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1 Samuel
Chapter Seven
1 Samuel 7
Chapter Contents
The ark removed to Kirjath-jearim. (1-4) The Israelites
solemnly repent. (5,6) The Lord discomfits the Philistines. (7-12) They are
subdued, Samuel judges Israel. (13-17)
Commentary on 1 Samuel 7:1-4
(Read 1 Samuel 7:1-4)
God will find a resting-place for his ark; if some thrust
it from them, the hearts of others shall be inclined to receive it. It is no
new thing for God's ark to be in a private house. Christ and his apostles
preached from house to house, when they could not have public places. Twenty
years passed before the house of Israel cared for the want of the ark. During
this time the prophet Samuel laboured to revive true religion. The few words
used are very expressive; and this was one of the most effectual revivals of
religion which ever took place in Israel.
Commentary on 1 Samuel 7:5,6
(Read 1 Samuel 7:5,6)
Israel drew water and poured it out before the Lord;
signifying their humiliation and sorrow for sin. They pour out their hearts in
repentance before the Lord. They were free and full in their confession, and
fixed in their resolution to cast away from them all their wrong doings. They
made a public confession, We have sinned against the Lord; thus giving glory to
God, and taking shame to themselves. And if we thus confess our sins, we shall
find our God faithful and just to forgive us our sins.
Commentary on 1 Samuel 7:7-12
(Read 1 Samuel 7:7-12)
The Philistines invaded Israel. When sinners begin to
repent and reform, they must expect that Satan will muster all his force
against them, and set his instruments at work to the utmost, to oppose and
discourage them. The Israelites earnestly beg Samuel to pray for them. Oh what
a comfort it is to all believers, that our great Intercessor above never
ceases, is never silent! for he always appears in the presence of God for us.
Samuel's sacrifice, without his prayer, had been an empty shadow. God gave a
gracious answer. And Samuel erected a memorial of this victory, to the glory of
God, and to encourage Israel. Through successive generations, the church of God
has had cause to set up Eben-ezers for renewed deliverances; neither outward
persecutions nor inward corruptions have prevailed against her, because
"hitherto the Lord hath helped her:" and he will help, even to the
end of the world.
Commentary on 1 Samuel 7:13-17
(Read 1 Samuel 7:13-17)
In this great revival of true religion, the ark was
neither removed to Shiloh, nor placed with the tabernacle any where else. This
disregard to the Levitical institutions showed that their typical meaning
formed their chief use; and when that was overlooked, they became a lifeless
service, not to be compared with repentance, faith, and the love of God and
man.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on 1 Samuel》
1 Samuel 7
Verse 1
[1] And
the men of Kirjathjearim came, and fetched up the ark of the LORD, and brought
it into the house of Abinadab in the hill, and sanctified Eleazar his son to
keep the ark of the LORD.
Fetch up —
That is, by the priests appointed to that work.
Hill —
This place they chose, both because it was a strong place, where it would be
the most safe; and an high place, and therefore visible at some distance, which
was convenient for them, who were at that time to direct their prayers and
faces towards the ark. And for the same reason David afterwards placed it in
the hill of Sion.
Sanctified Eleazar —
Not that they made him either Levite or Priest; for in Israel persons were not
made but born such; but they devoted, or set him apart wholly to attend upon
this work.
His son —
Him they chose rather than his father, because he was younger and stronger, and
probably freed from domestic cares, which might divert him from, or disturb him
in this work.
To keep the ark — To
keep the place where it was, clean, and to guard it that none might touch it,
but such as God allowed to do so.
Verse 2
[2] And it came to pass, while the ark abode in Kirjathjearim, that the time
was long; for it was twenty years: and all the house of Israel lamented after
the LORD.
Kirjath-jearim —
Where it continued, and was not carried to Shiloh its former place, either
because that place was destroyed by the Philistines when the ark was taken, or
because God would hereby punish the wickedness of the people of Israel, by
keeping it in a private place near the Philistines, whether the generality of
the people durst not come.
Twenty years — He
saith not, that this twenty years was all the time of the ark's abode there,
for it continued there from Eli's time 'till David's reign, 2 Samuel 6:2, which was forty years: but that it
was so long there before the Israelites were sensible of their sin and misery.
Lamented —
That is, they followed after God with lamentations for his departure, and
prayers for his return.
Verse 3
[3] And
Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do return unto the
LORD with all your hearts, then put away the strange gods and Ashtaroth from
among you, and prepare your hearts unto the LORD, and serve him only: and he
will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.
Spake — To
all the rulers and people too, as he had occasion in his circuit, described
below, mixing exhortation to repentance, with his judicial administrations.
If — If you do indeed what
you profess, if you are resolved to go on in that which you seem to have begun.
With all your heart —
Sincerely and in good earnest.
Put —
Out of your houses, where some of you keep them; and out of your hearts, where
they still have an interest in many of you.
Ashtaroth —
And especially, Ashtaroth, whom they, together with the neighbouring nations,
did more eminently worship.
Prepare your hearts — By
purging them from all sin, and particularly from all inclinations to other
gods.
Verse 6
[6] And
they gathered together to Mizpeh, and drew water, and poured it out before the
LORD, and fasted on that day, and said there, We have sinned against the LORD.
And Samuel judged the children of Israel in Mizpeh.
Poured it out — As
an external sign, whereby they testified, both their own filthiness and need of
washing by the grace and Spirit of God, and blood of the covenant, and their
sincere desire to pour out their hearts before the Lord, in true repentance,
and to cleanse themselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit.
Before the Lord —
That is, in the public assembly, where God is in a special manner present.
Judged —
That is, governed them, reformed all abuses against God or man, took care that
the laws of God should be observed, and wilful transgressions punished.
Verse 7
[7] And when the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered
together to Mizpeh, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel. And
when the children of Israel heard it, they were afraid of the Philistines.
Went up —
With an army, suspecting the effects of their general convention, and intending
to nip them in the bud.
Afraid —
Being a company of unarmed persons, and unfit for battle. When sinners begin to
repent and reform, they must expect Satan will muster all his forces against
them, and set his instruments at work to the uttermost, to oppose and
discourage them.
Verse 8
[8] And
the children of Israel said to Samuel, Cease not to cry unto the LORD our God
for us, that he will save us out of the hand of the Philistines.
Cease not, … — We
are afraid to look God in the face, because of our great wickedness: do thou
therefore intercede for us, as Moses did for his generation. They had reason to
expect this, because he had promised to pray for them, had promised them
deliverance from the Philistines, and they had been observant of him, in all
that he had spoken to them from the Lord. Thus they who receive Christ as their
lawgiver and judge, need not doubt of their interest in his intercession. O
what a comfort is it to all believers, that he never ceaseth, but always
appears in the presence of God for us.
Verse 9
[9] And
Samuel took a sucking lamb, and offered it for a burnt offering wholly unto the
LORD: and Samuel cried unto the LORD for Israel; and the LORD heard him.
Cried —
And he cried unto the Lord. He made intercession with the sacrifice. So Christ
intercedes in virtue of his satisfaction. And in all our prayers we must have
an eye to his great oblation, depending on him for audience and acceptance.
Verse 12
[12] Then
Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of
it Ebenezer, saying, Hitherto hath the LORD helped us.
A stone — A
rude unpolished stone, which was not prohibited by that law, Leviticus 26:1, there being no danger of
worshipping such a stone, and this being set up only as a monument of the
victory.
Eben-ezer —
That is, the stone of help. And this victory was gained in the very same place
where the Israelites received their former fatal loss.
Helped us — He
hath begun to help us, though not compleatly to deliver us. By which wary
expression, he exciteth both their thankfulness for their mercy received, and
their holy fear and care to please and serve the Lord, that he might help and
deliver them effectually.
Verse 13
[13] So
the Philistines were subdued, and they came no more into the coast of Israel:
and the hand of the LORD was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel.
Came no more —
That is, with a great host, but only with straggling parties, or garrisons.
All the days, … —
All the days of Samuel that is, while Samuel was their sole judge, or ruler;
for in Saul's time they did come.
Verse 14
[14] And
the cities which the Philistines had taken from Israel were restored to Israel,
from Ekron even unto Gath; and the coasts thereof did Israel deliver out of the
hands of the Philistines. And there was peace between Israel and the Amorites.
Peace — An
agreement for the cessation of all acts of hostility.
Amorites —
That is, the Canaanites, often called Amorites, because these were formerly the
most valiant of all those nations, and the first Enemies which the Israelites
met with, when they went to take possession of their land. They made this peace
with the Canaanites, that they might he more at leisure to oppose the
Philistines, now their most potent enemies.
Verse 15
[15] And
Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life.
Samuel judged —
For though Saul was king in Samuel's last days, yet Samuel did not cease to be
a judge, being so made by God's extraordinary call, which Saul could not
destroy; and therefore Samuel did sometimes, upon great occasions, tho' not
ordinarily, exercise the office of judge after the beginning of Saul's reign;
and the years of the rule of Saul and Samuel are joined together, Acts 13:20,21.
Verse 16
[16] And
he went from year to year in circuit to Bethel, and Gilgal, and Mizpeh, and
judged Israel in all those places.
In all places — He
went to those several places, in compliance with the people, whose convenience
he was willing to purchase with his own trouble, as an itinerant judge and
preacher; and by his presence in several parts, he could the better observe,
and rectify all sorts of miscarriages.
Verse 17
[17] And
his return was to Ramah; for there was his house; and there he judged Israel;
and there he built an altar unto the LORD.
Built an altar —
That by joining sacrifices with his prayers, he might the better obtain
direction and assistance from God upon all emergencies. And this was done by
prophetical inspiration, as appears by God's acceptance of the sacrifices
offered upon it. Indeed Shiloh being now laid waste, and no other place yet
appointed for them to bring their offerings to, the law which obliged them to
one place, was for the present suspended. Therefore, as the patriarchs did, he
built an altar where he lived: and that not only for the use of his own family,
but for the good of the country who resorted to it.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on 1 Samuel》
07 Chapter 7
Verses 1-9
The time was long, for it was twenty years.
An absent God
Well might it be said, “The time was long.” Twenty hours, without
Thy presence, are long indeed, and cloud the brightest day, and veil the
loveliest scenes. How should you like to be twenty years away from your beloved
father or mother? Would not the time seem very long? And have you ever mourned
an absent God? Have you been like Job, when he looked on every side and found
Him not? (Job 23:8-9); or, like Mary Magdalene,
whose tears were her meat, day and night, until she found Him whom her soul
loved? See how she stands beside the empty gravel Peter may leave--John may
leave--they may go to their house, or to their nets. The place where the body
of Jesus had lain was sweeter and dearer to Mary than all the sweets of earth:
and though her tearful eyes had too plainly told her His precious body was not
there, yet again she stoops, again she looks in, as though she hoped her ardent
wishes might bring Him back again. Yes, blessed woman, and they have power with
thy God, and prevail. Quickly was He at her side whom she sought sorrowing: and
quickly, at His presence, are tears exchanged for joy unspeakable, Happy art
thou, O Israel, when thou canst mourn an absent God! We have a beautiful
description given us of real, godly sorrow, in 2 Corinthians 7:10-11. If one of you
were to ask a gentleman or lady to come and see you, would you sit with the
cottage all in litter and confusion? would you not be tidying it, cleaning out
every corner, dusting every piece of furniture, and getting it as nice as you
could? Oh! when you truly cry to the Lord to return unto you, how diligent you
will be preparing your hearts unto the Lord! (2 Chronicles 30:19.) What
carefulness, lest there should be anything left undone! What clearing of idols
and rubbish! what indignation against the things which have usurped His place
in your heart, and robbed you of all your joy! what vehement desire to see Him
again filling the whole, and bringing every thought into captivity! what zeal
to make up for lost time! what revenge against ungrateful, treacherous self!
Would you wish to know the first step a soul takes in departing from God? You
may find it in your secret chamber--beside the little bed or chair, where you
once used to hold sweet communion with Him. “Thou hast restrained prayer,” is
the print of the first footstep in the downward road. Would you know the first
step of the returning soul? Go again, and look in the secret chamber: now that
distressed soul seeks Him early; and soon its youth is renewed like the
eagle’s--it walks, it runs, it flies (Isaiah 11:81). (Helen Plumptre.)
And Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do
return unto the Lord with all your hearts.
Samuel the Judge
For more than twenty years the Philistines had held undisputed
sway over the greater part of the territory of Israel. Shechem and Shiloh, the
ancient sanctuaries of worship, were both in the possession of the Philistines.
Even the sacred ark of the covenant had been surrendered ingloriously into the
hands of the uncircumcised. Restored by miracle, it still remained in the
Hivite town of Kirjath-jearim upon the border. Israel was without a sanctuary
as well as without a ruler. The power of the oppressor was to be broken.
Deliverance was to come in the only way in which it could come, through the
interposition of Divine aid. This help of God bringing deliverance is the great
theme brought to our consideration.
I. The help of God which brings
deliverance comes through the agency of a personal deliverer. This is the first
great historical lesson of those dark days in which the judges ruled. Each of
the hero-judges was officially a type of the great Deliverer. In each
succeeding one the personal analogies to the great Antitype become more and
more apparent, until in Samuel, the last and noblest of the line, we reach one
of the most illustrious types of Christ to be found in Old Testament history.
II. The help which brings
deliverance comes only upon condition of sincere repentance for sin and
whole-hearted return to the Lord. Samson adventured all upon personal prowess.
Conscious of extraordinary powers, he sought to annoy and intimidate the
Philistines into submission. Wasting his strength in brilliant but vain
exploits, a romantic life was crowned with a glorious death, yet he passed
away, leaving the Philistines still in possession of the land. Samuel, tracing
the miseries of the people to their true source in the chastisement of God for
their sins, realising that the first step towards disenthrallment must be taken
in repentance and reformation, sets himself quietly but steadfastly to work to
rekindle in the hearts of his countrymen the smouldering fires of religion. At
the basis of all true freedom from the Philistines that rule the heart, from
the bondage of corruption, from the fetters of guilt, from the “lusts that war
against the Soul,” is this bitter work of repentance, this putting away the
idols of the soul, this turning with the whole heart to the service of the
Lord.
III. The help which brings
deliverance comes through a covenant sealed with blood. As deliverance from
Philistine bondage came only through the provision of the covenant with
Abraham, as that covenant was ratified and rested in by the oppressed and
suffering people, so deliverance from the bondage of Satan comes only through
the provisions of the covenant of grace, as that covenant is sealed with the
blood of Christ and joyfully accepted and rested in by the sin-oppressed soul.
IV. The help which brings
deliverance comes in answer to prayer. The Church of God has never yet tasted
to its lull extent the power of prayer. It is Samuel’s memorial that he is (Psalms 99:6) “among them that call
upon God’s name,” who “called upon the Lord, and he answered them.” Luther,
Knox, Whitefield, Wesley, the men who carried forth great movements and
accomplished glorious works for God, have been men preeminent in prayer.
