In the quiet of an ordinary night, God broke his silence to speak to a young boy. And what he said changed everything. Remember, it's the story of Samuel hearing God's voice. Today, on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindahl uncovers the forgotten half of this beloved Bible story. The part that reveals why even the most devoted families can drift.
why busyness can become our greatest enemy. and why hearing truth without acting on it leads to heartbreak. This message may be the wake-up call that your family needs. Chuck titled his message, Samuel, the boy who heard God's voice. For the next few moments, I want you to think of yourself as a child.
A child in Sunday school, you're about seven to ten years of age. And as usual, your mind is drifting and wandering from one thing to another. You're busy, you're fidgety. You're not thinking much about what the teacher has on her or his mind. And then suddenly something catches your eye.
She brings in a series of large posters, which are. Pictures. And each picture represents A story out of the scriptures, and she has asked you. to name the story by just looking at the picture. Got it?
Okay, play along with me in this game and let's see how well you do as a class of seven to ten year olds in Sunday school looking at pictures.
So if you know the answer, just Answer it out loud, okay? The first Large poster shows a young man standing beside a fresh grave. He has blood all over his clothing, he has a knife in his hands, he has a look of guilt. On his face, and he's looking up. As God is speaking to him.
What is that picture? Good for you, Cain and Abel. That's right, one for one. Second, There is an enormous series of black clouds above. It looks like you cannot see land anywhere in the distance.
The sea is rough and turbulent, and there is a lonely, lonely, barge-like ship sitting on this water as the rain is pouring down. And you look through the window of the barge, and you see a monkey sitting on a giraffe's head. No one knows. Noah and the Ark, very good. Here's a third.
A young man with torn clothes, dirty, and pretty well spent in life, though he isn't very old, has his father's arms around him, and the father is repeatedly kissing him, and the boy has this look of remorse all over his face. Right, that's the greatest story that will ever be told, in my opinion. The story of the prodigal son. I never will get over that story. Here's another.
It's a scene of royalty. There is a queen standing beside her regal husband, and they are both arm in arm looking out on seventy five foot high gallows, and silhouetted against the sky is one man hanging dead. It's the story of Esther, you realize how few churches would guess that correctly? That is a virtually unknown story in the lives and minds of many people.
Okay, I got another one. A mother is standing waist deep in muddy river water. She has her baby that she's putting in a little handmade. Wait, I have a great thing I want to tell you. You're so sharp, I can't even get my story told.
Right, it's Moses in the bull rushes as she pushes this infant out into the Nile, and he finally winds up in the arms of the daughter of Pharaoh. And it's a magnificent story out of the scriptures. Each still frame. captures our attention because each is a story. There's an old rabbinic saying.
That goes like this: God made people because He loves stories. If Aristotle was correct that the Soul of a story is the plot. Then you and I would have to agree that the heart of a story. is the moral. or the lesson Or plural, the lessons.
That it may teach. Each one of those stories, and there are dozens of them from the Bible. If analyzed carefully and read thoughtfully, Provide us with Numerous morals and principles and lessons to live by. The elements of a story that keep our attention are many. There is suspense, there is surprise, there is discovery, there is the unknown, there are those trackless paths that are taken by the characters in the story, and we wait.
even while reading to find out how it turns out. What keeps a story interesting and moving is the progress within it, called the rhythm of the story. And the rhythm revolves around three questions. How did it start? What happened next and next and next?
And of course the third. How did it turn out? Usually, there is one main climax to every great story. Though, like some novels, if the stories are long enough, there are a number of climaxes. And we build toward them, and they help us breathe easier when we have reached that mountain peak, only to move on to another.
That's what holds the attention of a child. It dawned on me several years ago that we are losing grip. On the great stories of the Bible. I don't know when it was that we were sitting in the auditorium at Mount Hermon Christian Conference Center up near Santa Cruz, but my whole family and I, a number of years ago, were listening to the John Fisher. Concert.
Many of you are lovers of his music and have been to his concerts, and our family has been to a number of them. We were sitting there all in a row, but we were Cynthia and I were about the oldest ones there. We're terribly young, but there was an entire auditorium full of people in their teen years. Maybe a few in their 20s, but mostly teenagers. And John would start a song and they'd sing right along.
