The advantage of idols: you can make your god do what you want. But Jehovah won’t be pushed around. When Eli heard the solemn pronouncement on his house, he responded, “It is the Lord. Let Him do what seems good to Him” (1 Sam 3:18). We could admire his acquiescence if we didn’t know more […]
Read More… from September 14, 2023 — God Is Not A Good Luck Charm
Old-time preachers sometimes sounded like a fire alarm—because they believed there was a fire! “Samuel was afraid to tell Eli the vision” (3:15). Who wouldn’t be? It was a message of judgment. This cuts close to home, doesn’t it! The message we have is tempered with God’s marvelous mercy, but it includes the message of […]
Read More… from September 13, 2023 — The Whole Counsel Of God
The title looks forward to the Millennium, but God has spoken by children through the ages. What an honor to be God’s voicepiece to the nation! When Samuel responded to the voice of the Lord in the night hours at Shiloh, “Speak, for Your servant hears” (1 Sam 3:10), did he grasp that he would […]
Read More… from September 12, 2023 — A Little Child Shall Lead Them
A feeble priest. Failing eyesight. A flickering lamp. But a faithful young servant to carry on! The scene changes. We are now inside the living quarters of the priests at Shiloh. It’s bedtime. A series of markers are given to set the scene. First, we are told that, although young, and unlike Eli’s own sons, […]
Read More… from September 11, 2023 — Speak, For Your Servant Hears
The child Samuel proves that even little flames can show the difference between light and darkness. Immediately following the conclusion of Hannah’s glorious prayer (1 Sam 2:1-10), we catch the interplay between light and darkness with which we are so familiar in this world. Listen to these two sentences: “The child ministered to the Lord […]
People who think “good guys end up last” need to listen to the thrilling words of Hannah’s song. A paean is a song of enthusiastic praise or a celebratory poem of joyful triumph. The second chapter of 1 Samuel includes one of the greatest examples. Anyone studying the first ten verses of 1 Samuel 2 […]
Read More… from September 7, 2023 — Hannah’s Paean Of Praise
Every answered prayer is both a blessing and a burden, God’s supply and a stewardship of it. The time came when Hannah must keep her promise as the Lord had kept His. How those years must have flown! Was this vulnerable child ready for the rigors of Eli’s household? Was it three years that “Hannah […]
A newborn weighs a few pounds and is totally dependent on its mother. But it shouldn’t stay like that! There was no soy alternative or infant formula in Hannah’s day. The newborn for the first three years or so was dependent on the mother for milk supply. Then it was weaned little by little to […]
Read More… from September 5, 2023 — The Importance Of Weaning
The birth of Samuel may have seemed inconsequential, but it was a divine intervention in history. Whatever the deficiencies in Elkanah’s family, no one can deny that the words of 1 Samuel 1:19 are like rays of sunshine breaking through dark clouds. In spite of abounding wickedness, we read the family “rose early in the […]
Read More… from September 4, 2023 — A Living, Breathing Answer To Prayer