V. The help which brings
deliverance comes in the use of appointed means. Not when the first alarm was
sounded, and the people, started by the unexpected assault, “were afraid of the
Philistines,” did the Lord appear, but when Samuel, going calmly forward with
the sacrifice in the face of the advancing enemy, had shown the sincerity of
his trust in God--when the hosts of Israel, drawing inspiration from the faith
of their dauntless leader, had set the battle in array and were making use of
all available means of defence. In all our convicts with Satan, the world and
sin, help comes from God, but only as direct effort is put forth by us. It
comes to give efficiency and success to our efforts. We may not sit idle and
wait for some marvellous interposition of God’s power. We may not first do our
part in our own strength and then wait for God to do His. It is in and through
our working that Divine power is put forth and Divine help given. We work out
our own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh in us
both to will and to do of His good pleasure,
VI. The help which brings
victory in the first conflict is the pledge, to be gratefully recognised, of
complete and final deliverance.
VII. The help which brings
deliverance engages to the lifelong service of Him who so graciously interposes
for our relief. Each mercy received should be a silken cord binding more
closely to the service of God. Instead of presuming upon gracious
interpositions in the past as occasions for indulgence or inaction in the
present, we should find in these both incentive and encouragement to steady
progress and patient labour in the Christian life. (T. D. Witherspoon, D. D.)
An ideal statesman
The words “twenty years” should be connected with the following
sentence, “and all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord.” Thus twenty
years had elapsed before they began to revive from their sad state of religious
decline. “And Samuel spake.” Now Samuel appears upon the scene. He has been
absent since the third chapter. But now he is seen with all the energy of
spiritual fortitude, consequent upon deep devotion, trying to excite in other
hearts the aspiration of his own. Such an occasion is worthy of his presence,
and in the sequel we have at once presented the power and praise of a devoted
life. We have here before us a pattern statesman.
I. He was a man of spiritual
disposition. It generally happens that the leading spirits of a nation are
those famous for philosophical thought, scientific discovery, or political
revolution. The problem may be atheistic, the analysis anti-Christian, and the
social change debasing, yet, because the man has by some marvellous display of
genius flashed his name into the bewildered eyes of an astonished world, he is
called to eminence. Thus national prominence is attained by the sheer force of
mind power, irrespective of character, and while life is so commercial in its
tendency and so secular in its habit we must expect such to continue, This was
nee the case under the old Jewish theocracy. Samuel, the central figure of
these times, was raised to authority, not by mere thought power, but by the
Intense spirituality of his character. The spirituality of Samuel’s disposition
is manifested--
1. By his expostulation with
the people (1 Samuel 7:3). This expostulation
contains
2. By his supplication to the
Apostate nation.
3. By his strict recognition
of God This is observable:--
II. Such character may
hopefully anticipate the cooperation of heaven. “But the Lord thundered” (1 Samuel 7:10). Samuel, the holy
legislator, was the connecting link between God and help. How dependent is
human life upon leading powers!
1. A religious assembly
mistaken for a national army (1 Samuel 7:7). Now the Philistines
draw near for battle. This is a typical incident; the effort of moral
improvement necessarily excites opposition, either the sneer of forsaken
friendship, the persecution of sects, or the enmity of Satan.
2. The surprised worshippers.
The issues of victory.
3. In the elevation of
spiritual character, we have a guarantee for the execution of justice. “And
Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life” (1 Samuel 7:15).
4. Home the sanctuary of
public life.
Samuel the Judge
The interval between the time of the Judges and the time of David
is filled by the history of Samuel. His influence it was that safely led the
nation through two revolutions--the one in religion, the other in government. A
priest, yet Samuel was the first of a new spiritual order that was henceforth
to be greater than the priesthood, far more directly the mouthpiece of God,
more authoritative, the true leader of the people, if steadfast and unflinching
service to the people, if fearlessness and faithfulness, if unfailing goodness
and wise guidance can entitle any here in Israel to stand beside Moses and
Elijah, that man surely is Samuel. Yet in addition to these two offices, priest
and prophet--the greatest that any man can fill--he is also Judge of Israel,
that is, king in all but name, and in all but the outward trappings and
personal advantages. “Samuel was one of those great men of manifold gifts and
functions whom God raises up In great crises and for great services. He was not
like Moses, the founder of the economy, nor like Elijah, its restorer. But he
was its preserver through a revolution that had become inevitable; which be
opposed as long as he could, which he reluctantly accepted when he Could oppose
it no longer, and which by shear force of character he regulated and moulded so
as to prevent national disorganisation. Like Luther, he built the new
foundations on the old. As far as circumstances permitted he reformed his age,
and by his genius, his piety, and his wisdom he powerfully controlled the
turbulent elements of the national life.” It is interesting to trace the
analogy between John the Baptist and Samuel. There is a striking similarity in
the circumstances of their birth, in their early separation to the service of
God, in the rumour that spreads concerning them throughout the land, awakening
the expectation of a great religious revival. Each of them marks a transition
period in the history of Israel. Samuel is the last of the judges and the first
of the prophets, as John the Baptist is the last of the prophets and the first
of Christian preachers, standing and crying, “Behold, the Lamb of God.” Each of
them commences his work by summoning the people to a great national act of
repentance before God, and in each case the symbol of their repentance has a
singular similarity. We must remember that it was no light and easy work which
was thus demanded of them. Idolatry was not a mere perverse fancy; nor was it
only a selfish indulgence. It was the severance from all the association with
those about them, the setting of themselves up to be the peculiar people of
God--a thing that always costs as much effort and courage as most things a man
has to do. The national repentance is followed by a great national assembly.
Samuel bade the head men and representatives come together for a holy
convocation in Mizpeh. By contact with himself and by communion with one
another he would lead the people further in this work of reformation. As long
afterwards the repentance of Israel found its expression in coming to John for
baptism in the Jordan, so here they gathered together solemnly to confess their
sins and to declare their purpose of amendment. Samuel bowed before the Lord in
prayer for the people, whilst they “drew water and poured it out before the
Lord, and said, We have sinned against the Lord.” Like the symbol of baptism,
it was the token of their death and burial unto sin, that they might rise into
the new life of God. It is thus that the wise woman of Tekoa spake to the king,
“For we must needs die, and are as Water spilt upon the ground, which cannot be
gathered up again.” Standing beside the altar high up on Mizpeh, the
watchtower, Samuel stretched up his arms to Heaven pleading for the people.
Swiftly the black clouds gathered, as if the great artillery of God came forth
to the fight. Whatever the manifestation may have been, whether or not attended
by an earthquake, as Josephus asserts, it is certain that the Philistines never
lost the dread memory of that praying figure on the lonely heights, with hands
uplifted to the God of Heaven. That one man was mightier than all their hosts.
It seemed as if he were able to open the windows of heaven, and summon all its
force against the foes of Israel. “They came no more into the coasts of
Israel.” (M. G. Pearse.)
Solitary power
As prophet of the Lord, Samuel’s will was supreme--all the main
features of the history derive their expression from the spirit of Samuel.
There is authority in his word, there is inspiration in his encouragement,
there is death in his frown. Under these circumstances you see how naturally we
are led to meditate upon the profound influence of one life.
I. In the first place, look
at the sublime attitude which Samuel assumed in relation to the corruption of
the faith. Samuel distinctly charged the house of Israel with having gone
astray from the living God. Distinctly, without reservation, without anything
that indicated timidity on his part, he laid this terrible indictment against
the house of Israel. In doing so he assumed a sublime attitude. He stood before
Israel as a representative of the God who had been insulted, dishonoured,
abandoned. We find sublimity in the attitude, imperial force in the tone. How
did Samuel’s influence come to be so profound upon this occasion? The instant
answer is, Because his influence is moral. Moral influence goes to the heart of
things. He who deals with moral questions deals with the life of the world. Any
other influence addresses itself to affairs of the moment; all other influences
are superficial and transitory. He who repronounces God’s commandments, and
tells to the heart of the world God’s charges, wields a moral, and therefore a
profound influence. Herein is the supreme advantage of the Gospel. The Gospel
of Christ lays its saving hand upon the human heart and says, “This is the
sphere of my mission. I will affect all things that are superficial and local
and temporary; but I shall affect them indirectly. By putting the life right, I
shall put the extremities right; by making the heart as it ought to be, the
whole surface of nature will become healthful and beautiful.” We need men in
society who stand apart frees the little fights, petty controversies, and angry
contentions which seem to be part and parcel of daily life, and who shall speak
great principles, breathe a heavenly influence, and bring to bear upon combatants
of all kinds considerations which shall survive all their misunderstandings.
Regard Samuel in this light, and you will see the sublimity of his attitude.
Herein, again, is the great influence of a moral teacher, a revealer of
Christian truth. Whenever we hear a preacher who speaks the right word, we hear
God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost; through his voice we hear the
testimony of the angels unfallen; out of his words there comes the declaration
of all that is bright, pure, true, wise, in the universe of God!
II. Now let us look at the
holy attitude which Samuel assumed in relation to the guilt of Israel. In the
first instance he describes the corruptness of the case, points out the right
course, exhorts the people to take that course instantly, and then he speaks
these healing words: “If ye will do these things, and gather yourselves
together to Mizpeh, I will pray unto the Lord for you.” That is all we can do
for one another--the work of an instrument, the ministry of an agent. “I will
pray for you unto the Lord.” Then the human needs the Divine. We never
find--taking great breadths of history, ages and centuries--that the human has
been able to exist alone, and to grow upward and onward in its atheism, What
became of the Philistines? Now that Israel is getting its old heart back again,
and its eyes are being turned to the heavens, what becomes of the Philistines?
The Lord thundered that day upon the Philistines, and discomfited them, and
they were smitten before Israel. The Philistines came against a praying army.
We must consider not what the praying army did in the first instance, but what
God did. Observe when it was that Samuel said he would pray for the house of
Israel. The great lesson here turns upon a point of time. When Israel returned
unto the Lord with all their heart; when Israel put away the strange Gods and
Ashtaroth; when Israel prepared the heart unto the Lord and was ready to serve
him Duly; when Israel had done this part, then Samuel said, “I will pray for
you unto the Lord.” Under other circumstances prayer would have been wasted
breath. We find a great law here, which applies to the natural and the
spiritual. Is there a plague in the city? Purify your sanitary arrangements,
cleanse your drains, disinfect your channels, use everything that is at all
likely to conduce to a good end--then pray unto the Lord. After nature has
exhausted herself, there may be something for the Lord to do, may there mot?
Sometimes worldly people say--“Pray for us.” Men have said that to us. What
kind of men were they? Sometimes men who have made wrecks of themselves, who
have gone as far devilward as they could get, whose hearts were like a den of
unclean beasts, men who had no longer any grip of the world--the whole thing
was slipping away from them--they have said to the minister whom they had
previously characterised as a canting parson, “Pray for us.” But one condition
must be forthcoming on their part. There must be self-renunciation, contrition,
moral anguish, pain of the soul, repentance towards God. When these conditions
are forthcoming, the servant of Christ may say, “I will pray for you unto the
Lord.”
III. In the third place, look
at the exalted attitude which Samuel assumes in relation to his whole lifetime.
We read in the fifteenth verse of this chapter, “Samuel judged Israel all the
days of his life.” Think of being able to account for all the days of a whole
human history! Think of being able to write your biography in one sentence!
Think of being able to do without parentheses, footnotes, reservations,
apologies, and self-vindications! When we attempt to write our lives, there is
so much to say that is collateral and modifying in its effect--so much which is
to explain the central line. So our biographical record becomes anomalous, contradictory,
irreconcilable. Here is a man whose lifetime is gathered up in one sentence.
“Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life.” We have seen him in his
childhood, we have had glances of him as he was passing up to his mature age.
Today we see him in three impressive and remarkable attitudes. His whole
history is in this sentence: He was a judge of God all his days. Think of
giving a whole lifetime to God. There are those who cannot do that now. But
young men may be able to give twenty, thirty, perhaps fifty years all to
Christ. See then the profound influence which may be exerted by one life. We
are dealing with Samuel, and with Samuel alone. Samuel’s life is not confined
to himself; it is a radiating life, streaming out from itself and touching thousands
of points in the social and national life of others. Who can tell what may be
dons by one man? Speak the truth of God, and eternity itself cannot exhaust the
happy effect of that blessed influence! (J. Parker, D. D.)
Samuel the Judge
This scene at Mizpeh, and the results following, suggest several
lessons. We learn that:
I. One, to have power over
men, must have power with God. Why are the people, though late in their
repentance, now so willing to listen to the prophet’s words and obey them?
Samuel influenced the people, because God influenced him. The secret of his
power over men was his power with God. In a preeminent degree, this prophet and
judge of Israel was a man to whom unseen realities were brought near. Thus, God
fitted Samuel to do a work in Israel in the transition period between the
theocracy and monarchy, making him an eminent judge, the first in the regular
succession of prophets, the founder of the prophetic schools, the anointer of
Israel’s first and second king, and the man whom the people--even when
debauched by idolatry--reverenced, and whose voice was to them like the voice
of God. He was all this, because he held close intercourse with Heaven. The
hand that is outstretched to save, must clasp the throne. Ministers are weak in
the pulpit whenever they are weak in the closet.
II. The necessity and value of
religious ordinances, rightly used. It was not enough that Samuel assemble
Israel at Mizpeh. Gathered there, the people must be so influenced that the
impressions made would be permanent, and they fixed in their new attitude of
loyalty to God. Samuel must instruct them in the proper use of religious rites,
and show them how God can be so approached as to win His favour. Thus, far back
at Mizpeh, were taught the truths of Calvary. God is approached reverently,
with confession, with sacrifice, and with supplication. These two ways of
approaching God--Samuel’s with sacrifice and supplication, and Israel’s of
bearing aloft the ark with heedless shoutings--teach us lessons respecting the
methods by which, now, God is, and is not, appropriately worshipped. Not by
magnifying the outward, by giving prominence to the seen and the tangible,
while the unseen and spiritual are lightly esteemed. The value of religious
ordinances consists not in what man’s eye sees or his ear hears, but in what
his heart feels, and in what the eye of God perceives within the breast. No
wonder that Israel, thus addressing the Throne of Grace, were prevalent over
their toes. God heard their cry, and the arm of Omnipotence was their defence.
What though the Philistines, or Israel, or the prophet himself, could not
answer the question how God at that moment put a voice into the arching
heavens, or kindled up the clouds with electric fires? What though, then as
well as now, and now as well as then, the philosophy of prayer baffles finite
skill? Is it, therefore, any the less true that the prayer of penitence and
faith prevails with God? One other element now is needed to make the worship
complete--that is, an expression of thanksgiving. It was a fitting sequel,
therefore, when Samuel “took a stone and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and
called the name of it Ebenezer,” saying, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” We
learn, therefore, that expressed gratitude to God should find a prominent place
in all our worship. Israel not only felt grateful, they gave it utterance; they
clothed with form the sentiments their hearts felt. (Monday Club Sermons.)