And then he'd start another one of his songs and they'd sing right along with it. And they knew every pop tune, they knew every one of Fisher's songs, they knew every one of the praise choruses, and then he said, I'll never forget it.
Now let's do. My Jesus, I love thee. And he started to strum his guitar And he sang a solo. Except for the Swindolls who were sitting here singing along with him. And he said, wait, wait a minute.
You don't know that, do you? And almost to a person, they answered back. No. They wondered if that was a new one. They knew the pop songs, they knew today's tunes, they knew Fisher's works, which are wonderful pieces of music.
But they didn't know the great hymns. And while sitting there, it dawned on me that if we're losing touch with the great hymns, We are probably losing touch with the great stories. It was then that it was planted in my mind the seed thought that someday I wanted to do a series on great stories from the Old Testament. There are some in the new, of course, but most of the great stories of the Bible are tucked away in the Old Testament. And I find whether you're a child, seven to ten years old, or teenager, or an adult, there's something about the stories that still bring up fresh and encouraging thoughts to all of us.
And my Bible is open to one of the great stories, actually, a little slice out of a whole life. In 1 Samuel chapter 3, that uh I want you to turn to. Along with me. Every story has a setting, and frequently people know the story. but they don't know the setting.
And if you don't know the setting, it's like appreciating a naked diamond without a setting. It's a beautiful stone, but if it's placed in the right setting, it just comes alive. It just strikes you with its sparkle and beauty.
Now, these stories that have their settings, if you know the setting, you appreciate what the story is about. This story is set in the days of the Hebrew people. Following a time of warfare. It's sort of a lull. of peacetime.
Well, when my grandfather and I used to fish down in the Gulf, Off of Palachias down in South Texas area, we would every once in a while find ourselves in the middle of what he called a slick. If you fish, you know what that's like. There isn't a ripple. On the water. You could flip a penny out into the water and you could count the ripples that follow.
The water is like a placid lake. early in the morning. Great water skiing water. Just not a ripple on it. We have come to a time in Hebrew history that's like a slick.
politically. Things are a little boring. The judges have come and gone. There is one more judge that's left, and that's Samuel. The people have settled down to a lifestyle that is a bit indifferent.
A little ho-hum. The high priest is a man named Eli. Who is so old, verse 2 tells us his eyesight had begun to grow dim. He and his two wayward sons, Hofne and Finihas. Minister in the tabernacle.
which is the place of worship at this time of 1 Samuel 3. Oh, and I should mention that a woman has come on the scene and is now off the scene by chapter 3. Her name is Hannah. Hannah and Elkanah, her husband, prayed for a child. And they asked of God.
that he would give them A son. Shamuel is the word asked of God. She named her boy Samuel. And she promised God if he would give them a son, When the boy was weaned, she would take him to the place of worship. And she would literally deposit him there under the tutelage and care of Eli.
the aging, almost blind high priest. And there he would live the rest of his days. That's where we find the setting of the story in chapter 3.
Now, for the story itself. The boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord before Eli. And word from the Lord was rare in those days, visions. were infrequent. See, it is such a political and spiritual slick.
It's like the whole country is half asleep. And yawning its way from day to day. God is silent, it's as though the heavens are brass. There aren't visions that are coming. Samuel has never heard God's voice.
And he's serving the Lord as a young lad under the watchful eye of Eli, a sort of preoccupied, doting grandfather type. who takes this young lad under his wings. To teach him the things of the tabernacle. Verse 3, and the lamp of God had not yet gone out. And Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God.
was Interestingly, the whole story of 1 Samuel 3 takes place in a bedchamber. a little closet part of the tabernacle where the priests or the priests' family would live. And Samuel is resting in one of those areas. Verse 2 tells us that Eli was also lying down. In his place, so apparently they're in separate chambers, but nearby.
close enough for a voice to be heard, And while Samuel is resting or perhaps sleeping. Suddenly He hears a voice. The Lord called Samuel. And he said. Here I am.
Then he ran to Eli. And said, Here I am. For you called me. But he said, I did not call. Lie down again.
So he went and lay down. That tells us that God's voice, when it breaks the silence, is like the voice of a man. Yeah. Frequently, when we hear dramas presented or when a preacher gets carried away and refers to the voice of God, there is this great and mighty sound that is used. But I don't believe when God spoke, he spoke that way.
