1 Samuel 4-8

Introduction

In her despair, she cried out to the Lord, and the Lord heard her, and she conceived and bore Samuel. She presented Samuel at the temple or the tabernacle as being lent to the Lord. He was to be a Nazarite. No razor should come on the head of him all the days of his life. He was to be dedicated to the Lord. That was a promise that she made to God. If you will hear my prayer, I will lend him to you all the days of his life. Samuel grew in stature and was recognized among men. God called him with a personal calling. And at Samuel’s direction, the nation goes forth to fight against the Philistines for victory. But they met with defeat.

Or I mean the Israelites asked the right question. They asked among themselves, why has the Lord defeated us? It’s a question I think we do well to consider. God has called us to go forth and have victory over sin. We don’t always have victory over sin. The question we ought to ask is, Lord, why have you not given me the victory? What people say so often is, I just can’t overcome it. Where is God in that? You notice I can’t overcome it. It’s not about me. Was it about Israel? It was about God. Israel recognized they couldn’t overcome the Philistines without God. We need to recognize we can’t overcome sin without God. Let’s not say I can’t do it. Let’s say I need God. And go forth and entreat God.

So some good lessons here. I’ve got again the answers. I want you to tell me the question.

In the context of these chapters three through five, this person said, Let him do what seems good to him.

Who was Eli? Very good. Eli accepted the judgment that God had against his sons, Hosni and Phineas. They were corrupt. They were wicked. And Eli accepted that. These people said, Woe to us, who will deliver us. I don’t know of a quote in the context that said that. The Israelites may have said that at some point, but I’m thinking of chapter 4 and verse 8. When the Israelites brought the Ark of the Covenant into the camp, how did the Philistines react? God has come in the camp. Woe to us, who will deliver us? The Philistines said that.

Hosni and Phinehaz were killed. But this man came and told Eli what happened.

Okay, a man of Benjamin. We don’t know his name, just a man of Benjamin. Who came and told Eli what happened? This fell prostrate before the ark of God. Dagon, the idol of Dagon. That’s correct. And so we know that when the Ark went into the Philistine territory, that the hand of the Lord was very heavy. Where?

Okay. And name some cities. Oh, Ana.

1. God Acts for His Name’s Sake

Right. Went to Gath. And then it went to Ekron. And in each place the hand of the Lord was heavy. The land of the Lord was harsh. There was great destruction there. We might well ask the question: did God care what the Philistines thought? Stephanie says yes.

No. Look over with me in Psalms chapter 106 and verse 8. This is one of many places in the Old Testament. Other places would be when he brought the Israelites out of Egypt. He makes the statement in several places that he acts for his name’s sake. Psalms 106, verse 8, when he talks about the rebellion of Israel by the Red Sea, he says, nevertheless he saved them for his name’s sake. What’s that mean for his name’s sake? For the sake of his name? For the sake of his reputation. What would the Egyptians say if he brought them out into the wilderness and then killed them all? What kind of God is that?

So all will go. That’s right. That’s the second line, and that’s key. Because what God is doing here is not just punitive. It’s not that, hey, you’ve offended me, I’m going to get back at you. God is acting for his name’s sake. That’s his character. That’s what he’s always done. He’s doing that here.

He is causing them to see sorrows so they might recognize what they’ve done. They might come to repentance. Have they figured it out by the time we get to chapter 6?

They seem to have a pretty good idea because when it first happens, they’re not sure. Let’s just send it on. When it happens again, it’s like, wow. The third time? Okay. Okay, we need to send this back to Israel. Chapter 5, verse 10. Therefore they sent the ark of God to Ekron, and when the Ark of God came to Ekron, the Echronites cried out, saying, They have brought the ark of the God of Israel to kill us and our people. They already knew when it came to Ekron, they knew what to expect because they knew what had happened in Ashdod and Gath. And they said, This is the work of God back to Israel. Don’t do this.

