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Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
We understand God is Holy, and Omniscient, and Omnipotent and Loving and Compassionate, but what about when God runs out of patience and His Holy Justice moves God to action?
In our Scripture reading today we come face to face with this reality… Holy God will not be mocked.
Let’s open our Bibles to 1 Samuel 2:12 and continue with the story of young Samuel who has been left by his mother Hannah at the Tabernacle of the LORD, at Shiloh, to be raised there by Eli the High Priest and his priestly sons Hophni and Phinehas. You would think this was the safest, most God honoring place for a mother to entrust her young son to be raised and taught to serve God. But do you see what verse 12 says, my friends? “Eli’s sons were wicked men; they had no regard for the LORD.”
‘How is this possible’, we might ask? The contrast of verse 17 and 18 is part of the answer. “This sin of the young men was very great in the LORD’s sight, for they were treating the LORD’s offering with contempt. But Samuel was ministering before the LORD”
I don’t exactly know what “ministering before the LORD” means for Samuel, but I see three other phrases that give us a hint. 1:28 says “And he worshiped the LORD there” and 2:21 says “…the boy Samuel grew up in the presence of the LORD” and 2:26 says “And the boy Samuel continued to grow in stature and in favor with the LORD and with men.” Clearly young Samuel was awed by the God of his parents, and had been taught well to honor God in his heart, mind, choices, words and actions. Clearly Samuel was pursuing knowing God, worshiping God, and trying to live in a manner which honored God.
Samuel was a miracle son, born to a barren woman in God’s response to her desperate plea and her vow that if God gave her a son, she’d give him back to the LORD, for his whole life. Samuel was also God’s sovereign response to the dysfunctional spiritual leadership in Israel. Tomorrow we’ll dig more deeply into 1 Samuel 2:35 which is God’s explanation as to why He created Samuel. . .“I will raise up for Myself a faithful priest, who will do according to what is in MY heart and mind.”
Friends, do you see how important those early years at home with Hannah and Elkanah were to Samuel’s spiritual development? It seems to me their home must have been a Deuteronomy 6:4-9 home! “Love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul and strength. These commands are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you rise up. Tie them as symbols on your hand and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates.” Can you imagine that is the type of home Samuel grew up in? Of course we remember the pain Hannah experienced from Elkanah’s other wife Penninah (1 Sam. 1:6,7), but it appears God enabled Hannah and Elkanah to provide a God honoring environment for young Samuel.
Do you see a huge contrast in the attitudes of the hearts of these spiritual men at Shiloh? We presume Eli’s sons to be in their 30’s or older. Apparently they are unmarried. Eli is likely in his 60’s or older. (1 Sam. 2:22) Samuel is very young, perhaps 6 by now. Eli’s sons have grown up at the Tabernacle, surrounded by the worship of God everyday. But Eli’s sons are described as: “…they had no regard for the LORD.” What does that mean to you?
Seems to me it describes a hard heart, a prideful heart, a wicked heart. Yet these men everyday were at the Tabernacle which Moses and the people had fabricated so many years ago. They knew the stories of the cloud of God’s presence by day and the pillar of cloud by night which had hovered over this Tent of Meeting. They knew that inside this Tent, behind the thick veil, was the Ark of the Covenant, and the Shekinah Glory of God was in this place. Yet “…they had no regard for the LORD.” How can that happen?
I’ve seen that the downward slide to this dreadful place starts with spiritual boredom. That’s right. A person simply becomes bored with God, bored with Gods’ Word, bored with worship. Boredom marginalizes God, minimizes God’s value and elevates self. It’s actually idolatry. A person sees themselves as more important than God and elevates themselves above God in their own mind and heart.
But because we naturally do not like to be bored in life, a person in this condition looks for other things to excite or energize them, and thus they replace God with other pursuits that seem more fulfilling. Can you think of some examples? How many Christians forgo Sunday worship for an athletic event or an outing with friends or family? How many find TV or Netflix far more exciting that spending time with God, thus days or even weeks go by without them opening God’s Word and taking some time to sit and listen to God speak into their mind and heart?
