May 8
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Today's story in the very interesting book of Samuel tells of the famous story of the calling of Samuel. Samuel heard a voice calling three times and each time thought it was his elder Eli, yet Eli finally realized that it was God calling to him, Samuel responded in faith and readiness. Now i'd venture to say not that many of us have heard the voice of God calling audibly to us (though, i'm not saying it couldn't happen!) , yet this story still has significance. It not only is a great testimony to God's faithfulness in calling out men and women of faith at the right time in his redemptive history. It is also a reminder for us. Even though we may not hear God's audible voice in this life, we do have his communication to us. Al talked about this the other week. We have the Bible, if you have read it (just click on one of those links above) this week you have heard God speaking. So let us respond in faith to his call we have in the Bible, to tell others about him, to give him our worship, our prayers, our devotion to proclaiming and spreading the kingdom of God!
In John we read something similar, Jesus tells about how we can hear God's voice in this way and respond. He says, 'the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live'. God's word is powerful and it has the power to raise us from the dead, both literally and spiritually. Then Jesus ties it all together. He says that those who don't read the scriptures and then regard Christ as the Messiah, the chosen one of Israel, these are blind and rebellious to what that word says. The Bible is about Jesus.
In 1st Samuel 3:9 Eli taught Samuel the trick to prophecy --> tell God, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening." We have to ask of the Lord to speak to us & we have to do it in a humble manner of whatever-He-wants-He-gets.
ReplyDeleteLater in verse 18 Eli pressed Samuel to tell him what God said. Even though the message wasn't at all what Eli wanted to hear, his response was, "He is the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes." Again, whatever God wants He gets.