And so when we get to chapter 6. Now the Ark of the Lord was in the country of the Philistines for seven months. I mean, if there was just death and destruction or boils or rats for a day or two, you might tend to say, well, that’s just happenstance. But this is repeated for a period, a long period of time, seven months. And the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners saying, What shall we do with the Ark of the Lord? They could get rid of the Ark. They could just send it away, but they wanted to send it away in such a way as not just get rid of it, but to appease the God of Israel. They recognized that this was from Him.

So they asked their own priest, in what way should we send the ark back? And they said, Don’t send it empty, empty. Return it with a trespass offering. Then you will be healed, and it will be known to you why his hand is not removed from you. And they said, What is a trespass offering? They said, Okay, five golden tumors and golden rats to represent these miseries that he had brought upon them. This is nothing of divine revelation. This is something that’s fairly common in many cultures as a way to appease a God. And so they did this. They stacked up into a chest, these golden pieces, and prepared the ark.

In verse 5, you shall make images of your tumors and images of your rats. Perhaps he will lighten his hand from you, from your gods and from your land. Why then do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and the Pharaoh hardened their hearts? And that’s what Dennis was talking about. They weren’t completely sure. When you first read the text, it seems as though they’re certain. And I suspect there were some that were fairly certain. But there were probably some that said, you know, that’s just happenstance. That’s just, you’re just being superstitious. Surely their God is not this powerful. After all, we captured his ark. He can’t be that powerful. And so there was this appearing to be some dissension in the ranks, and the priests were pretty harsh and said, Don’t harden your hearts.

Remember what this God did to the Egyptians? When he Pharaoh hardened his heart. So if they came up with a scheme. Take a new cart, take two milk cows, which have never been yoked, hitch the cows of the cart, take their calves home away from them, take the ark, set it on the cart, put the articles of gold in the chest, send it away, and see what happens. What would be the natural thing to happen? Sharon says.

Who watched? Did they send some messengers or some servants out to watch? Who watched? From the Philistines. Who tagged along behind the ark and watched it all the way?

The Lords of the Philistines. This shows how critical this was. This wasn’t just some minor affair to send a servant off to. This was highly important. The fate of the nation rested on this. The Lords of the Philistines themselves went and watched personally.

2. When Adversity Comes, Draw Closer to God

What do we do when we’re faced with adversity? How do we handle it? The Philistines got the message.

When adversity comes, what do we do? Well, we know the book of Job, the great book of Job. When Job had adversity, there was advisors. His own wife said, What? Curse God and die. His other friends said, surely you’ve done something wrong, Job. And we see that the quandary that man is in is when adversity comes, we don’t always know why.

What do we do? One good thing to do, I think, in every situation of adversity is ask the question are we with God or not? We should use any adversity to draw ourselves closer to God. If this is from God, let’s draw closer to him. If it’s not from God, we’ll still be closer to God. Let’s act in a way that it draws us closer to God. Because there’s really two choices when adversity comes. We can either draw closer to God, or we can, like Job’s wife, blame him for our adversity and draw the other way. So adversity is one of those things that is a struggle that often separates man from his faith, or can cause him to draw closer. Which one will it be?

There’s our challenge. The Philistines did the right thing. They recognized this is from God or could be from God. They weren’t really sure. So what did they do? They acted in a way to appease God. We need to do likewise. We don’t always say, do like the Philistines. But this is one case that I think it’s appropriate. So they took the two milk cows, hitched them, and then they went and they headed straight for Beth Shemish. They went along the way, lowing the entire way. And they didn’t turn aside one way or the other. When they comes to Bethshemish, verse 14, the cart comes into the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh and stood there, and a large stone was there. It’s interesting that the cows stopped there.