Repentance and Victory
I. Preparation for victory in
repentance and return. At the time of the first fight at Ebenezer, Israel was
full of idolatry and immorality. Then their preparation for battle was the mere
bringing the ark into the camp, as if it were a fetish or magic charm. That was
pure heathenism, and they were idolaters in such worship of Jehovah, just as
much as if they had been bowing to Baal. Not the name of the deity, but the
spirit of the worshipper, makes the “idolater.” How different the second
preparation! If we are to have His strength infused for victory, we must cast
away our idols, and come back to Him with all our hearts. The hands that would
clasp Him, and be upheld by the clasp, must be emptied of trifles. To yield
ourselves wholly to God is the secret of strength. Confession breaks the entail
of sin, and substitutes for the dreary expectation of its continuance the glad
conviction of forgiveness and cleansing. It does not make a stiff fight
unnecessary; for assured freedom from sin is not the easy prize of confession,
but the hard-won issue of sturdy effort in God’s strength. But it is like
blowing the trumpet of revolt--it gives the signal for and itself begins the
conflict. The night before the battle should be spent, not in feasting, but in
prayer and lowly shriving of our souls before the great Confessor. Our enemy is
strong, and no fault is more fatal than an underestimate of his power. If we go
into battle singing, we shall probably come out of it weeping, or never come
out at all. We should think much of our foes and little of ourselves. Such a
temper will lead to caution, watchfulness, wise suspicion, vigorous strain of
all our little power, and, above all, it will send us to our knees to plead
with our great Captain and Advocate.
II. Victory on the field of
former defeat. The battle is joined on the old field. Strategic considerations
probably determined the choice of the ground, as they did the many battles on
the plain of Esdraelon, for instance, or on the fields of the Netherlands. At
all events, there they were, face to face once more on the old spot. On both
sides might be men who had been in the former engagement. Depressing
remembrances or burning eagerness to wipe out the shame would stir, in those on
the one side; contemptuous remembrances of the ease with which the last victory
had been won would animate the other. God himself helped them by the thunder
storm, the solemn roll of which was “the voice of the Lord” answering Samuel’s
prayer. “They were smitten before,” not by, the victors. The true
victor was God. The story gives boundless hope of victory, even on the fields
of our former defeats. We can master rooted faults of character, and overcome
temptations which have often conquered us. So, though the whole field may be
strewed with relics, eloquent of former disgrace, we may renew the struggle
with confidence that the future will not always copy the past. We are saved by
hope; by hope we are made strong. It is the very helmet on our heads. The
warfare with our own evils should be waged in the assurance that every field of
our defeat shall one day see set up on It the trophy of, not our victory, but
God’s in us.
III. Grateful commemoration of
victory. Where that gray stone stands no man knows today, but its name lives
foreverse This trophy bore no vaunts of leader’s skill or soldier’s bravery; One
name only is associated with it. It is “the stone of help,” and its message to
succeeding generations is: “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” That “hitherto”
is the word of a mighty faith. It includes as parts of one whole the disaster
no less than the victory. The Lord was helping Israel no less by sorrow and
oppression than by joy and deliverance. The defeat which guided them back to
Him was tender kindness and precious help. Such remembrance has in it a
half-uttered prayer and hope for the future. Memory passes into hope, and the
radiance in the sky behind throws light on to our forward path. God’s
“hitherto” carries “henceforward” wrapped up in it. The devout man’s
“gratitude” is, and ought to be, “a lively sense of favours to come.” The best
use of memory is to mark more plainly than it could be seen at the moment the
Divine help which has filled our lives. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Repentance and revival
There are two great services for God and for Israel in which we
find Samuel engaged in the first nine verses of this chapter.
1. In exhorting and directing
them with a view to bring them into a right state before God.
2. This being accomplished,
in praying for them in their time of trouble, and obtaining Divine help when
the Philistines drew near in battle.
1. In the course of time the
people appear to have come to feel how sad and desolate their national life was
without any tokens of God’s presence and grace “All the house of Israel
lamented after the Lord.” These symptoms of repentance, however, had not shown
themselves in a very definite or practical form. Now the putting away of the
strange gods and Ashtaroth was a harder condition than we at first should
suppose. Some are inclined to fancy that it was a mere senseless and ridiculous
obstinacy that drew the Israelites so much to the worship of the idolatrous
gods of their neighbours. In reality the temptation wan of a much more subtle
kind. Their religious worship as prescribed by Moses had little to attract the
natural feelings of the human heart. It was simple, it was severe, it was
self-denying. The worship of the pagan nations was more lively and attractive.
Fashionable entertainments and free-and-easy revelries were superadded to
please the carnal mind. To put away Baalim and Ashtaroth was to abjure what was
fashionable and agreeable, and fall back on what was unattractive and sombre.
Was it not, too, an illiberal demand? No. If the people were in earnest now,
they must show it by putting away every image and every object and ornament
that was connected with the worship of other gods. But the people were in
earnest; and this first demand of Samuel was complied with. Then the first
steps towards revival and communion must be the forsaking of these sins, and of
ways of life that prepare the way for them. It is not enough that in church, or
at some meeting, or in our closet, we experience a painful conviction how much
we have offended God, and a desire not to offend Him in like manner any more.
We must “prepare our hearts” for this end. We must remember that in the world
with which we mingle we are exposed to many influences that remove God from our
thoughts, that stimulate our infirmities, that give force to temptation, that
lessen our power of resistance, that tend to draw us back into our old sine.
Having found the people so far obedient to his requirements, Samuel’s next step
was to call an assembly of all Israel to Mizpeh. It is important to mark the
stress which is laid here on the public assembly of the people. When Samuel
convened the people to a public assembly, he evidently did it on the principle
on which in the New Testament we are required not to forsake the assembling of
ourselves together. It is in order that the presence of people like-minded, and
with the same earnest feelings and purposes, may have a rousing and warming
influence upon us. The next scene in the panorama of the text is--the
Philistines invading Israel. Here Samuel’s service is that of an intercessor,
praying for his people, and obtaining God’s blessing. The Israelites knew where
their help was to be found, and recognising Samuel as their mediator, they said
to him, “Cease not to cry unto the Lord our God for us, that He will save us
out of the hand of the Philistines.” With this request Samuel most readily
complies. But first he offers a sucking lamb as a whole burnt offering to the
Lord, and only after this are we told that “Samuel cried unto the Lord, and the
Lord heard him.” The lesson is supremely important. When sinners approach God
to entreat His favour, it must be by the new and living way, sprinkled with
atoning blood. All other ways of access will fail. Luther humbles himself in
the dust and implores God’s favour, and struggles with might and main to reform
his heart; but Luther cannot find peace until he sees how it is in the
righteousness of another he is to draw nigh and find the blessing--in the
righteousness of the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world. (W.
G. Blaikie, D. D.)
An Old Testament revival
I. In the beginning a sermon
was preached. A crisis had been reached; and in his searching and solemn
discourse Samuel seems to have sought to make these four points, which
certainly are worthy of employment always:
1. Those people must admit
the necessity of a new departure in their conduct and life immediately; they
must “return unto the Lord with all their hearts.”
2. They must put away every
sign and vestige of a bad past; “strange gods” would have to be entirely
relinquished.
3. They must instantly enter
upon a fresh spiritual consecration: they would have to “prepare their hearts
unto the Lord and serve Him only.”
4. Then they must trust
wholly, to the ancient promises God had made to their fathers and to them; for
He had covenanted to “deliver them out of the hands of” their foes.
II. Then followed an exemplary
response from the nation: “Then the children of Israel did put away Baalim and
Ashtaroth, and served the Lord only.” This sudden and thorough cleansing of
themselves from forms of idolatry reminds us of what in Britain used to be
called “a reformation of manners.”
III. Next their leader summoned
a great assemblage for a religious service of prayer.
IV. Now comes what might be
called a protracted meeting. There is always a point at which human mediation
in behalf of sinners must cease; then the sinners must take up the duty of
supplication for themselves, or be lost. This was true of even such a
prophet-priest as Samuel (Jeremiah 15:1): “Then said the Lord
unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be
towards this people: cast them out of my sight and let them go forth.” In this
case the people were intelligent enough to undertake at least these four duties
which are mentioned.
1. They came to a direct posture
of humiliation; they “fasted on that day.”
2. Then these people made
confessions of sin: they “said there, We have sinned against the Lord.”
3. Next, these repenting
people soberly renewed their covenant: “They drew water, and poured it out
before the Lord.” One of the Targums renders the clause thus: “And they poured
out their hearts in penitence as waters before the Lord.” Gill says: “This
signified that they thoroughly renounced idolatry, that nothing of it should
remain, as when water is poured out of a cask there remains no smell, as there
does when other liquors are poured out.”
4. They put themselves into
condition for fresh activity in devotion. The best explanation of that
statement, “Samuel judged the children of Israel in Mizpeh,” seems to be that
he reorganised the people afresh, for military service and for civil order and
for religious worship.
V. Thus there came the
descent of blessing in fulfilment of the Lord’s covenant.
1. Real consecration of
Christians generally evokes new opposition from foes.
2. Importunate prayer is the
condition of all success.
3. The full consecration of
one’s soul must recognise the sacrifice for sins. This lamb was the suggestion
of atonement made by a Redeemer.
4. God is faithful to the
instant in His interposition.
VI. There remained now nothing
more than to erect a memorial of the transaction.
1. All glory and honour of
the achievement should be distinctly ascribed to God: “The Lord hath helped
us.”
2. We should make our
acknowledgment as permanent as possible. Samuel chose stone; so did Jacob (Genesis 28:18).
3. We should take pains to
group our memorials so that one shall strengthen the other. Samuel set up his
pillar between Mizpeh, where this deliverance was vouchsafed, and Shen, where
another had been vouchsafed in the victory gained over the Philistines twenty
years before. Thus he linked the histories together, like pearls in a necklace.
4. Each successive
deliverance by a gracious God should deepen our trust and quicken our
expectation.
The careful investigation of such an incident as this has given us
certain conclusions which might well be stated at the close of our study now.
1. A revival of religion is
located in the church, and assumes a previous state of sad and guilty
backsliding.
2. The conversion of sinners
is not a revival; it is the gracious result that follows one which is genuine.
3. Any “measures” are
allowable, provided they are decent and orderly, that will lead believers to
penitence and duty.
4. Blessed is the
congregation whose spirituality is lifted and whose life is saved by a day of
God’s visitation.
5. More blessed still is that
church which never had a revival in all its history, and never needed one. (C.
S. Robinson, D. D.)
A city changed by a revival
When that worst of the Popes, Alexander VI, occupied the Papal
chair, about the end of the fifteenth century, the preaching of Savonarola at
Florence might well cause such alarm among Pope and Cardinals at headquarters
as to ensure the silencing and martyrdom of the preacher. What was the effect
of his preaching in Florence in 1495? The aspect of the city was completely
changed. The women threw aside their jewels and finery, dressed plainly, and
bore themselves demurely; licentious young Florentines were transformed as by
magic into sober, religious men; hymns took the place of Lorenzo’s carnival
songs. All prayed frequently, flocked to the churches, and gave largely to the
poor. Most wonderful of all, bankers and tradesmen were impelled by scruples of
conscience to restore ill-gotten gains, amounting to many thousand florins. All
men were wonderstruck by this singular and almost miraculous change; and,
notwithstanding the shattered state of his health, Savonarola must have been
deeply rejoiced to see his people converted to so Christian a mode of life.
Disaster aids repentance
When men have suffered sorely as a consequence of their misdoing,
or of their lack, they are very likely to strive with earnestness to guard against
a recurrence of such disaster. There is no time when it is safer to travel over
a great railway line, then just after a collision through the carelessness of a
switchman or a train starter. And while the whole country is shocked at the
loss of life and property through the giving way of an imperfectly constructed
dam, there will be reasonable care in the inspection and in the building of
dams. It is perfectly natural, therefore, that the people of Israel, who had
suffered defeat because of the misuse of the ark of the Lord by those who were
set to guard it, should be ready to bring it again to a fitting place, end to
set apart a fitting person to guard it sacredly. It is better to try to do well
after a great disaster than not to try at all; but how much better than all it
is to do well from the beginning. (H. C. Trumbull.)
Returning to lost experiences
A man upon the way, having accidentally lost his purse, is
questioned by his fellow traveller where he had it last. “Oh!” says he, “I am
confident that I drew it out of my pocket when I was in such a town, at such an
inn.” “Why, then!” says the other, “there is no better way to have it again
than by going back to the place where you last had it.” This is the case of
many a man in these loose, unsettled times; they have lost their love to
Christ, and His truth, since their corn and wine and oil have increased; since
outward things are in abundance added unto them they have slighted the light of
God’s countenance. When they were poor and naked of all worldly comfort, then
they sought God’s face both early and late, and nothing was more dear and
precious unto them than the truth of Christ. What, then, is to be done to
recover this lost love to Christ? Back again, back again directly where you
last had it! Back to the sign of the broken and contrite heart! There it was
that you drew it out into good words and better works; and though it be since
lost in the crowd of worldly employments, there and nowhere else, you shall be
sure to find it again. (J. Spencer.)
Three decisive steps
I. First, then, these people
were in a very hopeful condition. “All the house of Israel lamented after the
Lord.” What does it mean?
1. It means that they were
greatly oppressed. Their goods ware taken from them. They were beaten. They saw
their children slain. They were the slaves of the Philistines.
2. I think that, by the house
of Israel lamenting after the Lord, is meant, next, that they began to be
inwardly convinced that nobody could help them but the Lord.
3. It seems to me that, while
they desired Him, they were afraid that He would not deliver them. They prayed
after a fashion, but there was a dash of doubt about it.
4. Moreover, these people had
very little hope, but they had very much desire.
5. If you read the third
verse, you will see that, all this while, they had not parted with their idols.
They lamented after the Lord, but they did not get the Lord, because they
wanted to have the Lord and to have their idols, too. John Bunyan tells us
that, when he was playing at the game of “cat” one Sunday, on Elstow Green, as
he was going to strike the cat with his stick, he thought he heard a voice
crying, “Wilt thou keep thy sins, and go to hell; or wilt thou give up thy
sins, and go to heaven?” That question, without an angel’s voice, you may hear
at this moment. I put it now to some of you who would like to keep your sins,
and yet go to heaven. You lament after the Lord. You would be a saint; but then
you want to be a sinner, too. It is useless lamenting after the Lord, if it
does not lead you to give up your idols.
6. It meant that they could
never rest till God returned. Some of you have tried many ways to get rest.
Some years ago you got harpooned at a meeting; and though, like a big whale,
you have dragged out miles of line, and gone to the bottom of the sea of sin,
the harpoon sticks in you still. I know what you have been doing to get rest.
You have tried the world, and now there is nothing there that pleases you. I
wonder what you will try next. Will you try dissipation? Will you try
drunkenness? Will you try the use of drugs? Well; if God means to save you, you
will never rest till you are anchored in the port of Christ’s atoning
sacrifice. I sometimes hear of persons getting very angry after a gospel
sermon, and I say to myself, “I am not sorry for it.” Sometimes when we are
fishing, the fish gets the hook into his mouth. He pulls hard at the line: if
he were dead, he would not; but he is a live fish, worth the getting; and
though he runs away for a while, with the hook in his jaws, he cannot escape.
His very wriggling and his anger show that he has got the hook, and the hook
has got him. Have the landing net ready; we shall land him by-and-by. Give him
more line; let him spend his strength, and then we will land him, and he shall
belong to Christ forever.
