Tag Archive | women living well

1 Samuel 3 – God still speaks today…

Jan11

​Good evening y’all :). Today we are continuing our study of 1 Samuel with Good Morning Girls. We will be looking at chapter 3.

I pray you are blessed as you read 🙂

“Meanwhile, the boy Samuel served the Lord by assisting Eli. Now in those days messages from the Lord were very rare, and visions were quite uncommon. One night Eli, who was almost blind by now, had gone to bed. The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was sleeping in the Tabernacle near the Ark of God. Suddenly the Lordcalled out, “Samuel!” “Yes?” Samuel replied. “What is it?” He got up and ran to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?” “I didn’t call you,” Eli replied. “Go back to bed.” So he did. Then the Lord called out again, “Samuel!” Again Samuel got up and went to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?” “I didn’t call you, my son,” Eli said. “Go back to bed.” Samuel did not yet know the Lord because he had never had a message from the Lord before. So the Lord called a third time, and once more Samuel got up and went to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?” Then Eli realized it was the Lord who was calling the boy. So he said to Samuel, “Go and lie down again, and if someone calls again, say, ‘Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went back to bed. And the Lord came and called as before, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel replied, “Speak, your servant is listening.” (Isam 2: 1-10 NLT)

Verse 1 in particular struck me while I was reading the chapter. It tells us in those days messages from God were rare and visions were uncommon. I wonder why this is the case. Perhaps the last verse in the book of judges will shed some light to this.

“In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes”. (Judges 21:25 NLT)

The verse tells us that people did whatever they deemed right in their own eyes. That’s most likely the reason why the visions from God was very rare.

A quote from David Guzik on verse 1 says:-
“Why was the word of the LORD rare in those days? Probably, because of the hardness of heart among the people of Israel and the corruption of the priesthood. God will speak, and guide, when His people seek Him, and when His ministers seek to serve Him diligently.”(David Guzik, blueletterbible.org)

In the midst of all the corruption in Israel, God found a little boy named Samuel to speak to. Samuel was serving the Lord under the guidance of Eli. The Lord called out to Him three times. The first and 2nd time, Samuel assumed it was Eli calling out to him. Eli told him what to say when next he hears the voice call out his name. His response to Gods call shows his humility. He says “speak your servant is listening…”

God still speaks to us today, He speaks directly to our hearts, He speaks through his word, He speaks through his servants (Ministers, Pastors). The question is are we listening? Are we opening our hearts to hear from God? Is our response to God like that of Samuel or are we even too busy to hear him call out to us?. 

I pray in the midst of all the hustle and bustle of life we remember to always make time for God and listen out for Him, and even spend time in His word

God spoke to Samuel about what He would do to Eli’s family. Samuel told all of this to Eli and Eli accepted by saying, “Let God’s will be done”.

This got me thinking: could Eli have gone back to God to beg for forgiveness?…I’m reminded of how Hezekiah, after he was told he was going to die, went back to God and begged and God answered him, gaving him 15 extra years.  I’m thinking was Eli right in accepting just like that or could he have sought God’s face and also reprimanded his children and warn them of God’s word?

I pray we never get to a point where the grace of God expires in our lives, where we loose the opportunity to repent and turn from our evil ways

Thanks for joining today. Pls feel free to share your thots on the chapter.

Have a blessed evening 🙂

1 Samuel 2 – Eli and his Sons

Jan10

Good evening y’all :). Today we are continuing our study of 1 samuel with Good Morning Girls. We will be looking at chapter 2. 