3. A Lack of Reverence and Fear

They split the wood of the cart and offered the cows as a burnt offering to the Lord. And the Levites took the ark of the Lord and the chest that was in it, and they offered burnt offerings. The five lords of the Philistines, verse 16, had seen it, and they returned to Ekaron the same day. God made a judgment against those of Bethshemish. Why? They looked inside the ark. There’s a little bit of difference in the translations when you come to verse 19. I’m reading from the New King James, and it says, He struck 50,000 and 70 people or men of the people.

Most commentators that I’ve read will say that Bethshemish could hardly have, couldn’t have contained 50,000 people. And so this is a copyist error that has crept into some of the texts, and so the best reading is really 70. Josephus has 70 when he records the history.

Why? Because they looked in the ark. But why? Why? What’s the real reason? What did looking into the ark mean? Well, they weren’t Levi’s saying. Okay, God had told them. The ark was sacred. Even the Levites weren’t allowed to touch it. They were to carry it about with poles through the through the rings, John. Even though it is not made to be reached up. The uh the word offering that he offered was not improved. Maybe it’s not the right quality about it. So there might be other things or as well. Nothing, nothing in the text though, mentions the sacrifice as being unacceptable. The condemnation is what they did with the ark, right? Well, if you go back to the law and uh in Deuteronomy that there’s not any acceptable sacrifice, no cows are not.

And uh especially uh a cow with the hands or cow to the head, and then uh the new American statute says 5,000. Uh but the way it is working here, it doesn’t make it sound like it’s all from that area, right in your region. Regardless of how widespread it was, the judgment was not about the sacrifice, the judgment was about looking into the ark, Sarah.

It doesn’t say how they moved it though, does it? How can we offer the heart? Bathshemish was a Levite city, I believe. They do say the Levite had the ark. Again, the judgment was not against how they moved the ark, it was against they looked into it. And it really shows a lack of reverence and fear.

And that’s the key. A lack of reverence, a lack of fear. In this judgment, it does create fear among the people. The men of Betheshima said, Who is able to stand against this great and holy God? When we today fail to show fear and reverence for God, we can stand in the same kind of judgment of condemnation. We need to show fear and reverence in how we approach God. And so they sent messengers to the inhabitants of Kyrjoth. It was the next city along the road back to Shiloh. Whether they intended the ark to actually make it back to Shiloh, we don’t know. We don’t know exactly what happened in Shiloh. Some have said that perhaps Shiloh had experienced destruction based upon the Philistines capturing the ark and then going into Shiloh and burning it.

Don’t know, but they sent it down to the next city along the way toward Shiloh. And the men of Kyrjisth came and they took it. And they brought it to the house of Benadab on the hill and consecrated Eliazar his son to keep the ark of the Lord. 2 Chronicles. Look with me over 2 Chronicles chapter 1. We see a flash forward in history. Because what we have at this point is the ark has come back, but the ark is separated from the tabernacle. And it stayed that way until the temple was built, apparently. In 2 Chronicles, Solomon is reigning. Verse 3 of 2 Chronicles 1, Solomon and all the congregation with him went to the high place that was at Gibeon, for the tabernacle of meeting with God was there, which Moses the servant of the Lord had made in the wilderness.

So we’ve got the tabernacle at Gibeon, just north of Jerusalem, about four or five miles. But David had brought up the ark of God from Kyrgistjuram to the place David had prepared for it, for he had pitched a tent for it in Jerusalem. So the ark stayed at Kyrgistjurim for a while, and then David brought it into Jerusalem where it would be close by and pitched a tent for it, but not the original tent or tabernacle. So you got the tabernacle and the ark at two different places.

4. Prepare Your Hearts and Serve Him Only

Doesn’t tell us how long after? I know I’ve read some comment commentators that said it took twenty years for them to go and and conquer the Philistines. I don’t see the text saying that. The text does say 20 years, but that was 20 years the Ark stayed at Kyrjusgiram. Verse 3 is not necessarily 20 years later. But Samuel speaks of the house of Israel, saying, If you return to the Lord with all your hearts, and then put away the foreign gods and the ashtaroth from among you, and prepare your hearts for the Lord and serve him only. Then he will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines. We gain a little bit of insight. Because of chapter 4, when Samuel said, Go against the Philistines, and they went and didn’t give the victory, why not?