That’s what evidently happened to Eli’s sons. But my friends, we have a spiritual enemy who is “…prowling around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8) That’s the great enemy of God, Satan, and he is quick to assign his demons to work on a person who is bored with God, enticing them further and further away from God, all the way to the point of despair.
Before long this person begins to be critical of God’s people, doubtful about the truth of God’s Word, and skeptical about the validity of prayer and worship. Then it doesn’t take long and they simply fill their lives with things other than spiritual things, and after a while they have “no regard for the LORD” and in attitude, word and deed they are living very far from God. Have you known anyone like that?
Now in the case of priests Hophni and Phinehas, do you see two things which describe how dark and hard their hearts had become? In 1 Samuel 2:13-16 there’s a description of their defilement for personal gain, of the sacrifices the people brought to God in their worship.
And in verse 22 the description of their sexual immorality with the women who served at God’s Tabernacle. Do you see some of Romans 1:18-32 in their behavior? Do you see God cannot remain silent? His Holy Justice calls Him to action!
This isn’t the only place in the Bible we see God moved to judgment. Consider the great flood of Genesis 6; or fire falling from heaven to consume the wicked towns of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19; or God striking the 10 leader/spies dead who urged the people NOT to trust God and His invitation into the Promised Land (Numbers 14:37); or God opening the earth and swallowing up Korah, Dathan, Abriam and those in rebellion against Moses with them (Numbers 16). Is that enough friends, or would you like more examples, the Bible is filled with them?! Holy God will not be mocked! His patience has a limit.
Please notice Eli’s response to what he hears is going on with his sons, in verses 22-25. What do you think of this approach to coaching his sons? That’s what parenting is, right, coaching? Coaches encourage good performance and correct poor performance, and coaches watch to see when attitude or performance of an athlete is so bad it is harming the effectiveness or attitude of the team. When that happens it’s time to bench the athlete, pull them out of the game, and if need be even take them off the team for a while, until their problem can be corrected.
Eli the High Priest had a responsibility to guard and nurture the spiritual sacredness of everything that was part of life and worship at the Tabernacle. Eli failed miserably in that he did not deal with the terrible cancer of the sin of his own sons, who were defiling the worship and mocking God. He evidently did not correct them, did not discipline them, did not remove them from the privilege of priestly service. His inaction actually nurtured their hard hearts and their spiritual drift away from God. Can you make the application to parenting and even church leadership?
As a result God had to deal with the situation. Notice verse 25, it’s one of the most shocking verses in the Bible. “…His sons, however, did not listen to their father’s rebuke, for it was the LORD’s will to put them to death.” What? God’s patience had run out!
The damage they were doing to the spiritual condition of Israel was so grievous that God determined their hearts were so hard, they would never repent, and He therefore began to prepare to remove them… permanently, by death.
Watch this friends. Holy God will not be mocked. He is patient, not wanting anyone to perish and all to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9) but He is also holy and His patience is not infinite. But, look at what God was doing with young Samuel whose heart remained tender and teachable before God: “And the boy Samuel continued to grow in stature and in favor with the LORD and with men.”
It means in the failure of both Eli and his sons, who were supposed to be nurturing and teaching Samuel, God Himself was nurturing Samuel and protecting his young heart from being damaged by Eli, Hophni and Phinehas. As God continued to nurture Samuel, people were noticing a distinct difference between Samuel and Hophni and Phinehas. Already, God was preparing both Samuel and the people for the day when Samuel would be the spiritual leader of God’s people.
As you and I look across the landscape of where you live today. Are there some who are failing as spiritual leaders, and do you see some God is raising up and nurturing for leadership influence in the future?
Oh Lord God Almighty, we thank You for Your Holiness and Your Justice. We trust You to be patient and loving, but we are also grateful that You are working for the Glory of Your Holy Name and you will not allow wickedness to prevail!
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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