I will be looking at the lessons we can learn from Eli and his sons

I pray you are blessed as you read 🙂

“Now the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord.
The custom of the priests with the people was that when any man offered
sacrifice, the priest’s servant would come, while the meat was boiling,
with a three-pronged fork in his hand, and he would thrust it into the
pan or kettle or cauldron or pot. All that the fork brought up the
priest would take for himself. This is what they did at Shiloh to all
the Israelites who came there. Moreover, before the fat was burned, the
priest’s servant would come and say to the man who was sacrificing,
“Give meat for the priest to roast, for he will not accept boiled meat
from you but only raw.” And if the man said to him, “Let them burn the
fat first, and then take as much as you wish,” he would say, “No, you
must give it now, and if not, I will take it by force.” Thus the sin of
the young men was very great in the sight of the Lord, for the men treated the offering of the Lord with contempt”. (I sam 2: 12- 17 ESV)
“But Samuel, though he was only a boy, served the Lord. He wore a linen garment like that of a priest.” (1 Sam 12: 18 NLT)



Eli was the High Priest. He knew the laws of God and understood what God
required of the priesthood. His children were also priests and were in
charge of the offerings and sacrifices the children of Israel brought to
God.

It’s interesting to see that Eli’s sons were foolish and corrupted in their priestly service to God but in the midst of the corruption, it is recorded that Samuel served the Lord as a priest. The latter part of Verse 21 also says “Samuel grew up in the presence of the Lord“.  Samuel somehow managed to escape the corruption that was going on in Eli’s house.

I wonder how Eli got it right with Samuel but seemed to fail when it came
to his own children. Perhaps he was too busy with the priestly duties
that he forgot to truly disciple his children in the ways of the Lord.

It will be unfair to put all the blame on Eli as his children were grown men at this stage They were old enough to know right from wrong yet they chose to go the wrong way. Their actions where so bad that they even
went as far as sleeping with the women in the temple. God was pretty outraged by their actions. Verse 17 says “….for they treated the Lord’s offerings with contempt“. They had no regard whatsoever for God or the people bringing the offering.

Eli though didn’t seem to do much about his children’s behavior. What I would have expected from Eli was for him to discipline them when he found out about their nasty behavior. He should have reprimanded them
and probably suspended them from their duty till they repented. We are only told of one instance where he told them off.  And even at that, he didn’t take any action. They still continued in their office as priest
misleading and taking advantage of others.

Samuel on the other hand continued to grow in the presence of the Lord. Even in the midst of the corruption, God was raising Samuel as a godly priest.

Here are few lessons I gleaned today – 

1) Our service/ sacrifice to God should be done in an acceptable manner as
prescribed by God. The children of Eli were serving God as priests but
their service was done in an unacceptable manner, which eventually led
to their death and the destruction of their entire lineage.

“The time is coming when I will put an end to your family, so it will no
longer serve as my priests. All the members of your family will die before their time. None will reach old age. You will watch with envy as I
pour out prosperity on the people of Israel. But no members of your family will ever live out their days”. (V31 -32 NLT)

Romans 12: 1 tells us offer ourselves as a pleasing sacrifice holy and acceptable unto God which is our reasonable service. I have come to realize that partial obedience is as good as disobedience. With God, it’s either you fully obey or you don’t. there is no in between. God has standards and He won’t change His standards for anyone. He is a Holy God…

2) As parents we shouldn’t love our children more than God. It seems Eli didn’t want to offend his children and his insufficient enforcement of discipline upon them resulted in God punishing him and his entire generation. God said to him why do you love your children more than me.

“Disciplining our children is an act of obedience to the Lord. Leniency is not love. .
. it is idolatry. We are really putting our desire to be LIKED by our children above our responsibility to equip and train our children. We are putting ourselves before God andour
children! God has given us the charge to “train a child in the way they should go”. When we turn our head away from the wrongs our children do .. . we are turning our head from God and are abandoning our responsibility to our children! When we rationalize, excuse, blame others for, and condone wrong behavior, we sin against God” (Bruce Goettsche Union Church of LaHarpe)

3) Our sins may and can have serious impact on people around us and generations unborn. The whole of Eli’s lineage was in trouble and cursed because of the disobedience of his sons

I pray for the grace to offer our services and sacrifices to God in a pleasing manner. In Jesus’s Name. Amen

Thanks for joining today. Pls feel free to leave your thots on the chapter in the comments section

Have a blessed evening basking in Gods goodness and grace 🙂