting
ahead of ourselves because our story for this morning is about Samuel’s call
from God that he experienced as a boy.
Samuel’s
mother Hannah was unable to conceive until God granted her prayer. But with the answer to her prayer came a
promise, the promise to dedicate the boy to the Lord. And so when the time was right, Hannah
brought the boy to Eli the priest to live in the temple and to learn the ways
of faith.
One night
after several years of living with Eli, Samuel heard someone calling to him in
the night. He assumed that it was Eli,
his caretaker. But when he would go to
Eli in response to the call, Eli would send him back to bed. This happened several times until Eli
realized that it was the LORD calling to Samuel. Eli then instructed Samuel to go back to bed
and the next time he heard someone calling for him to reply, “Speak Lord, for
you servant is listening.”
And that’s
what Samuel did. He went back to bed and
when he heard the voice call to him again, he said, “Speak Lord, for your
servant is listening.” At this, God gave
Samuel an earful about Eli; and in the morning, Samuel reported all that he had
heard to Eli.
Lesson 1: God brings the message
Within all this, it seems to me
that there are a number of lessons that we can learn. The first lesson that stands out to me is
that we are often not the ones who bring the word of God to people. Rather, we are often times the ones who are
able to help people recognize that God is calling and to guide them in
listening to what God has to say.
Eli did not have the message for
Samuel. Eli did not even know at first
that God had a message for Samuel. But
as God continued to call, Eli became aware of what was really happening. He identified for Samuel that it was God who
was calling and then instructed him on how to receive the message that God had
for him. Eli served as a sign post to
God and that is often our role as well.
Lesson 2: Set aside space to hear
The second lesson that stands out
to me in this passage is the importance of setting aside space to hear. The LORD called out to Samuel, but it wasn’t
in the midst of his daily routine. It
wasn’t while he was busy doing something.
The Lord called out to Samuel in the night while he was still and
attentive. Now this doesn’t mean that
God can’t speak to us in the midst of our daily lives. In fact I’m sure that many of us have
experienced God talking to us in the midst of circumstances. And yet more often than not it seems to me
that in the midst of our daily lives, we are too distracted to hear God calling
to us, let alone to hear the message that he has for us.
Yesterday on Facebook, I saw a
picture of a chalkboard sign like you would see on the sidewalk in front of a
restaurant or the Ice Cream Parlor downtown.
On it were the words, “Anyone have plans to stare at their phone somewhere
exciting this weekend?” And it struck a
chord with me.
While at Disney World, I heard one
of the cast members saying that they have cameras in all of the rides so that
they can see what people are doing during the ride. And all too often, they see people texting
during some of the rides like Soaring (which was so great that we rode it
twice, by the way). Now if you've gone to the trouble to experience something
or to go somewhere or to be with someone; doesn't it make sense that you should
set aside the phone that you can use any time (like while you wait in line for
the next ride) and be present to what is before you at that moment and that
will be gone in the next moment?
Perhaps this is true for many of us
with God as well. If we spend all of our
waking moments doing and if we always have music or something playing in the
background; it is much harder for us to be present with God and much harder for
us to hear the whisper of God calling us when it does come.
Lesson 3: Learn to know God through service
The third lesson that stands out to
me in this passage is that Samuel learned by doing. Verse 7 tells us that Samuel did not know the
Lord. He was serving Eli the priest and
so we must assume that he had some head knowledge of who God was, but he did
not yet know God. Samuel learned to know
God by serving God, by participating and doing.
I observed something this week at
VBS that is not entirely new, but that I believe is growing. Traditionally, we think of Vacation Bible
School as a week to nurture our children in their faith through pouring the
gospel message into them. And this
certainly does happen. Through worship,
teaching, and a variety of lessons; we teach our kids about faith and the Bible.
Vacation Bible School has also been
seen traditionally as an outreach to those outside of our congregation. And this aspect has been growing for us in
the last number of years given the fact that we have fewer and fewer Bethel children
to participate in VBS and yet our average attendance is holding pretty
steady. This year from Bethel, we had 7
children who were eligible to participate in VBS; but we had 45-50 children
each day. So at best, about 15% of those
attending VBS were from Bethel.
Many other children who attended
were from extended families and other local congregations like Oak Grove and
Jubilee. But about 13 kids or another 25%
of the children coming to VBS had never been to our VBS before and their coming
was through contacts like movie night, door knockers, and inviting
friends. That’s exciting, but it seems
to me that this is also what we would typically expect and hope for.
What struck me more was looking at
those who were helping and the number of people who helped make VBS happen who
do not attend Bethel. Take a moment and
look at your insert. How many names of
helpers do you see that go to people who do not typically attend Bethel?
{Pause} I count 35 names on the
sheet. Of those, I count 6 that do not
attend Bethel. That’s about 17% of our
helpers who do not attend at Bethel.
And it seems to me that beyond
being thankful for their willingness to serve and make VBS a reality this is
also a method of nurture and discipleship that we tend to overlook. It is a method of connection to God that is
more akin to what Samuel experienced in our passage. Learning to know God does not only come from
us sharing our knowledge with others.
Learning to know God also comes through opportunities to connect with
God through service, through doing.
Bluffton Chapel
Randy Keeler shared with me that
when he began as campus pastor at Bluffton that the chapel attendance was
pretty low. He worked with a group of
students to plan and lead the chapel services.
One of the things that they were looking for was including other people
in the “chapel crowd.”
During one of their planning
meetings they were offering suggestions for special music and one of the music
majors suggested a fellow student who could play the hand bells solo. Now think about that. We typically have 6 or more people when we use
the hand bells in worship and he was able to play them as a solo.
They asked if he would do special
music and he agreed. So now someone who
never came to chapel was coming, but more than that some of his friends who
never came to chapel decided to come because they wanted to see and support
their friend.
The hand bell ringer did a really
good job and when Randy went up to tell him so after the service, the student
said, “You know I also play guitar if you ever need someone to help out.” Before long, he was playing guitar in the
praise band and chapel attendance began to grow. But it began not with sharing knowledge of
God so much as with creating an opportunity for encounter with God through
participation and service.
Conclusion: Samuel’s Call
Samuel experienced a call from God. He received God’s message. And in so doing, we see that the message
often comes from God not from us. We are
more of signposts pointing toward God.
We also see that we need to set aside space to hear the message of God
and that we often learn to know God through doing and participation as well as
head knowledge. May God guide and direct
us as we continue to seek God’s message.
Amen.
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