They did not “know” the Lord.
(1 Samuel 1:11, 1 Samuel 2:12-21, 1 Samuel 3:1-21)
Before we jump into these readings, remember that 1 Samuel is following the time of the Judges. The time of Judges was a period in Israel history when God’s people had full access to the knowledge of the laws given by God, it was embedded into their culture and ways of life at this time. However, Israel started to diverge and change to make worshiping and honoring God easier for them to be immersed with the rest of the world. They made a law unto themselves, creating their own sense of right and wrong (Judges 21:25). It could be considered a “dark age” of Israel history, where each tribe or household held different beliefs, no one in agreement, each believing they were right. God used these judges to bring his people back on the right track. In fact, Samuel is considered the last judge to Israel, Samuel was not a Levite but an Ephrathite. He became a judge and prophet, and a priest-like after the order of Melchizedek. Samuel is the one who will anoint the first two kings of Israel, Saul and David.
Do you ever get worried for your children’s faith? We want to protect them from the world and its twisted lies, bring them up in the truth of God’s Word. We as parents try to protect our children by sending them to the right school, living in the right neighborhood, or having the right friends. We tried to give our children the best possible outcome for success in this world and success in their spiritual condition. Samuel is born into dark times, to a mother who cried out for a child. Her prayer is answered, and now she is to give her only child to the Lord under the care of Eli. She hands Samuel over to a man whose own sons are filled with contempt for the Lord. Eli’s sons did not know the Lord (1 Samuel 2:12). How does the sons of the high priest, who grew up immersed in tabernacle life helping with the duties of the sacrifices, not know the Lord? Their whole life revolved around the Lord. And how is Eli to teach and lead Samuel if he cannot do so with his own sons?
A few important points here:
- The phrase “to know” someone in Hebrew was a sexual and intimate description of a relationship between two people. Eli’s sons “did not know the Lord” means they did not have a relationship with him. They knew his name, but that was about as deep as it went.
- Eli rarely taught Samuel about the Lord (1 Sam 3:1).
- Samuel did not know the Lord (1 Sam 3:7).
- Even when man (Eli) fails doing what God intended (to teach Samuel), God does not forget or leave us in the dirt. The Lord steps in to teach a young and impressionable Samuel surrounded by negative influences.
- The Lord made sure Samuel hears him and knows he is God.
“And Samuel grew, and the Lord was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground” (1 Samuel 3:19). The circumstances did not seem ideal for this young boy to be left in, but having God’s Word changed him, change the circumstances, changed the outcome compared to Eli’s sons. God’s Word did this, not Eli’s words, not some devotional words, not a pastor’s words, not a father’s words, nor a friend’s weekly blog words. The true power that changes hearts is His Word, not how mankind repackages it, twisting it into their own truths – like during the time of the judges. Eli’s sons heard, read, and acted what they want to hear, read, and act…but they did not know the Lord. Samuel started out not knowing the Lord. But he listened to the voice calling him in the dark of night. He clung to it, not one word Samuel heard “fall to the ground’. That expression means the words he heard and read from God seeped and soaked into his studies, into his thoughts, and God placed them in his heart to dwell. The Lord’s words did not pass through one ear and out the other. There was a home, a place for his Word to live inside Samuel’s heart. Then Samuel knew the Lord. Application of Samuel is so important, we are surround by complacency and evil like Eli’s sons, who are not in the word but claim they are in the “faith”. We are surrounded by children and people who have never really heard God’s Word.
מגן השביל 