It may feel a little odd this week to back track in the
Biblical narrative. 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 before Solomon even came onto the
scene.
So yes, talking about Samuel this week after already talking about three of the kings is clearly anachronistic. And yet 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 so it seems fitting to seep back and dwell with that passage this week.
In I Samuel 3:1-21 we read that 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, Eli would send him back to bed, 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, he should 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.
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.
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, 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.
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.
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