Or Samuel would not have thought that it was Eli. Who called him? I think God manifested himself in the voice of. of a normal sounding adult Jewish male, in this case the voice of Eli.
Sounded just like it. I can still recall the voice of my aging father in the middle of the night. back in the late seventies when he lived in our home. He was occasionally in need of help. And though our bedroom is upstairs, and his bedroom was downstairs with his own bath.
I remember hearing in the middle of the night the sound of his voice. And my wife is well, and we on occasion would take turns to get up. and to go and be with him for some particular need he had.
So it makes a lot of sense when I see Samuel getting up and going into Eli's room and saying, Here I am. And Eli understanding that perhaps Samuel was dreaming. or just thought he heard something that he didn't. are really here.
So he says to his friend, his young colleague in ministry, I did not call, lie down again.
So he went and lay down. And the Lord called yet again Samuel.
So Samuel arose and went to Eli. and said Here I am, for you called me. But he answered, I did not call my son. Lie down again.
Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord. That means he hadn't been connected with any sense of the Lord's manifestation. He was not in touch with. There hadn't been made a connection, a bonding between the two of them. nor had the word of the Lord yet been revealed to him.
They weren't, I guess we could say, they weren't on speaking terms. What Samuel knew of the Lord, he knew through Eli. But there hadn't been a direct connection. which was not infrequent in the days before Scripture was complete. It was not uncommon for the Lord to break the silence.
in a wilderness and to speak audibly. or for him to give a vision to a prophet. Or to give a direction from some supernatural source. That's the way it was in those days, but it had never happened to Samuel.
So he was inexperienced in these things. The only thing he needed to do was to go to Eli and Verse 8 tells us it happened a third time.
So the Lord called Samuel again for the third time, and he arose and went to Eli. And he said, Here I am. For you called me. Then Eli discerned that the Lord, was calling the boy. I'm intrigued by that.
I'm intrigued by the word discerned. There is not a course you can take in school that will give you that discernment. It comes only by experience. It comes only through the passing of time. Where you and the Lord are on an intimate relationship kind of basis.
And you discern the Lord is in this. or the Lord is not in this. Or maybe you get enough of your ducks in a row to put it together and say, That Fits. I can see God's hand in that. Or in this case, these repetitious events were Too much for Eli to think of them as mere coincidences.
And he dipped back into the well and the reservoir of his experience. He thought, that's got to be the Lord. That's got to be Jehovah. And so at this moment, He counsels Samuel to be very sensitive. Eli said to Samuel, Go lie down.
And it shall be If he called you, Then you shall say, Speak, Lord. For thy servant is listening.
So Samuel Went and lay down in his place, and I'll assure you, he did not go to sleep. Can you imagine? Working as a young person under someone who has years. In the things of God, and that person you so greatly respect says that's God's voice. If you hear it again, you listen.
You listen. Stay sensitive to what God is going to say.
Now, you know, in my days in Sunday school, that's where the story ended. And I was never told. What God said. Oh. It is one of the severest warnings God ever gave a man of God.
And one of the only times, and maybe the only time, he ever gave the warning through the ears of a child. Maybe because it was so severe, my Sunday school teachers never felt like a child ought to hear. what God had said. God is warning Samuel. about his mentor.
Eli. In each of the other times, we read simply the Lord called. But now we read verse 10. The Lord came. And stood.
And called as at other times. Samuel, Samuel. Samuel did as he was told. Speak. for thy servant is listening.
Mm. This is one of those intimate moments. It's the first time in his young life, and it isn't the last, but it's the first time he has connected with the living God. The two of them all alone. And In that hushed moment of silence in his bedchamber.
He hears these awful Words of warning. The Lord said to Samuel, Behold, I'm about to do a thing in Israel at which both ears of everyone who hears. will tingle. The warning of God is stated in verses twelve through. Fourteen.
And let me say it's not the first time God has revealed it. You may be shocked to know that God has already pulled Eli aside and told him about his boys. In fact, I want to go back and show you that before I read what we read here. Look at chapter 2, verse 27. A man of God came to Eli and said to him, Thus says the LORD.