II. These people were called
upon to take three very decided steps.
1. The first thing that they
were to do was to “put away the strange gods.” Every man seems to have a
different idol. One has pride: he is so wonderfully good, so self-righteous; he
has never done anything wrong. He is quite as good as a Christian, and rather’
better. Another man’s god is his self-confidence. Hear him talk. He understands
everything; he does not need to be taught anything; and if there is anything in
the Bible that he does not understand, why; then he does not believe it.
2. Now, notice the next step
of decision: “Put away the strange gods, and prepare your hearts unto the
Lord.” The mere outward reformation was not enough. They might have torn down
every idol in the land, and have been no nearer God for that. See, in France
today, how the people who have for so long bent the knee in superstition and
idolatry, have, many of them, flung away their vain worship, only to sink into
infidelity. What better are they, when they exalt the “Goddess of Reason” where
before stood the altars of the Papacy, when the heart is untouched, and God is
not in all their thoughts? Still, there are many in that land, as I trust,
there are many here, who are lamenting after God, and only await the
preparation of the heart, which comes from Him, to how in allegiance before His
throne. What, then, is the way to prepare the heart? The first thing is,
confession of sin. Then resolve in your soul that you will quit these sins.
Then there must be much prayer; for so it was with these people. Cry mightily
unto God: “Lord, save me!” Remember, too, that there must be trust, or else the
heart is not rightly prepared. Then, break away from the world.
3. That is the next step, the
service of God: “Serve him only,” said Samuel. “Then the children of Israel did
put away Baalim and Ashtaroth, and served the Lord only.”
III. They were helped to do all
this by having faith. It was faith in Samuel, as we have already noticed. You
can be much more helped, yea, graciously enabled, if you have faith in Christ.
1. They believed Samuel’s
word.
2. These people believed
chiefly in Samuel’s prayers.
3. The people had faith in
Samuel’s sacrifice.
4. Israel also accepted
Samuel’s rule.
The Lord help you to believe in God incarnate, in God making
sacrifice for sin, in Jesus dead, buried, risen, ascended, sitting at the right
hand of God, and soon to come in glory! Let him enter your life, and dwelling
in your heart, judge your every action, and rule over your entire life. (C.
H. Spurgeon.)
The revival
Revivals of religion have been the blessed experience of the
Church in every era of its living history. At Bochim, in the early age of the
Judges, a great revival took place. In the days of Samuel the Church of God was
gladdened by another. Hezekiah’s reign was greatly signalized by the general
revival of religion; so was Josiah’s. The nation of Judah was preserved from
idolatry by means of these great awakenings. In the time of the building of the
second temple there was a revival of religion which wrought most influentially.
Pentecost stands prominent in the history of revivals. Ordinances and means of
grace may have been performed in dull routine, but they were “Faultily
faultless, icily regular, splendidly null.” But when times of refreshing came,
the power of the Spirit was felt. Two features have generally marked these
periods of spiritual awakening--the power of prayer, and the power of
preaching. Prayer then recovers its unction, its wrestling, and its efficacy.
It may be that a few only are found seeking one thing--the renewing of God’s
work; but these are in earnest--they pray in faith, in the Holy Ghost, and in
expectation of the blessing. Ere Pentecost occurred, the company of the
believing were much in prayer. It was so in a remarkable degree in the
eighteenth century. In such seasons preaching has been with power. The
preachers were awakened, and spake their word with boldness and freedom, and in
expectation of success. We need only to name Baxter and Doolittle, Alleine and
Flavel, of the Puritan age, whose ministry was largely blessed; Jonathan
Edwards, Thomas Shephard, and Tennant, of America, who scarcely ever preached
without success; Wesley and Whitefield, and their coadjutors in England; William
Burns, and Robert M’Cheyne, and Asahel Nettleton, of our own time. These all
were men radiant with godliness, burning with earnestness, untiring in labour,
and singularly clear and pointed in their enunciation of the gospel. They were
instruments of reviving. The revival under Samuel was brought about by prayer
and preaching. To this man it was instrumentally to be traced. He wrestled in
secret and exhorted in public; waited for the blessing, and, under God, led the
blessed revival. When the ark of God was taken, and Ichabod became the fittest
name of Israel, the cause of godliness was deplorably low. Form, which had for
a time supplanted faith, at length departed with the ark. God in great mercy
taught them that form was unavailing without living piety. Had the victory
remained with the Hebrews at Ebenezer, the ark of God would have been made an
idol, and the ordinances of a divine religion been corrupted into heathenism.
But its capture was permitted, even though that disgraced the religion of the
people, rather than this danger should be incurred. When the ark was restored
to Israel the chosen people were not prepared to convey it again to Shiloh. The
men of Bethshemesh, after their first enthusiasm and sacrifice were over, felt
no more interest than an idle curiosity, and presumed to inspect that which had
been commanded to be covered from all but the high priest’s eyes. And, though
so many perished by the hand of God for their sacrilege, no spirit of
repentance and reformation moved the people. The Bethshemites are not without
their parallels. Unfeeling souls may be met with everywhere. Mercy and judgment
move them not. Grace and law melt them not. They can hear the pleadings of
incarnate Love suffering to save, and never wish a personal interest in His benign
salvation. The Bethshemites besought the inhabitants of Kirjath-jearim to take
away the ark of God; but when this was done there does not seem to have been a
single priest in attendance to welcome the holy symbol or to deposit it within
the tabernacle. During twenty years the children of Israel forgot their God and
Redeemer, and they were perverted by their foul idolatries. Apostasy from God
never improves the soul. False worship cannot elevate. Israel did not recover
their independence or their happiness until they were as a people brought back
to God. This was the great object of the reformation under Samuel.
1. Samuel preached
repentance. This has ever been the subject of earnest exhortation in times of
attempted revival. It rang through Germany by Luther’s lips of music, and
echoed among the Alpine valleys from Zuingle’s patriotic soul. It was the
subject of Latimer’s blunt home thrusts at the practical heart of England, and
it thundered throughout Scotland from the stern and fearless Knox. The doctrine
of repentance is the appendix to every republication of the Ten Commandments,
and the preface to every offer of the Gospel. So, when Samuel taught, this was
his awakening theme. The law of God was his great argument, and the acquiescing
consciences of the people his responses to the truth; therefore, with authority
and with boldness did he convince of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment.
The people began to awake. A deep impression fell upon them all from Dan to
Beersheba. They saw their sin in the light of God’s law. Twenty years of
unpardoned sin was a heart-breaking retrospect. And therefore did they lament.
It was well to be awakened from the long spiritual sleep. It was well to be
sorry for their sin.
2. Samuel sought fruits meet
for repentance. The people were anxious, for sin oppressed their souls; but
Samuel did not rest satisfied with the expressed emotion. He demanded instant
proof of professed sincerity. To give up evil ways is one of the earliest signs
of a penitent soul. It is indispensable to separate from whatever contaminates
the soul. To put away idolatry was, therefore, the first requirement which
Samuel made of the awakened people. At the time of the Protestant Reformation,
when the people were awakened, they cleared the churches and also their houses
of all images used for worship. When Christianity was successfully introduced
among the South Sea Islanders, She burning of the idols was the proof of their
sincere awakening.
3. Samuel urged a believing
return to the Lord. Repentance does not constitute reformation. It is only the
outer court. By faith we enter into the holy place. Faith lays hold of a
covenant God, of His pardoning mercy and justifying righteousness. Faith is the
reunion of the soul to the Lord. The heart must have an object. No person is
without a god, to whom all his efforts are devoted, and on whom his affections
are placed. It may be the world, or the creature, or self, or some
superstition, or else the true God. The tendency of the heart is to the false
and the worldly. But the awakened conscience finds no satisfaction in anything
less than God. When the work of reformation was being wrought among the people
Samuel felt anxious that all the nation should realise the benefit. He
therefore summoned all Israel together. “They drew water and poured it out
before the Lord.” This was not a Divine institution; but it was a practice
frequently observed to give confirmation to solemn pledges. It perhaps implied
that as “water is spilled upon the ground and cannot be gathered up again,” so
their vow was never to be recalled, but to be preserved in all its obligation
and obedience. It is like that testimony which Scotland, as a nation, once gave
to the Covenant in a time of spiritual revival. “At request of their devoted
leaders in the Reformation, the people crowded to Edinburgh from all parts of
the country, and assembled in the Greyfriars’ Churchyard to the number of sixty
thousand! Alexander Henderson stood forth in their midst, and, in a prayer of
wondrous power and pathos, confessed the nation’s sins, and their desire to
return to the Lord and to the purity of worship commanded in His word. It was
then proposed to join themselves in a covenant engagement to maintain the
Lord’s cause. The deed was read and explained.” Those that had doubts were
conferred with ere the deed was subscribed. “Again,” says the historian, “a
deep and solemn pause ensued; not the pause of irresolution, but of modest
diffidence, each thinking every other more worthy than himself to place the
first name upon this sacred bond. An aged nobleman, the venerable Earl of
Sutherland, at length stepped slowly and reverentially forward, and with
throbbing heart and trembling hand subscribed Scotland’s covenant with God. All
hesitation in a moment disappeared. Name followed name in swift succession,
till all within the church had given their signatures. It was then removed into
the churchyard and spread out on a level gravestone to obtain the subscription
of the assembled multitude. As the space became filled they wrote their names
in a contracted form, limiting them at last to the initial letters, till not a
spot remained on which another letter could be inscribed. There was another
pause. The nation had framed a covenant in former days and had violated its
engagements, hence the calamities in which it had been and was involved. If
they too should break this sacred bond how deep would be their guilt! Such seem
to have been their thoughts during this period of silent communing with their
own hearts; for, as moved by one spirit, they lifted up their right hands to
heaven, avowing by this solemn appeal that they had now joined themselves to
the Lord by an everlasting covenant that shall not be forgotten. In Israel,
Samuel stood forth and led the services of worship. Nor could that day be soon
forgotten by the people. It witnessed the renewal of their covenant with the
Lord. It recorded their marvellous mercy, when the crimson stains of twenty
years were forever wiped out by God. It celebrated the recovery of a nation’s backsliding,
when sins which as a thick cloud had darkened their moral firmament were
blotted out;. Backslider, Mizpeh speaks to thee! That spectacle of a nation’s
penitence, and the healing of a long backsliding, tells thee that there is
mercy with God, and illustrates His words of love, “Return unto me, ye
backsliding children; I will heal your backslidings.” Unconverted sinner,
Mizpeh speaks to thee! That scene of repentance after twenty years of sins,
reveals many who then first found the Lord. Backsliders were restored, the
impenitent might be saved. (R. Steel.)
Gather all Israel to
Mizpeh.
The brotherhood of worship
In the establishment of one of our great goldsmiths is a vast iron
safe with many locks, containing immense treasure, but no one can open that
chest; the keys are in the hands of many trustees, and only by their
concurrence can the hidden wealth be made manifest. Thus it is in the natural
and in the spiritual world, the wealth of the Divine blessing can be reached
only through the brotherhood of man, the brotherhood of saints. “Not forsaking
the assembling of yourselves together.” (W. L. Watkinson.)
Verses 7-11
The Philistines went up
against Israel.
The holy war
The revival of religion
has ever had a most important bearing as social and political improvement. The
return of man to God restores him to his brother. Restoration to the earnest
and hearty performance of spiritual duties towards God leads to a corresponding
reformation in relative and political duties. It was the revival of religion
that gave such liberty to the Protestant nations in the sixteenth century. It
was the revival of religion which secured the Protestant succession in England,
and many of the liberties which we now enjoy. It was the revival of religion
that gave such a martyr roll to the Scottish Covenanters, and led to the
Revolution settlement of 1688. It is to the religious revivals that America
owes much of the political happiness which, amidst the most discordant
elements, it has possessed. In the reformation under Samuel patriotism was
revived, the independence of the nation was recovered, and in such a way as
showed the gracious interposition of a covenant God. Many revivals have had
trying ordeals at the outset and a baptism of fire. Pentecost was immediately
succeeded by a Moody persecution. The planting of the Church among the heathen
was in the midst of enmity and opposition. Ten fierce persecutions were the
experience of the religion of Christ, while it was advancing successfully
through the Roman Empire. Few reformations were accomplished in the sixteenth
century without martyr fires. So we find in the days of Samuel that the renewed
Church of Israel was a child of storm and conflict. It was not strange that,
when the preaching of Samuel had been instrumental in awakening the Hebrews,
and when they were seeking to reform their worship and renew their covenant
with God, their oppressors should attempt to restrain their incipient
patriotism, and to inflict a chastisement. Persecution is the first object of
tyrannical powers when a subject people are revived to freedom of thought and
devotion to God. When the cause of God receives any new spiritual impulse there
are not wanting those who seek to arrest it by persecution, by controversy, or
by secular temptations. When the fagot cannot pervert, dissension may weaken;
when threats fail, bribery may corrupt. The first prevailed in Spain, when the
dreadful Inquisition destroyed the rising Protestantism. The second nullified
the influence of the Reformation in some of the German States. The third
prevailed where a tempting Erastianism reduced the Church to worldliness. The
time of revival is therefore a season of imminent danger. The Philistines are
then upon you. Are you awakened to spiritual concern? Satan is also aroused to
effect his intended ruin of your soul. Are you about to take up the cross and
to make a Christian profession? He is active to bring about your fall. The
Philistines are then upon you. On a former occasion, when they were in similar
danger, they reposed their trust in the ark of the Lord; but now their
confidence is in the God of the ark. They confided in the form, now in the
reality. Before they were apostate and impenitent; now, they are awakened,
reconciled, and devoted to the service of God. In their extremity, therefore,
they urge prayer. They seek Samuel’s intercession.
1. It was
the most powerful means of aid. “Prayer moves the arm that moves the universe.”
It can wrestle with the Angel and have power with God end prevail. It is the
divinely appointed means of assistance: “Call upon me in the day of trouble,
and I will deliver thee.”
2. It was
prayer in which they had all a believing interest. The people are ready to join
when Samuel uttered his supplication. Their earnest desire gave intensity to
Samuel’s words; their faith gave power to his believing intercession. Many
hearts united in one exercise.
3. It was
prayer to their covenant God. “Cry unto our God for us.” They had just renewed
their covenant with God, and accepted Him as theirs. He had been their father’s
God--a prayer hearing, covenant-keeping God. They knew to whom they addressed
their cry. It was to no unknown god, nor to an imaginary deity. Rest your soul
on Jesus. Then every prayer is offered to a Friend in whom you have confidence,
and from whom you may expect a blessing.
4. It was
prayer for a definite object. They specified their want. They stated the desire
of their hearts. Too many pray in a way so general as to exhibit little
interest in what they ask. When public prayer was made a sacrifice was offered.
The intercession was dependent on atonement. The efficacy of the petition was
in the acceptance of the substitute. Thus it was that Samuel took a lamb in all
the purity of its youth and offered it wholly unto the Lord. The atonement made
by the Redeemer was infinite, and is sufficient to take away wrath from thee.
“Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world!” Our prayers must
ever rest for all their efficacy on the Lamb of God. Ascending in the name of
Jesus they will prevail. This is what is meant when we ask for Christ’s sake.
Samuel’s prayer prevailed, and the answer came ere his worship was performed.
They had returned to God; they had secured His help. The Lord listened to their
prayer of faith, and that day fought their battles. The artillery of heaven was
moved against the Philistines. Israel was victorious without feats of arms. Nor
was this the only instance in their history. God had made the waters of the Red
Sea His weapons to overcome the Egyptians. In the Valley of Ajalon hailstones
did the work of conquerors, and the natural day was prolonged to give Joshua
the victory. In after days, too, the hosts of Sennacherib were vanquished by
the destroying angel in answer to the prayer of Hezekiah. And in the future yet
to be realised the believing supplication of the ransomed Church will secure
the interposition of God on the field of Armageddon to baffle the armies of the
world united to destroy his cause. “If God be for us, who can be against us?”
is the lesson we may draw from this event in the days of Samuel. The Church of
God is threatened in critical times. All over the world events seem preparing
to try the faith and energy of professing Christians. But so long as prayer is
so blessed a resource the little flock need not fear. God is the glory in the
midst of His cause, and the wall of fire around her. (R. Steel.)
National deliverance
The great thunder with
which God thundered on the Philistines carried down from God the answer and the
needed help. There is no need for supposing that the thunder was supernatural.
It was an instance of what is so common, a natural force adapted to the purpose
of an answer to prayer. Natural, but not casual. Though natural, it was God’s
answer to Samuel’s prayer. But how could this have been? If it was a natural
storm, if it was the result of natural law, of atmospheric conditions, the
operation of which was fixed and certain, it must have taken place whether
Samuel prayed or not. Undoubtedly. The uniformity of natural law enables the
Almighty, who sees and plans the end from the beginning, to frame a
comprehensive scheme of Providence that shall not only work out the final
result in His time and way, but that shall also work out every intermediate
result precisely as He designs and desires. Surely, if there is a general
Providence, there must be a special Providence. If God guides the whole He must
also guide the parts.
1. Let us
apply this view to the matter of prayer. The prayer of Samuel was prayer which
God had inspired. What more reasonable than that in the great plan of
Providence there should have been included a provision for the fulfilment of
Samuel’s prayer at the appropriate moment? The thunderstorm, we may be sure,
was a natural phenomenon. The only thing miraculous about it was its forming a
part of that most marvellous scheme--the scheme of Divine Providence--a part of
the scheme that was to be carried into effect after Samuel had prayed. If the
term supernatural may be fitly applied to that scheme which is the sum and
substance of all the laws of nature, of all the Providence of God, and of all
the works and thoughts of man, then it was a miracle; but, if not, it was a
natural effect. It is important to bear these truths in mind, because many have
the impression that prayer for outward results cannot be answered without a
miracle, and that it is unreasonable to suppose that such a multitude of
miracles as prayer involves would be wrought every day. We do not deny that
prayer may be answered in a supernatural way. But it is most useful that the
idea should be entertained that such prayer is usually answered by natural
means. By not attending to this men often fail to perceive that prayer has been
answered. Let the means be as natural as they may--to those who have eyes to
see the finger of God is in them all the same. But to return to the Israelites
and the Philistines. The defeat of the Philistines was a very thorough one. The
impression thus made on the enemies of Israel corresponds in some degree to the
moral influence which God-fearing men sometimes have on an otherwise godless
community. In the great awakening at Northampton in Jonathan Edwards’ days
there was a complete arrest laid on open forms of vice. And whensoever in a
community God’s presence has been powerfully realised, the taverns have been
emptied, the gambling table deserted, under the sense of His august majesty.
Would only that the character and life of all God’s servants were so truly
godlike that their very presence in a community would have a subduing and
restraining influence on the wicked!
2. The
step taken by Samuel to commemorate this wonderful Divine interposition. (W.
G. Blaikie, D. D.)
Verse
8
And the children of Israel said to Samuel, Cease not to cry unto
the Lord our God for us.
The cry for mediation
I. Mediation sought. The
Israelites, unarmed, undefended, are in great dismay. They turn to Samuel and
implore his continued intercession.
1. Times of humiliation for sin and of reformation from sin are times
in which the foe is very busy--doing what he can to binder.
2. Times of humiliation and awakening produce a sense of need of an
intercessor from personal unworthiness, from the gravity and danger of the
occasion, from the difficulty of relation to the unseen. We want someone to act
for us. The principle of mediation in the Gospel of Jesus Christ does fit in
with our nature and condition.
II. Mediation exercised.
Samuel prays and sacrifices.
1. Takes a young lamb.
2. Prays. The mediation of Jesus Christ is so divinely suitable and
sufficient, as He is both priest and sacrifice. His offering and intercession
may give us “boldness and access with confidence.”
III. Mediation accepted. “The
Lord heard him.”
1. Interposition by means of the elements of the natural world.
2. The foe is completely routed. (H. Gammage.)
Verse 12
And Samuel took a stone.
The everlasting memorial
How few of Egypt’s modern
inhabitants know who built those works of wonder that still draw crowds of
travellers! It might be said, in the words of one who longed for posthumous
fame, and had done much to merit it, but who knew what had been the experience
of departed greatness--it might be said with Solomon: “There is no remembrance
of the wise more than of the fool forever: seeing that which now is, in the
days to come shall all be forgotten.” (Ecclesiastes
2:16.)
But there is a memorial which shall never be erased--a monument that shall
never crumble into dust, and persons who shall never be forgotten. The events
connected with the life everlasting have all their stones of remembrance, and
the righteous shall ever shine as the sun in the kingdom of the Father. The
providences which ministered to the children of God are all recorded in the
heart, and will ever be recalled with thanksgiving to the God of grace who
ordered them. In the history of His Church God has commemorated the
interpositions and providences of His hand. Many a monumental stone stands in
the chronicles of Israel. Ararat is ever associated with Noah’s thank offering
after the Deluge. Mount Moriah has been embalmed in believing hearts since
Abraham built there his altar and called it Jehovah-jireh--“The Lord will
provide.” Since Jacob set up the stone which had been his pillow on that
memorable night when he saw the ladder, Bethel has been fondly cherished by all
who love the House of God. When Jordan was crossed by the pilgrim Church twelve
stones marked out the spot where the priests’ feet had stood; and Bochim became
associated with the record of a nation’s tears. So when Samuel and the children
of Israel received such a token of the Lord’s love and help in their victory at
Mizpeh in answer to prayer they erected a stone and called it Ebenezer, to
perpetuate their gratitude. Thus has the Church of God advanced. Constituted a
pilgrim through this wilderness to the land of promise, every step of progress
marks her gratitude. Commissioned to war against sin, every conquest becomes a
spiritual march in music. Sent to evangelise, every convert is a trophy and
“Hitherto hath the Lord helped us” is the chorus of every stanza in her
progressive song. Thus David set to music the history of Divine mercy to His
people, and recalled the past in their daily praises, while the experience of
his own soul became the “Hitherto” of the common chorus. The perils to which
the children of Israel were exposed were beyond their own strength to overcome.
They were weakened by oppression. They were faint by backsliding. They needed
help from the hand of God. They had met together at Mizpeh, and, amidst general
weeping, had confessed their sins, and renewed their covenant with God. But as
they were paying their vows, and joining in a religious service, they were
wantonly attacked. Their newborn zeal was put to an early test; but as their
penitence was sincere, their vow hearty, their prayer believing, so was the
faithfulness of God availing in their need. How many hearts were that day
restored to God, confirmed in faith, and revived to prayer! Temporal
deliverance and spiritual restoration went hand in hand, and a common Ebenezer
marked the rare experience. The Church was blessed with a revival, and the
State with liberty; souls were awakened, and citizens restored to patriotism.
The spiritual man became the truest patriot, the best subject of the laws, and
the most courageous defender of the State. Thus they had reason for this stone
of remembrance and this eucharistic inscription. But they teach us a
lesson--both in temporal and spiritual things to recognise the answer to our
prayer, and to give thanks. Have you experienced the providential mercies of
God? They demand recognition--a stone of memorial, and an Ebenezer--a psalm of
thanksgiving. Have you been brought onward in life to this day, finding daily
bread and watchful care? But there are other blessings of greater importance to
the soul, and which call for special notice and unceasing gratitude--the helps
vouchsafed in grace. The deliverance of the soul from sin is a Divine
interposition of the grandest kind. The recovery of the soul from backsliding
is an appropriate occasion for an Ebenezer. It was this especially which was
Israel’s national blessing. Their deliverance from the Philistines followed
their restoration from the backsliding of twenty years. It was a touching token
of the Lord’s acceptance of their tears and of their prayers. It was a manifest
pledge of His unchanging love. After a season of carelessness, spiritual sloth,
and coldness in prayer, have you been revived? Has your first love returned?
Then, have you returned to give God thanks, and in a more consistent
devotedness inscribed the Ebenezer of your soul? These Ebenezers are useful to
the believerse They remind him of dependence, and recall his confidence in the
strength of God. They encourage him by the past, to trust and not be afraid in
all future trials. (R. Steel.)
Ebenezer
It is certainly a very
delightful thing to mark the hand of God in the lives of ancient saints. But
would it not be even more interesting and profitable for us to remark the hand
of God in our own lives? Ought we not to look upon our own history as being at
least as full of God, as full of His goodness and of His truth, as much a proof
of His faithfulness and veracity as the lives of any of the saints who have
gone before? Have you had no deliverances? Have you passed through no rivers,
supported by the Divine presence? Have you walked through no fires unharmed?
Have you had no manifestations? Again, it is a very delightful exercise to
remember the various ways in which the grateful saints recorded their
thankfulness. Who can look without pleasure upon the altar which Noah reared
after his preservation from the universal deluge? Would it not be quite as
pleasant, and more profitable for us to record the mighty acts of the Lord as
we have seen them? Should not we set up the altar unto His name, or weave His
mercies into a song?
I. The
spot where the stone of ebenezer was set up.
1. Twenty
years before on that field Israel was routed. Twenty years before, Hophni and
Phineas, the priests of the Lord, were slain upon that ground, and the ark of
the Lord was taken, and the Philistines triumphed. It was well that they should
remember the defeat they had sustained and that amidst the joyous victory they
should recollect that the battle had been turned into a defeat unless the Lord
had been upon their side. Let us remember our defeats.
2. The
field between Mizpeh and Shen would also refresh their memories concerning
their sins, for it was sin that conquered them. Had not their hearts been
captured by sin, their land had never been captured by Philistia. Had they not
turned their hacks’ upon their God, they would not have turned their backs in
the day of conflict. Let us recollect our sins; they will serve as a black foil
on which the mercy of God shall glisten the more brightly.
3. Again,
that spot would remind them of their sorrows. What a mournful chapter in
Israel’s history is that which follows their defeat by the Philistines.
4. While
dwelling upon the peculiarity of the locality, we must remark that, as it had
been the spot of their defeat, their sin, their sorrow, so now before the
victory, it was the place of their repentance. You see, they came together to
repent, to confess their sins, to put away their false gods, to cast Ashtaroth
from their houses and from their hearts. It was there that they saw God’s band
and were led to say, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” When you and I are
most diligent in hunting sin, then God will be most valiant in routing out foes.
5. You
must remember, too, that Ebenezer was the place of lamentation after the Lord.
They came together to pray God to return to them. We shall surely see God when
we long after Him.
6. On
that day, too, Mizpeh was the place of renewed covenant, and its name signifies
the watchtower, These people, I say, came together to renew their covenant with
God, and wait for Him as upon a watchtower. Whenever God’s people look back
upon the past they should renew their covenant with God. Put your hand into the
hand of Christ anew, thou saint of the Most High, and give thyself to Him
again.
II. The
occasion of the erection of this memorial. The tribes had assembled unarmed to
worship. The Philistines, hearing of their gathering, suspected a revolt. A
rising was not at that time contemplated, though no doubt there was lurking in
the hearts of the people a hope that they would somehow or other be delivered.
The Philistines being as a nation far inferior in numbers to the children of
Israel, they had the natural suspiciousness of weak oppressors. If we must have
tyrants let them be strong ones, for they are never so jealous or cruel as
those little despots who are always afraid of rebellion.
1. The
victory obtained was by the lamb. As soon as the lamb was slaughtered, and the
smoke went up to heaves, the blessing began to descend upon the Israelites, and
the curse upon the foes. “They smote them”--note the words--they “smote them
until they came under Bethcar,” which, being interpreted, signifies “the house
of the Lamb.” At the offering of the lamb the Israelites began to fight the
Philistines, and slew them even to the house of the lamb. If we have done
anything for Christ, bear witness that it has been all through the Lamb.
2. As in
this occurrence the sacrifice was exalted, so also was the power of prayer
acknowledged. The Philistines were not routed except by prayer. Samuel prayed
unto the Lord. They said, “Cease not to cry unto the Lord for us.” Let us bear
our witness that if aught of good has been accomplished it has been the result
of prayer.
3. Again,
as there was prayer and sacrifice, you must remember that in answer to the
sweet savour of the lamb and the sweet perfume of Samuel’s intercession,
Jehovah came forth to rout his foes.
III. The
inscription upon the memorial. “Ebenezer, hitherto the Lord hath helped us.”
The inscription may be read in three ways. You must read first of all its
central word, the word on which all the sense depends, where the fulness of it
gathers. “Hitherto the Lord hath helped us.” Note that they did not stand still
and refuse to use their weapons, but while God was thundering they were
fighting, and while the lightnings were flashing in the iceman’s eyes they were
making them feel the potency of their steel. So that while we glorify God we
are not to deny or to discard human agency. We must fight because God fighteth
for us. I said this text might be read three ways. We have read it ones by
laying stress upon the centre word. Now it ought to be read looking backward.
The word “hitherto” seems like a hand pointing in that direction. Look back,
look back. Then the text may be read a third way--looking forward. For when a
man gets up to a certain mark and writes “hitherto,” he looks back upon much
that is past, but “hitherto “is not the end, there: is yet a distance to be
traversed. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
A New Year’s Sermon
That battle was won before
a single blow was struck. That victory was achieved at the Throne of Grace,
where many a glorious triumph has been gained which never could have been secured
elsewhere. Prayer was the mighty weapon which Israel wielded to the utter
discomfiture of the Philistine hosts. The power of prayer lies in the power
which prayer commands: the power of God.
I. The
principles of the text, as they enter deeply into religious experience. We are
taught:
1. That
we all need help from God. Christians need assistance from a power superior to
their own as certainly as did Israel at this crisis. Sin, which has robbed man
of his original rectitude, has also deprived him of strength. Unrescued by
Divine grace, he is utterly powerless. Nor does the most matured Christian
possess the least spiritual energy but as he receives it from on high. There is
no equality between the power of the Christian’s enemies and his own unaided efforts.
There are times when the Christian becomes so painfully conscious of this that
he is almost ready to quit the field, but this, instead of driving us to
despair, should operate powerfully in leading us to God for help, so as to feel
with the Apostle: “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
2. The
help of God is bestowed in connection with the use of the means appointed by
God, and it is only in their employment that we can reasonably expect Divine
aid. Neither the fact of our weakness nor the promise of Divine assistance has
been revealed to lead to the exclusion of human exertion. The text implies that
it is “help” that is promised, not the performance of the work for us, but
assistance by which we shall be enabled to do our duty.