Why not? Why, O Lord? Samuel says, Here’s why. You’re still worshiping your idols and the Astaroth. Who are the Astaroth?

The Canaanite goddesses. Canaanite goddesses, right? Specifically the consort of Baal and others. Female consort. Uh we often think about Ba and forget about the Ashtaroth. Uh when uh Elijah was up on Mount Carmel, how many prophets of Baal were there? Four or five. Four hundred and fifty, I think it was. How many prophets of Astaroth? It was another 400. Yeah. All we remember is Baal, not the Astaroth. But they were both there. And so they had accepted the Canaanite deities. Plural. Not just Baal, but the Astaroth as well. And he says, not just Baal, he says, foreign gods. This is serious. This is a major rebellion. When you go after these, you have rejected God. So he says, prepare your hearts by coming back to the Lord and serving him only.

Why? What did God say in the very beginning of the Ten Commandments? Exodus 20. They shall have no other gods before me. God says, I’m a jealous God. We’ll do well to heed that. So the children of Israel put away the bells and the ashtaroth and served the Lord only. And Samuel said, gather all Israel to Mizhpah, and I will pray the Lord for you. Mespah, you would call is where they gathered to uh deal with the Benjamin problem when there was grievous sins in Benjamin. They gathered there. It was a nice place a little bit north of Jerusalem, a nice plain area where they could have a large numbers together. And so they gathered there. How did they approach God when they gathered? Did they have their robes on and go through some ceremonies?

How did they approach God? Yeah, they fasted. Why fasting?

It’s a way of cleansing themselves.

Sorry?

I can’t hear you. Okay, it’s it’s a way of humbling themselves. And I think there’s the key. It is a cleansing, but it’s a cleansing by humbling. We might talk about sacrifice. How do you sacrifice? You deny yourself something. In this case, food. Fasting is a typical way that men would approach God. It involves self-denial. It involves humbling. And that’s how you approach God. You cannot approach God without humbling yourself. There’s nothing wrong about fasting today, is it? Nothing wrong with that. I don’t know of any place in the New Testament that says thou shalt fast, or you must fast. That doesn’t mean we can’t. When we deny ourselves in order to spend time in prayer and humbling ourselves before God, that’s a good thing. It’s a good thing.

I think it’s uh sad that so many Christians today don’t know fasting. I think many Christians have never fasted in their entire life. Um we see Muslims doing it. We might think it’s odd. It’s not odd. It’s a way of approaching God, a way of humbling ourselves. So Samuel took a suckling lamb and offered it as a whole burnt offering to the Lord, and Samuel cried out the Lord for Israel, and the Lord answered him. How did the Lord answer Samuel when he made the sacrifice?

5. Here I Raise My Ebenezer

Is this an unusual thing that God thundered on the Philistines?

This harks back to the beginning of the conquest, doesn’t it? When they first come into the land, God says, I will fight for you. And they come into the land, and there was this great battle, and God led the charge with hail, and more people died from the hail than died from the swords of the Israelites. This goes back to the beginning of that conquest that calls back up those memories. God is with us like he was then. Similar to that statement that Peter made when he was with Cornelius, right? And the Spirit of God fell on them. And when he goes back and reports to the apostles, what does he say? Well, this Cornelius is a good guy, you know. And I think I think God’s blessed him.

No, he said, He fell on the Spirit fell on him like it in the beginning with us. That’s how strong affirmation this is. God calls down thunder, and it so confused them that they were overcome before Israel. Israel didn’t gain the battle. God did. Yes, Israel went and fought, but what did they do? They, quote, wiped up. They pursued them. But the victory was already won by God. Pretty amazing. Astounding. There is victory in God when we’ll humble ourselves before Him. So the men of Israel went out of Mizpah and pursued the Philistines and drove them back, verse 11, as far as below Bethcar. And Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mespah and Shin and called its name Ebenezer, saying, Thus far the Lord has helped me.