Did I not indeed reveal myself to the house of your Father? when they were in Egypt in bondage to Pharaoh's house? And Did I not choose? Them from all the tribes of Israel to be my priests. to go up to my altar.
to burn incense, to carry an ephod before me. And did I not give to the house of your father all the fire offerings of the sons of Israel? Why? Do you kick at my sacrifice? and my offering.
which I have commanded in my dwelling. and honour your sons. above me. By making yourselves fat, With the choicest of every offering of my people Israel. Therefore the Lord God of Israel declares, I did indeed say that to your house, and the house of your father should walk before me forever.
But now the Lord declares, Far be it from me. For those who honor me, I will honor, and those who despise me. will be lightly esteemed. The days are coming when I will break your strength. and the strength of your father's house, So that there will not be an old man in your house.
And you will see the distress of my dwelling. In spite of all that I do good for Israel, and an old man will not be in your house forever. And he describes a scene of disintegration of Eli's family.
Now, if you don't know the story, the background, you're scratching your head thinking, well, what's that all about? What were his sons like?
Well Verse 12, chapter 2. Go back earlier. You maybe can't believe this. Eli's a great preacher. He's a fine priest.
He's the high priest. He goes in once a year in the holiest place of all. No one else in the land had that privilege. He's busy about the work of judging. He's working with the people in spiritual things, giving counsel.
Spending his time in the tabernacle of God and with the people and their needs. But how about his boys? Verse 12, the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord. That's a strong.
Strong word. They were reprobates. May I say it? They were losers. Spiritual losers.
But they had been anointed priests. And the custom of the priests with the people, when any man was offering a sacrifice, the priest's servant would come while the meat was boiling with a three-pronged fork in his hand. Then he would thrust it into the pan or kettle or cauldron or pot. All that the fork brought up, the priest would take for himself. Thus they did in Shiloh to all the Israelites who came there.
Also, before they burned the fat, the priest's servant would come and say to the man who was sacrificing, Give the priest meat for roasting. As he will not take boiled meat from you, only raw. And if the man said to him, They must surely burn the fat first, and then take as much as you desire, then he would say, No. but you shall give it to me now, and if not, I will take it by force. Thus, the sin of the young men was very great before the Lord, for the men despised the offering of the Lord.
Rather than taking what the Lord provided, they wanted the choicest pieces of meat, and they demanded that. Uh The elements of this Old Testament story are unfolding, and there's much more to discover as the drama will culminate in an epic confrontation. You are listening to the Bible teaching of Chuck Swindahl. This is Insight for Living with the sixth message in a biographical series. Chuck titled today's study, Samuel, the Boy Who Heard God's Voice.
In this 14-part series, Juxmundahl describes the Bible's often overlooked characters. Their complex stories, both inspiring and cautionary, have an enormous impact even to this day. they remind us that God values humble obedience over public recognition. Who would imagine that Samuel would hear God's voice in the night and be the one who would challenge Eli the priest? To fully engage with this series of biographical sketches, Insight for Living has a great resource that lets you linger over each Bible character at your own pace.
It's a spiral-bound workbook that uses a process that engages you. and leaves room for making your own observations and recording your reflections. Look for the Searching the Scriptures study titled Fascinating Stories of Forgotten Lives at insight.org/slash offer. We're also excited to introduce something brand new. It's called Guided by Grace, a beautifully designed magazine created just for you.
Each colorful issue celebrates characteristics that define authentic Christian living: joy, leadership, generosity, and authenticity. You'll find inspiring messages from Chuck, stories of God's transforming work around the world from Inside for Living pastors, plus devotionals to deepen your walk with the Lord. It's all designed to encourage you right where you are in your spiritual journey. Best of all, it's completely free. No cost, no obligation.
To subscribe to the quarterly newsletter from Insight for Living called Guided by Grace, call us at 800-772-8888 or visit insight.org slash guided by grace to request your free one-year subscription. Let Guided by Grace become a trusted companion in your walk with God when you visit insight.org/slash guided by grace. I'm Bill Meyer, urging you to join us when Chuck Swindahl continues a cautionary message to parents and grandparents Tuesday on Insight for Living. The preceding message, Samuel, the boy who heard God's voice, was copyrighted in 1990, 1992, 2001, 2006, 2012, and 2024. And the sound recording was copyrighted in 2024 by Charles R.
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