3. The
actual bestowment of this help. The text records a fact: “Hitherto hath the
Lord helped us.” It was not help promised or provided merely, but help actually
bestrewed. Help implies just that amount of assistance which the case requires,
and by which the Christian shall be sustained under every trial, and delivered
out of the last.
II. The
character of the help which God supplies.
1. Suitable
and efficient. Without adaptation in the remedy the case must remain
unrelieved. The source of the Christian’s help stamps its character. It is
Divine.
2. Divine
help is certain. Human aid, feeble as it is, is very uncertain in its
bestowment. By a sad perversity of human nature, there is a disposition to
confer favours with a liberal hand on those who are already affluent, while the
indigent are sometimes allowed to drag out a miserable existence and pine away
in penury. If a man once opulent should be ruined by misfortunes, persons who
proudly recognised him when on the height of prosperity pass him by as if the
man’s calamities had so altered every feature of his countenance that they
cannot recognise him. Should an individual fall a prey to his own folly, pride
and extravagance, he must struggle with his self-caused miseries alone. And not
infrequently a cold, inactive, good-for-nothing sympathy is all that is
manifested toward the most deserving. But the causes which render human aid so
uncertain cannot affect God. The relation which He sustains to His Church
renders it impossible for Him to regard the interests of any of its members with
indifference: “God is in the midst of her; . . . God shall help her and that
right early.”
3. This
help is seasonable, it comes at the right time to a moment. It may not be given
just when it is expected, nor when to human eyes it would seem most desirable.
But are the Divine plans and arrangements to be precipitated and thrown into
confusion just to meet human fretfulness and patience? The God by Whom help is
bestowed knows the most opportune season for its bestowment. God is attentive
to “times end seasons;” and the Divine slowness has never been opposed to the
Divine punctuality.
4. The
help of God is constant and unfailing. “Hitherto,” wrote Samuel, “the Lord hath
helped us.” This was at a protracted period in the history of God’s people, and
up to that time there had nothing failed of all that the Lord had spoken.
Whenever they were defeated it was not the result of failure in the Source of
their supplies, but of their own unfaithfulness and sins. The promise of Divine
help is conditional; and only let the conditions of the promise be fulfilled,
and the help shall be continued. The last soldier on the field of Christian
warfare; the last labourer in the vineyard of the Lord; the last pilgrim in the
toilsome way to heaven, will need help from God as we do at this moment; and
all shall have it.
III. This
conduct to which this help should lead on our part.
1. Grateful
acknowledgment of past favours. The expression of gratitude was public and
monumental. There is a way of making the expression of our gratitude monumental
and lasting by making it practical. Seize every opportunity of testifying to
the goodness and faithfulness of God. Let the world know what a wise and
almighty Helper ours is. Strive to spread the truth of God; and labour to
perpetuate the institutions and auxiliaries of the Christian Church.
2. Past
help should lead to confidence in God at the present moment. The words of
Samuel were retrospective; but this recognition of past help was designed to
teach the practical lesson: “Have faith in God” now. When friends meet who have
a past to look back upon they soon talk over the difficulties and trials with
which they have had to struggle, memory generally recalls them first. At a
deeply afflictive crisis in David’s life, when our harps would have been
unstrung and mute, the Psalmist swept his and pealed forth: “I will sing of
mercy and judgment.” He saw that the two were blended, and he would sing of
both; but as “mercy” greatly predominated, he placed that first in his song.
3. Inspire
hope as to the future. (Samuel Wesley.)
Ebenezer
God must be acknowledged
in all our mercies, and it is delightful to be able to see in them the answer
of believing and fervent supplication. “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but
unto Thy name give glory.”
I. Let
us consider what we have to record.
II. Let
us now consider with what views and feelings our stone of memorial should be
set up, and this expressive word, Ebenezer, inscribed upon it.
1. With
sincere piety. To ascribe the honour and power of a work of grace to ministers
instead of God the Spirit, is about as irrational as it would be to give praise
and glory to the pen with which Milton wrote his immortal poem, instead of
giving it to the sublime genius of the bard himself. O let me be forgotten as
far as possible, and Christ only thought of.
2. This
expression, Ebenezer, must be uttered by us, as it was by Samuel and the Jews,
with adoring wonder.
3. Can
joy be absent or unsuitable on this occasion? Impossible!
4. A
sense of unworthiness should make our gratitude the more intensely fervent. (J.
A. James.)
Ebenezer
Monuments generally have
two objects They are intended to ornament a country or town, and to celebrate
the glories of the hero to whose memory they are raised. A monument is erected
after a successful battle, in order to glorify the leader under whose auspices
the battle was fought and the victory won. The cathedral of St. Paul’s is, by
the inscription above the doorway, a perpetual proof how even a great man may
be thinking rather too prominently about himself when he is rearing a temple to
the Most High God. But Samuel, though he has been instrumental in achieving
very much more than a triumph in battle--for he has effected a great moral
revolution and revival--never thinks about himself. Two thoughts and purposes
vividly occupy and fill his mind. One is to magnify Jehovah, to exalt His name,
to keep Him before the people; and the other is to be useful to the people. He
wants to assist them to be trustful and brave, because relying on God.
I. Ebenezer
is the landmark of work accomplished. There are some people, as you know, or
perhaps I ought to say that it is a peculiarity which characterises all people
more or less, that they have a very keen sense of evils and disadvantages which
belong to the present, and a very dull perception of the privileges secured and
the progress which has been made. Of this we have a familiar illustration in
the Israelites themselves. Men are constantly looking with affectionate regret
upon the past--
“That past which always wins a glory from its being far,
And orbs into the perfect star we saw not when we moved therein.”
Whatever millennium there
may be is there in the “good old times.” Hence, the world is always standing
still or going back. Now against such tendencies as these Ebenezer is a needed
and useful protest. There may be other hills to climb, and they may be hills
which will try our strength to the very utmost; but let not this prevent our
acknowledging with joy and thankfulness that one hill has, at least, been climbed.
The Church is a long, long way from perfection, I know. The grey dawn is not
breaking at this very moment into the golden tints of the millennial morning;
nay, the clouds may be as thick as they were in Israel under Ahab and Jezebel.
Nevertheless, let Elijah remember that that glorious scene did take place on
Carmel, the fire did come down from heaven, and the king of darkness did
receive a staggering blow. Say what you will, the Lord did thunder in the
heavens with a great thunder, and the Philistines were discomfited by it,
therefore set up a stone and call it Ebenezer. The world is bad enough, God
knows, but thank God it is not without its Ebenezers. In those good old times
to which you are looking back there were not so many cases of drunkenness recorded;
but neither were there so many people to get drunk nor so many newspapers to
bring the sin to light. In those good old times the English artisan and the
English yeoman were little better than serfs; and though the day of
emancipation is bringing out a generation as demoralised (or so they say) as
that which followed Moses out of Egypt, and is marked by excesses as wild as
those which raged at Meribah and Massah and under the mount, still the day of
emancipation has dawned, and my firm expectation is that the womb of the future
is bearing within it a race of Israelites indeed, who will enter into the
promised land. In those good old times the traffic in human souls, which
degrades man to the level of goods and chattels, was not only tolerated, but defended
on Christian principles. In the good old times war was an expedient to which
any tyrant who felt himself strong enough would resort without compunction, and
without exciting any deep indignation. Now a moral sense in regard to war has
grown up, which can compel even the most powerful of tyrants to pause ere he
wantonly draws the sword. Yes; the Philistines may not be driven out of the
country; they may not be utterly annihilated; but their grip, which was at our
throat for more than twenty years, has been shaken off. They have been heavily
smitten; they are at least quiet. Raise then a stone, and call it “Ebenezer,”
for hitherto hath the Lord helped us.
II. This
stone is a monumental memorial of the secret of success. Come near to it and
read what is written thereon, and you will find--not some inflated bombast
extolling the valour of the Israelites, but--a very simple sentence, giving
glory to Jehovah of Hosts. And see how the future which is briefly epitomised
in the next verse confirms this “hitherto.” “The hand of the Lord was against
them all the days of Samuel.” And what was Samuel?--a mighty man of valour? a
Moltke among generals? a Bismarck among statesmen? Nay; but a judge who built
up a kingdom of righteousness, and preeminently a man who could pray. Praying,
as his very name implies, was his forte. It was as one who called upon the Lord
that he was distinguished. And it was under the regime of prayer that
the Philistines were held in such complete subjugation. The truth which is thus
condensed in the word Ebenezer is of the utmost practical importance. There is
a Divine Ruler who providentially governs and personally superintends the lives
of individuals and the histories of nations. We are not living under a reign of
abstract law or inexorable fate; we are not moved round by a mechanism of
wheels, revolving in predestined cycles, and grinding out an unalterable
sequence of causes and effects. Let devout faith set up then a stone and write
upon it, Ebenezer, and with what awful and yet rapturous solemnities life
becomes invested. I have often stood with a feeling of almost reverence upon
me, high up on some mountainside, looking at vast mysterious boulders, once
deposited there by forces which it is hardly possible to conceive, but to the
existence of which these mighty masses of rock are the indisputable testimony.
But when I come upon Ebenezer, I come upon a stone which says to me, “The
mighty God, even Jehovah Himself, has been here. Here the sword of the Lord has
been flashing unsheathed, and here the banner of the Lord has been waving
unfurled.” Let devout faith set up a stone and write upon it Ebenezer and with
what calm, persistent, uncompromising steadiness we are inspired to advance,
just living and working out the everlasting will of righteousness, and simply
do that which is just and true and acceptable to God. The only peril you have
really to fear is the extinction of Samuel as a reigning influence; for then
you will be on the same footing as the other nations of the earth, and the question
will be: Can you send as many battalions as they can into the field? So long as
Samuel, the man of righteousness and the man of prayer, is influential, you
will come safe out of every crisis, under the banner of the God of battles.
Remember Ebenezer, and let that keep you from meddling, hasty tactics, as well
as from despondency or dismay; and let the believer come and rest his soul upon
this stone. (R. H. Roberts, M. A.)
God’s past mercies the
encouragement to future trust
In forming our opinion of
certain actions, and in pronouncing them to be either good or bad, useful or
injurious, their character must be ascertained from the principle on which they
are wrought A splendid deed, which mankind would applaud, may, in the sight of
God, be almost as strong an indication of a corrupt heart, as a foul
transaction, which all would unite in condemning. The fact is, man regards the
outward appearance only, the Lord looks on the heart. A simple stone set up in
the name of the Lord may as effectually denote the overflowings of gratitude,
as a costly magnificent temple, dedicated with all the pomp and solemnity of
modern architecture. Such was the case in the instance recorded in the text.
The prophet Samuel, though dead still speaks to us; he seems to afford a practical
illustration of Solomon’s admonition, “In all thy ways acknowledge God, and He
shall direct thy path.” This is the duty inculcated, which we would earnestly
desire to see transcribed in your lives If, then, we add our wonderful
preservation from seen and unseen dangers; the way in which the Lord hath
helped us over our mountains of difficulty, or out of the depths of
tribulation, smoothing our path when it was rugged to our step, or
straightening it when it was crooked; if we have experienced that a blessing
hath rested on the operation of our hands, or on the meditation of our hearts;
if, in the domestic relations of life, we have been favoured with any special
tokens of God’s superintending providence and fostering protection (and who has
not had them?), what gratitude ought to be ours; what abundant occasion have we
to adopt--what demons of darkness should we be if we did not adopt--the
sentiment of Samuel, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” But this may be a mere
empty expression of the lips, or, at least, a mere transitory ebullition of
feeling, evaporating with the event which has called forth the sentiment. We
would wish that the impression should be permanent, such as would only
terminate with our lives; we would wish to see erected some standing memorial
of the loving kindness of the Lord, which should declare his goodness, and
bespeak our gratitude. How is this to be effected in the present day, since
such a rude memorial of Divine mercy would be inconsistent with the notions of
modern refinement? It may be accomplished in two ways. Those who have omitted
to do so, may lay the foundation stone of a domestic altar, and rear a
structure in their houses, on which may be placed the morning and evening
sacrifice of prayer and praise. But the conduct of Samuel may be imitated in
another point of view, by the reception of Christ Jesus in our hearts; thus to
erect a spiritual edifies in our souls, and to make our bodies the temple of
the Holy Ghost. Christ is indeed that living stone, which we would see the
tenant of every bosom testifying in a lively way of providential and redeeming
mercies: a “stone disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious;” a
“tried stone,” a “sure foundation;” but to “some a stone of stumbling, and a
rock of offence:” a stone, which the builders, in their impiety and folly,
rejected, which is now become the head of the corner; yes, it is indeed this
Rock of Ages, which we desire to see set up in all our hearts, at all times,
and upon all occasions, as the stable basis on which to erect; a structure of
temporal or eternal blessedness; as the sure refuge and hiding place from the
storm of adversity, or the gale of prosperity. Here, then, we have the line of
conduct we earnestly recommend for your adoption, strongly enforced by the
patriarch of old: receive Him into your hearts, whom we preach unto you
as the author and finisher of your salvation. Let the idol altar be thrown
down, and the name of Jesus Christ be inscribed thereon; may that natural,
dead, indurated heart yield its place to the living stone, which will impart
new life and vigour to all its energies and emotions, and gratefully record the
achievements of Divine grace to the glory of God the Father. (H. S.
Plumptre, M. A.)
Memorials of Divine Mercy
There is a distinct
recognition, here, of the hand of God in providence; and there is a marking of
the event of God’s interference in their behalf by some visible outward sign
which would serve to bring it back to them. For no man, after the battle and
the victory, returning that way, and beholding this stone, would forget it.
They would cherish it in their memory, and tell their children of it. And if
their occasions or needs ever took any of them again through the region of
their old captivity, their old fear, the old battle and the old victory, that
outside memorial would stand to remind them, not merely of each external event
but also of the interior moral truth that it was of the Lord’s mercies that
they were preserved, and that it was of God’s interposing providence that they
were victorious. Now, we are in many respects like the Israelites. There are,
in the history of every man, certain remarkable events that are worthy to be
remembered. The gracious and providential interference of God in our behalf
deserves to be noted. The memory of all His mercies ought to be perpetuated.