Look in your uh thumb books. We sing this song a lot, number 420. I don’t know if you think about this when you read, when you read the words of the song. But I think it’s really appropriate for us to remember the symbolism of Ebenezer. Oh, thou fountain of every blessing, tune my heart to sing thy grace. Verse 2, here I raise my Ebenezer. Let’s make it personal. Has God helped you? Has God given you victory? You look at your life. Maybe your life isn’t perfect, but know this. There are plenty of people that are slaves to alcoholism. They are slaves to drug drugs. They are slaves to sin. Their lives are bondage. What about you? Are you free from that kind of bondage? Praise God.

Hither by your help I’ve come. That’s where I’m out, God. Hither by your help I’ve come. Here I raise my Ebenezer, because I recognize that whatever victories I’ve gained, I’ve gained them through God. And I hope by thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home. And I think he’s talking clearly about the heavenly home. Oh, to grace, how great a debtor. Daily I’m constrained to be. Let thy goodness like a fetter bind my wondering heart to thee. There’s so much symbolism in this message here.

Sorry about that. We would do well to do likewise. Praise God and acknowledge him. Thus far the Lord has helped us. So the Philistines were subdued and they didn’t come anymore in the territory of Israel. Were the battles all over? When Saul comes on the scene, what’s he doing? He’s fighting the Philistines. When David comes on the scene, what’s he doing? He’s fighting the Philistines. And sometimes we get discouraged, you know, I seem like I’m always struggling with sin. Whether you’re struggling or not is not the important thing. The important thing is, is God giving you some measure of victory? Because they had the victory, and yet there was still a struggle that ongoes throughout time here. It says at the end of verse 14 that there was peace between Israel and the Amorites.

Wait just a minute. I thought there was not supposed to be peace between Israel and the Amorites. Wasn’t the Amorites one of the seven that God had said you should utterly destroy? What’s the purpose of why he says there’s peace among the Amorites and Israel? When Israel’s weak, what happens to the Amorites? They’re ready to take over. They’re ready to oppress. They’re not ready to oppress right now. Why? They recognize that this victory has come from God. And so they make peace. This is not about what Israel’s doing, it’s about what the Amorites are doing. They’re recognizing Israel’s position and that God has blessed them. Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life. Were his sons good?

6. They Have Rejected Me

It’s sad, isn’t it? Eli apparently was a good man. His sons were wicked. Samuel was a good man, but his sons were not. So when we move into chapter 8, it came to pass that when Samuel was old, he made his sons judges over Israel. You would think that he would have learned something from Eli. God judged Eli because he didn’t restrain his sons. Samuel should not have put his sons into position as judges when they were not walking in his ways, turning aside after dishonest gain, took bribes and perverting justice, verse 3. And yet he did. All the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said, Look, you’re old, your sons do not walk in your ways. Make for us a king to judge us like all the nations.

Okay, there’s that, but what about his sons? They’re going to be in power after him. They had just been through the wicked sons of Eli, the wicked sons of Samuel, you would think.

Samuel wasn’t pleased with that. And God said to Samuel, what? They’re not upset with either up there with him. Yeah, they haven’t rejected you, Samuel, they’ve rejected me. According to all the works that they have done since the day that I brought them out of Egypt, even to this day, which with Jave forsaken me and served other gods, so they are doing to you also. Hear their voice.

And show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them. And so Samuel begins to tell them what’s going to happen. As Dennis said, the king in verse 12 and 11, he’s going to take your sons and he’s going to make them into uh chariot drivers, horsemen, runners before his chariots. He’s going to make some of them captains in his armies. Some is going to plow ground and reap his harvest. It’s all going to be about him. He’s going to oppress you in the sense that your working will be to go for his benefit, not your own. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. He will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, your olive groves, give them to his servants.

