(An audio version of this message can be found at https://www.spreaker.com/episode/1-samuel-3-verses-1-10-listening-for-gods-voice–58277665)
Had the wireless radio been on, they would have known the Titanic was sinking. The radio operator of another ship had tried to relay a message to the radio operator on the Titanic letting him know that they had encountered an ice field. But the Titanic’s radio operator was busy relaying passengers’ messages and rudely told the other radio operator to be quiet. The radio operator on the other ship turned off his radio and went to bed. Ten minutes later, the Titanic struck an iceberg. Their distress signals went largely unanswered because few other ships were listening.
First Samuel 3:1-10 focuses on listening for God and His varied movements within our lives. God always talks to us through insights, encounters, hunches, dreams, bursts of energy and inspirational thoughts. Our calling is to listen to the many voices of God that are often hidden in everyday experience, and then follow God’s guidance. These voices shape our encounters with God in our own unique ways.
This passage comes up regularly in some Sunday School classes where the teacher is urging the children to listen hard for God’s voice in their own lives. If that voice comes, the children are urged to respond as Samuel did in the temple. Samuel lived at a time when prophets rarely spoke to Israel. The passage begins with an interesting statement: “The word of the Lord was rare in those days.” The people did go on with the business of their religion. The Israelites’ hearts were hard, and the Lord knew they would not listen. The lack of a word from God was not so much connected with God’s reluctance to communicate with the people as with the lack of a human instrument to receive and speak the word of the Lord.
Most people don’t think of Samuel as a prophet because they associate the word “prophet” with predicting future events. While that was part of a prophet’s role, his main business was to speak God’s word to the people’s current situation.
Samuel did not yet know the Lord even though he had learned about Him his whole life. Knowing about God is not the same as having a personal relationship with Him. While most people think of the more dramatic revelations of God as normal, most people experience God’s guidance in quite ordinary ways: through positive and negative experiences, while reading Scripture, through the counsel of another, or out of a growing interest.
God’s call to Samuel came with greater intensity each time. This last time He called his name twice—a signal that this was a crucial moment. Other people whom God called by repeating their names include Abraham, Jacob, and Moses.
The most important aspect of Samuel’s call was the provision of Eli to help him interpret the call. Eli is much more tuned into Samuel’s spiritual experience than he was to Samuel’s mother. After all, Eli thought that Samuel’s mother was drunk when she asked God for a son. Eli could not see physically, but he did have good spiritual vision because he perceived that it was the Lord who had called Samuel. Eli told Samuel how to respond. Eli taught Samuel how to listen to God-and if we are going to be people of God, we must also learn how to recognize God’s efforts to speak to us.
Samuel’s call reminds us of the importance of spiritual mentoring. Many of us seek the services of professional spiritual directors, but we have to equip church members, youth leaders, and pastoral staff to be spiritual mentors. The church needs to be a laboratory for spiritual formation. Individual congregations or groups of congregations should offer classes in Christian meditation, prayer, and healing touch.
This passage refers to Eli’s failing eyesight. A priest who can’t see! No wonder the people had not heard anything from God. How could it be otherwise when Israel’s leadership was ineffective and corrupt? When religious leaders, of all people, are blind to sin, of course the word of the Lord will be rare and visions few. Religious leadership ideally combines receptivity and expertise. A capacity to hear and knowledge of what to say are necessary if God’s word is to be heard and visions to appear abundantly.
Servants like Samuel listen to their masters differently than others. Eli’s wise counsel is a good reminder that God can often use us to give better counsel to the children of others than we have been able to give to our own. God often supplies people like Eli at different times when we can’t discern God’s direction for our lives.
When have we missed something important? Not something like a cell phone call, but something deeper. When have we chosen to ignore instead of answering? When should we have done something but have been inactive? When should we have spoken up but have been silent? Most people who speak of their call do not describe a major disruption in their lives. There have been a few experiences like Paul’s encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus, but most calls are a slow, quiet awakening to something. It could be a calling to a particular church office, an injustice that needs to be addressed, or a task that needs attention.
God’s call to serve does not guarantee a perfect life. God’s words to Samuel were hard to hear and even harder to tell Eli. In the verses following this passage, we read that Samuel’s first act of his call was to tell God’s word to Eli and that word involved judgment against Eli’s sons. Eli is a good example of how not to be a parent. Contempt, arrogance, and disobedience marked Eli’s sons. Eli dealt with them poorly. These major factors contributed to the bleak spiritual climate during Samuel’s childhood. Like Samuel, Isaiah and Jeremiah, God’s call often involves working to change human systems that are broken, and that can lead us down difficult paths.
Are we ready to hear God’s voice? Don’t answer that question too quickly, because we might hear something that is not what we had in mind. Where are we most likely to hear God’s voice? It could be anywhere, but chances are it will likely be in the church, and that is because the church is the most likely place for getting the help we need in hearing and understanding. Samuel needed Eli’s help, and we need each other’s help today.
We are living in a time when many people seem unable to discern God’s voice from the noise of the world. People are starving to hear God, but they do not have ears to hear. They grew up in religious environments. They go to church every week. They have a head knowledge of God, but they do not recognize God’s voice in their lives. There comes a time when we must recognize God’s voice for ourselves. God does not want us to have a religion; He wants us to have a two-way relationship with Him. Samuel was never the same after His encounter with God, and we will never be the same after we encounter God.
If God were to speak to us, would we recognize God’s voice? Would we be listening close enough to hear a voice that we might connect with God? Should we even expect God to speak? To hear God’s call, we must be prepared to listen and see rightly. We must follow the truth wherever it leads-even when the truth hurts. We have to listen and speak prophetically. We have to challenge our own assumptions about God and faith so that we can find the sacred in unexpected and even disreputable places.
If we become submissive to God, we will begin to enjoy doing God’s will because the people will be blessed. With the light of God in us, like Samuel, we are called to invade a world in need of healing. We will make a difference in the world because we are called for a major purpose in the time we are living in.
Bibliography
- Jeremiah, David: The Jeremiah Study Bible: New King James Version (Brentwood, TN: Worthy Publishing; 2013; p. 363)
- Chafin, K.L., & Ogilvie, L.J.: The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Vol. 8: 1,2 Samuel (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Inc.; 1989; pp. 39-42)
- Stanley, C.F.: The Charles F. Stanley Life Principles Bible: New King James Version (Nashville, TN: Nelson Bibles; 2005)
- MacArthur, J.F. Jr.: The MacArthur Study Bible: New American Standard Bible (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers; 2006)
- Lucado, M.: The Lucado Life Lessons Study Bible (Nashville, TN: 2010; pp. 350-351)
- Beth Tanner, “Commentary on 1 Samuel 3:1-21.” Retrieved from www.workingpreacher.org
- “The Voice.” Retrieved from www.sermonsuite.com
- “If God is Silent, Ask: Do You Have Ears to Hear?” Retrieve from info@cufi.org
- Os Hillman, “Hearing God’s Voice.” Retrieved from tgif@maarketplaceleaders.org
- Raul Ries, “A Submitted Life.” Retrieved from www.crosswalk.com/devotionals/somebody-loves-you-radio-w-raul-ries/
- “1 Samuel 3:1-20.” Retrieved from communic@luthersem.edu
- Glenn Packiam, “The Servant Hears.” Retrieved from donotreply@email.rbc.org
- Debie Thomas, “What Do You See?” Retrieved from www.journeywithjesus.net
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