Every critical period, as the turning of the year; every point of success in
any enterprise of life; every point where we gain a higher joy, whether it be
secular, or social, or spiritual; every new relation which promises great;
blessedness to us; every business achievement which seems to lift us out of
darkness and out of difficulties; every great mischief that impended as a
threatening sky, but; that is rolled away--every such event or experience ought
to have a distinct recognition. We should think of them in their individuality,
and in their sequences; and it would be well for us if we could set up some
memorial, and be able to say to one and another, “Hitherto the Lord hath helped
me.” It is the Lord--not my skill, not my wisdom, not my prowess--that hath
helped me hitherto. “Our true” life is the inward life. It deserves, therefore,
to be specially watched and recorded. No other thing deserves such celebrations
as a man’s inward victory--his inward deliverance. A blessing that comes from
God should be recognised by us, though it comes in no visible form. No one who
has a constant succession of good fortune, keeps any ideal in his mind of the
number of Divine mercies of which he is the recipient. If God were to recount
what He has done for us, it would seem as though our life were a golden chain,
in which one golden link clasped another, every hour being a link, and every
day lengthening the chain. I sometimes think, of a night, that it is a sin to
go into the house and leave God’s glory flashing abroad in the Northern Lights,
or in the stellar exhibitions in all the broad expanse above, without a
witness--certainly without my witnessing them. I feel as though it were a
stupidity to retire to sleep with all this amazing display going on. For, what
are men’s inventions and ingenuities compared with those astonishing
developments which every summer’s day shows us in the clouds, in the storms,
and in frescoes of light and beauty? Every single day there is enough in the
silence of nature, and in the might of nature, enough to fill the soul with joy
and gratitude. But, while day tells it to day, and night repeats it to night,
man sees but little of it. There may he kept a calendar of dates. It is astonishing
how much one can preserve in this way with very little trouble. When travelling
in Europe, I was so full of excitement end enjoyment that I had not time to
keep a journal; so I just put down under each date one single word--the name of
the city; or the name of the picture; or the name of the mountain; or the name
of the pass; or the name of some person whom I had met; and now I can go back
ever a month’s travels, and, though there are but these single words, that
whole history starts up when I look at them. If you regularly take a memorandum
book, at night, and think back through the day, and bring up before you what
God has done for you, what He has shown you, what significant thing has
happened, and put down the caption of it under the proper date, you will be
surprised to find what a calendar your book will become at the end of every
year. In some of the German houses there is a charming habit of this sort.
Instead of papering their rooms, or frescoing them in the ordinary way, they
employ the ablest artists of their times to paint their walls with the most
exquisite landscapes, which are to stand there for ages. And in these
landscapes are representations of their own family here and there. Here, for
instance, are the grandparents; there are the children; and here are the
friends and neighbours. And so, one has in his house, a kind of memorial of his
social relationships, and of everything significant in his family history. It
is a most charming idea if it, be executed fitly. But I would not recommend to
you any such custom as this, which is very expensive, and unfitted to our
habits and manners And yet, it is quite possible for one to have objects on his
wall, which shall answer very much the same purpose: A leaf here, an anchor
there, or a little flower, plucked, dried, and hung in its proper place, may
mark some significant passage in one’s history This may be seen in castles. The
man of the castle says, “Do you see those antlers? Do you see that frontal? I
will give you a history of that hunting expedition.” They are memorials which
he has preserved of various experiences in hunting. Why should not every
dawning mercy have a star blazing from the wall, and saying to every one that
looks upon it, “Hitherto the Lord hath helped me?” Why should our houses be so
barren of our own history? Why should we leave our eyes so entirely without the
aid of interpreting symbols? I know not why a person’s house should not become
a kind of memorial of personal history. Or, a journal might be made of the
Bible. If you keep a kind of register, so that the text refers to and is
associated with the event, your Bible becomes a memorial. You are setting up
all the way through it stones of remembrance, as it were. You are providing a
record for your old age. And by and by, when you take down your Bible, and put
on your glasses, and look back upon your past life, not only will it be the
word of God, but you will find bow the word of God fed you in the wilderness,
strengthened you in sickness, and comforted you in circumstances of
discouragement. How many things a man can record on the fly leaves of his Bible
which will afford him pleasure and profit in after life! And how precious that
Bible will become to him when he has woven it into his experience as a kind of
epitomising of his life. Or, one might, if blessed with means, take the
occasions of God’s hopefulness to him, and make them also occasions of charity.
There are what are called “memorial windows” in churches Such windows are put
in often, by affection, to be the memorial of a wife, or sister, or parent, or
child, or friend. In the old country there are a great many of them. One of the
most affecting things I ever saw in my life was in the church of the
“Succouring” Virgin--that is, of Mary, the Succourer. It was, I believe, in one
of the French cities. The whole church was filled with tablets. Here was one of
an officer, for three days’ deliverance, on such, and such and such dates. It
was a little marble slab let into the wall, inscribed with letters of gold. On
inquiring and comparing dates, I found it was during the battle of Inkerman, at
a time when the French army were in great danger. The man had been preserved;
and when he came back, he put up in this church this tablet, recalling the
mercy of God in sparing his life. Another inscription was, “My babe was sick; I
called to the Virgin; she heard me; and my child lives.” There was the tablet
that celebrated that event. And I could not read these inscriptions without
having tears fall from my eyes like drops from a spice bush when shaken in a
dewy morning, blow, everybody ought to have a church somewhere for himself--not
a literal church; but someplace where he can celebrate God’s special goodness
to him. (H. W. Beecher.)
The place of memorials in
the Christian life
I. What
the memorial commemorated. It was erected on a battle field where they had been
twice defeated. Thus it reminded them of their own
1. Helplessness.
But it was also erected on a spot where they had witnessed a great victory, won
by God’s help. It therefore also reminded them
2. God
was their Helper. The stone also commemorated--
3. The
extent of their victory. “Hitherto hath the Lord helped them,” as far as this
place. It was a kind of border stone marking their advance on a former
position.
II. How
it helped them. They called it “Help Stone.” In commemorating past help it
proved a present help.
1. By
keeping them from self-trust.
2. By
stimulating their activity. The sight of this stone aroused their patriotism
and religious fervour. It was like the flag which stirs the soldier’s martial
spirit.
3. It
deepened their sense of obligation. To retreat from the position marked by this
memorial would have been as disgraceful as for an army to lose its standard.
III. The
place of memorial is a Christian life. A written pledge or a spoken vow is for
us what “Help Stone” was for Israel. By that act we warn the enemy that he has
no more claim upon the territory of our hearts. And each subsequent communion
is a gazing afresh upon the memorial of victory won by Christ. (R. C. Ford,
M. A.)
God’s help
1. Observe,
the language here of the writer is retrospective. It takes in the wide sweep of
the Jewish history.
2. Thus
it becomes the language of gratitude.
3. Then,
too, consider how the inscription on the stone set up by Samuel, lays a good
foundation for hope and trust. And it is upon this help we ground too our
faith. The true Christian must always feel deeply humbled at the remembrance of
his transgressions, but in the effort of a true repentance he is conscious of
God’s merciful aid and compassion. The text furnishes a motive for future
perseverance.
5. The
text indicates that those who are Divinely assisted in their undertaking, will
find in the end that their life of labour and of uprightness, as regards both character
and conduct, has not been in vain. No. In some matters of an outward kind, at
first sight, it may seem that even the most exemplary career has ended in
disappointment, in perfect uselessness.
6. Hence
arises the duty of cooperation with the help of the Almighty. The builder when
furnished with proper materials must use them. It would be downright folly for
him to fold his hands, to make no exertion, and only to call aloud for help.
The Christian too must take his place in the Church, as in a city, and although
he knows that without God’s help his watchfulness will be of no use, still he
must not sleep at his post. (W. G. Horwood.)
The Lord’s Helping His
people
doctrine.
It is the duty of the
Lord’s people to keep the memorial of the experience which they have of the
Lord’s helping them. I shall discuss this point under two general heads.
I. The
Lord’s helping His people.
1. How
doth the Lord help His people?
2. Let
us inquire why the Lord helpeth His people.
II. To
speak of the keeping up of the memorial of the experiences which they have had
of the Lord’s helping them.
1. What
it is to keep up the memorial of the Lord’s helping us.
2. Inquire
what of these experiences of the Lord’s helping should be recorded and kept in
memory.
3. Inquire
why we should keep up the memorial of these things
The Lord our Help
From this passage we are
forcibly taught, in the first place:--
I. that
it is our especial duty, under the apprehension of any impending calamity, to
seek unto God for deliverance by fervent believing prayer.
II. We
are taught by this portion of sacred history, that God will hear the relieving
prayers of His servants. We are far from affirming that prayers, offered up in
faith, and “for things agreeable to God’s will,” will always be granted in the season
or in the manner that the supplicants might either desire, or in their fallible
judgment might deem most proper No! This would be to usurp God’s prerogative,
and to substitute our own erring judgments in the place of His wise and all
disposing sovereignty. All that God permits us to do, is to approach Him in
importunate, believing prayer, leaving the result to His own unerring disposal.
III. It is
our duty to recognise the hand of God in every deliverance.
IV. A
public acknowledgment of gratitude is due to almighty God for mercies received
and for deliverance from impending evils. In perusing the history of the
heathen world, we are particularly struck with the practice of perpetuating the
memory of great events to future generations. When nations were delivered from
impending calamities or favoured with unlooked for blessings, they raised the
song of gratitude to those whom they esteemed their preserverses The praises of
their deliverers were sung by the poet, and extolled by the historian; their statues
adorned the cities which gave them birth; and other striking memorials were
instituted to convey to future generations an abiding sense of the value of
their services. If, from the heathen, we turn to the enlightened world, we
shall find that the memorials which, in the one, were erected to the statesman
or the conqueror, were, in the other, expressly instituted in token of
gratitude to God--the great and only Deliverer.
V. Let
your recollection of God’s past mercies inspire you with the feelings of future,
unreserved confidence.
VI. Let
me call upon you to testify your sense of the Divine mercies, by an increasing
devotedness to the service of your God. (Robert Cook.)
Retrospection and
Gratitude
The character of Christian
gratitude, etc. “Hitherto the Lord hath helped us.”
1. Christian
gratitude is retrospective.
2. Christian
gratitude is devout. It connects the thought of God with the travelled past.
There may have been second causes: gracious interpositions and friendly
agencies; but above and beyond all, the good man recognises the hand of God,
and in real devotion says, “Hitherto the Lord hath helped me.”
3. Christian
gratitude is joyful. Every event in the providence of God has a message of
mercy in it to the good man. Day unto day is saying to him, “Rejoice in the
Lord, ye righteous, and shout aloud for joy, all ye that are upright in heart.”
4. Christian
gratitude is ever trustful. It speaks thankfully of the past, and looks forward
hopefully to the future; hitherto sounds the keynote of hereafter. (W. G.
Barrett.)
Verses 15-17
And Samuel judged Israel all the darts of his life.
The prophet judge
In the hopeful emergency of Israel’s lamenting after Jehovah,
“Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel;” and the clear, bright word, and
the wise act of that and subsequent days, show him to us as worthy to be a
prophet of the Lord, and a judge or ruler of a great people. Great soldiers
have been admired for the way in which they have seized the black and bloody
opportunity of a crisis in a battle in order to plunge into more successful
carnage; but what better is that than the shark’s swift and well-timed whirl
and dash at its almost escaping prey? How much loftier and demanding what
higher gifts and power is the act of him who sees and grasps the opportunity of
raising a nation from its almost ruin, and even before the delivering time has
come sees the flower of hope blooming among the ruins? Such was Samuel’s act in
this passage; and such in our own day the hope and deed of Cavour and Victor
Emmanuel, who foresaw and made possible the growth of united Italy, at a time
when the priests and soldiers had brought the Italy of history to a degradation
that only soldiers and priests know the way unto. It is of the greatest
importance that we should understand Samuel’s arrangements for the national
recovery, and apply the principles involved as piously and intelligently as we
can
1. Notice, then, that Samuel’s first great act in his character of
prophet-judge was to call the people to a thorough religious and moral
cleansing: religious in that they were required to disown the idolatry that was
in their lives and opposed to the worship of Jehovah; and moral in that the worship
of Baal and Astarte was licentious, degrading; vicious in society as well as
profane before their God. Samuel required this of them as well as “lamenting
after the Lord.” Israel needed the true worship of the pure God. Purity of
heart, temperance of spirit, chastity of body, righteousness to one another;
these things, aimed at for the love of God, are His true worship; these were
the true ways of putting from them the false and foul idols that God abhorred.
So we have to learn. Mourn after God; be penitent and contrite; but aim after
Godlikeness as well. Mourn over your sins, but show the true contrition that
seeks to be like God; that says, “I will arise and go to my father.” Remember
that the invader was in the land; the polluters of the sanctuary still in the
sacred places. A soldier “patriot” might have earned renown by military
expeditions and dashing raids into the conquered territory; but the dark day of
soldier-judges was gone. There was now a man leading who preferred his
country’s purity to her prosperity, and would have rather seen his nation die
than have her prosper with the work and wages of iniquity. Therefore he called
them to a national purifying. But the call of Samuel is intended to be to us.
For it is not the only duty of a nation to summon its armed bands and squadrons
in times of national peril, or international anxiety. Nor is it less than
profanity to send armies forth invoking the “God of battles,” forgetting that
before the barbarity of man shed human blood in war, God was a God of purity,
and is to be remembered in war and strife, and before conflict and carnage, as
the God of righteousness, who will require unjustly or heedlessly shed blood at
the hands of those who have poured it out to cry unto Him from the ground.
2. Samuel’s next great act as a prophet-judge was to summon the
people to a great prayer assembly. So distinctly did he put the duty of
consecration to God before all things that, instead of military deliberations,
instead of holding a great council of war, he said to them, “Gather all Israel
to Mizpeh, and I will pray for you unto the Lord.” But this mighty act of
penitence and prayer was rudely disturbed. Like the royal and prelatic
dragoons, that rushed down the mountain side against the meetings of the
Scottish Covenanters, to stain the heather with their blood, the Philistines
marched swiftly to Mizpeh against their defenceless tributaries. Evidently the
Israelites had made no military preparation; and all seemed to threaten that
the meeting for prayer and purification would end in a horrible massacre, like
many similar meetings in Christian times. The only brave heart there was
Samuel’s. The best man was the most courageous. Penitence led to prayer, prayer
to victory, and victory to praise. Such is our soul’s sure way. The prominent
feature of the day in connection with Samuel is one that repeatedly shows
itself in his life, and that is his character of intercessor. He prayed
hopefully when all was gloomy and foreboding, and he did so not because or when
he could do nothing else. He did not act as we so often do; he did not make
prayer a last resource, but first and foremost he cried unto the Lord. It was
for prayer that he assembled the people, and it was while he was uttering his
peculiar cry of earnest intercession that the voice of the Lord’s thunder was
heard. Nor, in thinking of Samuel’s prayers and the people’s penitence and
their efficacy, must we forget the instructive contrast there is between this
day of unexpected triumph and the day of battle at the same place; when,
notwithstanding the presence of the ark and all the Divinely ordained
accompaniments of its mystery when it led the armies of Israel, there was
nothing but disaster, disgrace, and death. Under Samuel, without the ark, or
priest, or any symbol of the presence of God, Israel’s enemies were destroyed
and the penitent people delivered. The difference was in the penitence; in the
setting of their hearts towards the Lord in contrition and prayer. Ichabod was
the word that ended the day of trusting in the ark; but Ebenezer crowned the
day of penitence and prayer.