Take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, give it to his officers and servants. Take your men servants and your maidservants and your finest young men and donkeys and put them to work. He will take a tenth of your sheep, and he will you will be his servants. Interesting in verse 18, what he says.

What’s the Lord going to do? He’s not going to hear you.

Nevertheless, people refused to obey the voice of Samuel and said, No, but we will have a king over us. We will be like all the other nations, and our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles. Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he repeated them in the hearing of the Lord. Now, one thing for true, and that is the king. They wanted him to fight their battles. You remember what happens? We’re not going to get into it in this study. But if you know the history, what happened when Saul was appointed king? Did they take him into the palace and set him on the throne?

Before that, though, right after who was made king? Did he have a throne? Did he have a temple?

He went home. He went home. They didn’t know what to do with him. He went home. He didn’t have any of this infrastructure. And as Sarah was saying, when the enemy came and encroached, and then he went out and fought the battle, then he was accepted. And they began to create us more of a standing army and so forth. But initially they didn’t know what to do with him because this wasn’t the history of Israel in the past. The king up to this point has always been God. It’s his kingdom. And even when there’s an earthly king, it’s still God’s kingdom. So the Lord said in verse 22, heed their voice and make them a king. And Samuel said to the men of the city, Israel, every man go to his city.

Every man go to his city. Go back home. Chapter 9, we’re not going to get into it for time’s sake. But you know the history. Samuel finds Saul, whom God has chosen, a man of great stature, who was head and shoulders among the rest. Interestingly enough. Um there’s just so much there. I can’t talk about the whole thing. Any comments about the material we covered tonight, chapters six, seven, and eight. I know it was an English life today, and dedicated to the Lord and the prophet and all that. Um probably wouldn’t allow them to marry.

Samuel was married. Uh men of God have typically been married, not always. Paul wasn’t married.

That was his choice. It was never commanded, and there’s necess nothing necessarily wrong with choosing not to be married, but that’s not what God has required. Men have required that in some cases, but God hasn’t. Any other comments?

Yes.

And so we see on this occasion and on the occasional dozen later on, that both times Levites really stuff up and responsibility to properly transport the ark. That ark should have been properly, but it was transported. Well, it had a lid on it. It should have had a lid on it. But then when they ever looked out a tabernacle, you’re supposed to take the tabernacle and cover the ark of the testament. Right. Should have been covered, that’s right. So the people didn’t look on it. What do you think the people were looking for when they opened it up and looked into it?

There were some things there that were treasured, weren’t there, wasn’t there? What was in the ark?

Aaron’s rod that budded, Ten Commandments. And a bowl of manna, that’s right. And I I suspect that they wanted to be assured that those things were still there. But you don’t just look in the ark, Sarah.

And that’s interesting that I thought about that too. Well, did the Philistines look in the ark? We aren’t told.

And so when they failed to obey, that was punished. The Philistines wouldn’t have known, most likely. But yet they were still punished. Whether they looked in it or not doesn’t matter. They were still punished because they failed to reverence not just the Ark, they failed to reverence the God of Israel. And that that was really their sin. So whether the foolish things looked in it or not, don’t know.

See, that’s a good question.

That’s what you kind of get the feeling the Israelites are taking the ark as if you got God in a bottle, and surely God won’t be captured. He’ll bring us the victory. We know that Ezekiel records that when God is preparing Jerusalem for destruction by the Babylonians, Ezekiel sees the glory of God depart from the temple. I don’t believe the presence of God was with the Ark when it went into battle. I think the presence of God would have departed before that. We don’t see God being contained in a bottle or him being a part of the Israelites treating the Ark irreverently. Well, some good thoughts, some good comments. I appreciate your time. Sunday we’ll start new classes for most of the grades. We’ll be in the auditorium for special speaker on Sunday.

And then Wednesday night we’ll start the new quarter. Thank you for your time.