3. Samuel’s next great act as a prophet-judge was to consolidate the
reformation and prosperity by systematic righteous judgment. “He went from year
to year in circuit to Bethel and Gilgal and Mizpeh, and judged Israel in all
those places.” He was too wise not to know, and too devout not to remember,
that a land left with only a military success, and rejoicing chiefly over the
damage done to its political rivals, would ever be a temptation to itself, and
would expose itself more and more to the perils of raillery ambition and
adventure. History is full of instances of this. Ambition will govern the
military nation, and avarice the commercial, with little regard to the God of
justice in either. But by judging for God, witnessing regularly to the presence
of God’s law as he went through the various districts, Samuel prevented the
people’s penitence being only fugitive, “as the morning cloud and as early
dew,” and guarded against the perils of their enormous deliverance from foreign
oppression. Concentrate the truth of this on the smaller range of your own
private lives and personal development. For it is possible that penitence, if
only fleeting, and the great kindnesses of God may be made the occasions of
greater condemnation. And this grace of knowing the Lord and the revelations of
Himself to His earnest souls are not spasmodic, interjectional, and unreliable;
for “His going forth is prepared as the morning; and He shall came unto us as
the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.” Consolidate your
penitence into piety, your thankfulness for deliverance into earnest devotion
and regular good doing. Go, round your nature, and set everything and every
power to the acquirement of “holiness, without which no man shall see the
Lord.” (G. B. Ryley.)
Samuel the Judge
Samuel is a splendid model of sanctified authority. Even as Mount
Gideon towers in rugged, regal grandeur above that broad tableland on which the
fortunes of the Jewish monarchy were afterwards unrolled, so his strong pure
character towers in magnificent sublimity above the fickle, selfish age in
which he lived. He was the highest type of a ruler. There are two kinds of
authority, that which is sustained by force of arms, and that which is held by
force of character. Samuel had the latter; the former is hard to get and hard
to keep. It is the possession of tyrants. We have had in these later days a
striking illustration of these two kinds of power in the Czar of Russia and the
late ex-Emperor of Brazil. A certain writer in commenting on the life of the
former says: “No one in the world is so grand a monarch, and yet no one in the
world today is more wretched. He knows that the spirit of Nihilism is abroad
throughout his vast domains, he fears to see in every face the look of an
assassin. Turn now to the other picture, Dom Pedro, for many years the loved
and trusted emperor of the Brazilian people, the friend of the oppressed, the
emancipator of the slave, the patron of the arts and sciences, who was willing
when his people had become, through his own generous influence and training,
ripe for a republican form of government, to abdicate his throne and to go
uncomplainingly into exile. His was an authority resulting from character. He
held a throne within a throne which could not be touched or overthrown by the
vicissitudes of a progressing civilisation. The influence of the last of the
Brazilian emperors, like the influence of the last of Israel’s judges, will be
felt throughout successive, generations. The authoritative power of a strong,
continuous character is a fact familiar to us all. Samuel ruled by virtue of
what he was in himself, and he was what he was because of his early training
and continuous growth in character. I would like to say a few words about this
continuity of righteousness. As a rule the men and women who have the strongest
influence in the world today are those whose moral characters have been built
up from their youth time. I do not wish to say anything that shall discourage
those who have emerged from the wild excessses of youth into a manhood
comparatively strong and influential. I think of men like Augustine, and John
Bunyan, and John Newton, and John Gough, who, having emerged from the fiery
furnace of dissipation, went about among their fellow men and, despite the
awful scars upon their characters and the smell of fire upon their garments,
wielded a mighty influence for good and exercised a moral authority in the
world which might have been impossible had they, like Timothy and St. Anthony
and Edward the Sixth of England, led lives of unbroken righteousness. And yet
these men may be regarded as exceptions to the general law of influence. The
wild oats theory is all wrong, the assertion that you must be a profligate and
a prodigal before you can be a prince among men is devil’s gospel. I have no
doubt that the devil over-reaches himself and cheats himself, but in any
transaction between you and him he is longer-headed than you are. If you give
him a mortgage on your life in the early days, he will be pretty sure to get
out of you double the face of your note before he gets through with you. Many a
reformed man, many a converted man, is obliged to lament today, as Job did,
because “the iniquities of his youth” possess him. The sin is forgiven, but the
disabled body, the weakened will, the impaired influence, the thought of those
who have been led astray by his example, must abide with him. Chaucer, “the
bright herald of English song,” a man of surpassing abilities, failed to be the
power that he might have been because of his early sins. He cried out
repeatedly On his deathbed: “Woe is me that I cannot recall and annul these
things; but, alas! they are continued from man to man and I cannot do what I
desire.” I had a letter from one of these unfortunates only a few days ago. He
has for many years been yielding to temptation. Again and again he has striven
to break away from the thraldom of his past life, but as yet in vain. He says:
“I have been on a disastrous downhill slide for the past few weeks; nothing
wrong other than dissipation, which ought to be a criminal offence,
particularly for me. Sinning and trying to repent seems to be my lot. Why
cannot I be saved?” The difference between a character that has grown up into a
matured strength from early goodness and purity and that which results from
some sudden and violent conversion after years of weakening excesses is like
the difference between the stalactite and the icicle: they look much alike,
they are formed by the same forces of nature; but the one is many years
forming, and the other grows in a night-time. Keep the icicle under right
conditions of temperature and it remains, like the stalactite, solid and
beautiful; but change those conditions, put the two together under the burning
heat of the sun, and the creation of a night time will molt away, while the
deposit of many years will be strong and solid still. The prince among men who
is the greatest moral power in the world today, the man who can do the most in
moderating and guiding the passions of his fellow men, who is best able to help
the weak and encourage the faint, and who impresses his character upon the age
in which he lives, is the man who, like Samuel, can look back through middle
age and youth and childhood upon a life which has been clean and true. (C.
A. Dickinson.)
Samuel the Ruler
Other books--the works of great men and possessed of great
merit--have been written for the use of princes in training for a throne; but
in preference to all such, were we a prince’s tutor, we should select the
Bible; and for a pattern for rulers him whose name stands at the head of this
chapter. America boasts her Washington; England her Hampden; Scotland her
Wallace; Greece and Rome their patriots or patriot-kings; but among the few
illustrious men whose deeds shine in the annals and whose names are embalmed in
the heart of nations, where, in all history, sacred or profane, is there one so
eminently fitted to rule as Samuel--who presents such a remarkable combination
of mental power, the purest patriotism, and the highest piety?
1. He was a patriotic ruler.
2. His object was not his own personal aggrandisement. “L’etat,
c’est moi” (“The State, it is I”), said Louis XIV to one who
happened to speak in his presence of the interests of the State. A striking
picture that of one who, though called “the great,” was an incarnation of the
worst passions of human nature--of selfishness, pride, heartless cruelty,
insatiable ambition, and abominable lust!--a truer picture, though drawn by his
own hand, than any left by Bossuet, or Massillon, or the other flatterers of a
bloody tyrant and ruthless persecutor of God’s heritage. We meet with no such
scenes under the rule of Samuel. Unlike those that had preceded, or were to
follow, the sword slept in its scabbard all the days of Samuel--that great
battle excepted which inaugurated his reign, and was won by his prayers. Under
his government--Samuel himself the highest example of it--piety flourished; the
stream of justice ran pure; the rights of all classes were respected; private
property was safe; and the public burdens, pressing lightly, were easily borne
by a prosperous people. I can fancy, when old men described the happy and quiet
life they led in the good days of Samuel, how many felt that when their fathers
clamoured for a king, on that occasion, as old Bishop Latimer said of another,
the vox populi was rather the vox diaboli than the vox Dei--the
voice of the devil than the voice of God.
2. Samuel was a pious, as well as patriotic, ruler. It would appear
that in the rudest times of old an altar always rose near the throne; and that
an indispensable part of every palace was the chapel, where he to whom others
knelt, knelt to God; and learned to remember that there was One above him whose
throne overshadowed his; at whose mercy seat kings had to seek for mercy; whose
laws were to form the rule, and his glory the chief end of their government.
Simply the vicegerent of God, and no king, Samuel had no place in Israel; the
palace, if such it could be called, was the tabernacle, where God dwelt within
the curtains of the holy place, No armed guards protected the person, nor
gorgeous retinue attended the steps of Samuel. No pomp of royalty disturbed the
simple manner of his life, or distinguished him from other men; yet there rose
by his house in Ramah that which proclaimed to all the land the personal
character of its ruler, and the principles on which he was to conduct his
government In a way not to be mistaken, Samuel associated the throne with the
altar; earthly power with piety; the good of the country with the glory of God.
“He judged Israel,” it is said, “all the days of his life, and went from year
to year in circuit to Bethel, and Gilgah, and Mizpeh, and judged Israel in all
these places; and his return was to Ramah, for there was his house, and there
he judged Israel, and there,” it is added, “he built an altar unto the Lord.”
That altar had a voice no man could mistake. In a manner more expressive than
proclamation made by the voice of royal heralds with painted tabards and
sounding trumpets, it proclaimed to the tribes of Israel that piety was to be
the character, and the will of God the rule, of his government. What an example
Samuel presents to our magistrates, our judges, our members of parliament--to
all entrusted with authority, and how should all who love their God and country
pray that every post of honour and of public trust may be filled with a man of
the type of Samuel! Religion is the root of honour; piety the only true
foundation of patriotism; and the best defence of a country, a people nursed up
in godliness--of such virtue, energy, and high morale, that, animated with a
courage which raises them above the fear of death, they may be exterminated,
but cannot be subdued. It, is not, as some allege, our blood, with its happy
mixture of Celtic, Saxon, and Scandinavian elements, but the religion of our
island--our Bibles, our schools, our Sabbaths, our churches, and our Christian
homes--which, more than any and than all things else, has formed the character
of its inhabitants; and to that more than to the genius of its statesmen, or to
its fleets and armies, Britain owes her unexampled prosperity, and the peace
that has brooded for a hundred years unbroken on her sea-girt shores. (T. Guthrie,
D. D.)
The judge in circuit; or, religion in business
In every State much depends on the proper administration of
justice, and it is of the first consequence to sustain it incorrupt. It is with
the body politic as with the individual. Regard must be had to those secondary
laws which influence health and contribute to our fitness for discharging
ordinary duties. If we pay no respect to the laws of diet, exercise, and
ventilation, by which health is conserved, we become unable to perform our
business, the internal economy is deranged, and all the members of the body
suffer. In society there are principles that regulate order and prosperity,
which cannot with impunity be set aside. If the administration of justice be
neglected or perverted, liberty and religion must seriously suffer. But when
religion is revived, it is of vast moment to bring all civil affairs under its
purifying influence. Without this, religious ceremonies would serve as cloaks
for sin, and liberty excuse licentiousness. It was, therefore, the great
business of Samuel, when by God’s blessing he had godliness recovered and
national order re-established, to free the judgment seat from corruption, and
to make it a respect and a dread through all the land. The civil government of
Israel was peculiar. It had its origin from God, and was as much a Divine
institution as the Church itself. Jehovah was their lawgiver and king, both in
Church and State. Church and State being co-extensive in Israel, the Levites
acquired a large share in the administration of justice. In the days of David,
we read that six thousand of the Levites were officers and judges (1 Chronicles 23:4), in addition to
the number employed in the tabernacle service. Members of the State were
subject to the law of the Church, and the members of the Church were citizens.
Religious error was criminal in civil law. Idolatry was treason, for God was
their king. Offences against society were subject to ecclesiastical censure,
and cut off the guilty from the congregation of the Lord. The two forms of
government were mutually helpful and interdependent. The revival of piety
purified the State, and spiritual officers led rulers to reform. Samuel was a
Levite, and was devoted to the sanctuary by the circumstances of his birth. But
he also discharged high civil offices on account of the position into which he
was providentially raised. He officiated as a priest, and he ruled as a judge.
Samuel was an upright and godly judge. There is a danger of separating the
official from the personal character, and whenever this is done the individual
is seriously injured. There have been good men who have been bad judges, and
bad men who have made respectable judges. There is another danger to which a
judge is exposed, when he is tempted to indulge personal feelings while seated
where impartial judgment should be given. It is recorded of Aristides, one of
the brightest names in ancient Greece, and a man to whom his contemporaries
awarded the title of “the Just,” that when he was a judge between two private
persons, “one of them declared that his adversary had greatly injured
Aristides.” He thus hoped to awaken the personal feelings of the judge against
his opponent and secure a verdict favourable to himself. But the just judge
replied, “Relate rather what wrong he hath done to thee, for it is thy cause,
not mine, that I now sit judge of.” Private feelings may, however, sometimes be
tried severely. When Brutus had to occupy the seat of justice and his two sons
were placed at the bar charged with treason against the State, it was trying
for the patriot to set aside the parent, and for duty to act against affection.
But the majesty of law prevailed over the emotions of kindred, and the spectators
are said to have gazed more at the judge than on the culprits on that august
occasion, and to have regarded the scene as a most illustrious exhibition of
moral heroism. Party feeling is another danger to which judges are exposed.
When Richard Baxter had to bear the coarse ribaldry and unjust judgment of
Jeffreys, it was evident that party feeling ruled the decision of that wicked
man. A judge should be upright, and Samuel brought to the judicial seat a
character fitted for the high office he had to discharge. The altar was beside
his bench and his home. The profession of his faith was beside his robe of
office. The believer was in the judge. He connected the official with the
personal so intimately that he could not be a godly man without also being at the
same time an upright judge. Nor has he stood alone in the lives of judges. Sir
Matthew Hale was a man after Samuel’s pattern. Under the power of godliness and
familiar with the word of God, he sought to evidence the principles of religion
in the practice of his profession. When he was an advocate, he would not plead
a cause, if he were convinced of its injustice; and when he rose to the bench
and was Chief Baron of the Exchequer he was noted for the impartiality of his
decisions. A peer of the realm who had a case in court once called upon him to
give him private information, that he might have fuller understanding of it
when it was brought up for judgment. Sir Matthew is reported to have said that
“he did not deal fairly to come to his chamber about such affairs, for he never
received any information of causes but in open court, where both parties were
to be heard alike.” The duke complained to the king; but his majesty observed,
that “he believed he would have used himself no better, if he had gone to solicit
him in any of his causes.” Sir Matthew feared God and regarded man, but his
integrity of righteous action was not to be sacrificed. Samuel did not forget
whose law it was which he dispensed, whose worship he observed, whose altar was
at his house. After the fatigue of official duty, the exercise of devotion at
the family altar was sweet refreshment. Before entering upon the anxieties of
judgment or the vexation of litigation, domestic worship was his best
preparation. Amidst the difficulties of the conflicting cases before him he
would remember the altar, and seek wisdom requisite for the occasion from the
Lord most high. Secular engagements did not pervert his godliness, or lead him
to neglect family worship. He could come from the strife of tongues to the
peace-speaking blood, and approach with humble faith the altar of his God. That
is not a complete house which is without an altar. It may have a hearth to
warm, and accommodation to suit the body, but it has not that which likens it,
as it links it to heaven. You may have a respectable business, and conduct it
well, and yet want what blesses it--a domestic altar. A house without an altar
lacks its brightest ornament, its clearest light, its best principle, and its
sure consecration. But where the altar is in the house it has a safety lamp.
Numerous have been the testimonies to the value of the domestic altar. (B.
Steel.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》