Topic: How can I be faithful in a world of distractions?
Personal Piece: Man, does it feel good to just sit for a couple hours. I feel like I've been going non-stop for the last week...which I have been. Early mornings and long days have made for a busy week but though I've been exhausted it has been a good kind of exhausted. Last week I did something that God has been asking me to do for over a year. When the Chick-fil-A I work at first opened a little over a year ago the stress was so high that friends who had worked together for 2 or 3 years began to turn against each other. God told me to pray for Chick-fil-A and asked me to do a Jericho March around the restaurant. I never did. Not until last week. Though I could not see with physical eyes I could feel the walls of division start to crumble. While there are still communication issues and gossip, I can feel the difference in the atmosphere. God is moving, removing the strongholds and replacing them with joy.
Thought of the Week: Over the last few moths, I have talked a couple of times about Moses and a little bit about his successor Joshua. These were two incredible men of God and during their lifetimes the nation of Israel was a holy and powerful nation. They weren't warriors by any means but they had Yahweh at their side and that made all the difference. Other nations trembled and panicked when they heard they were coming, not because they had a huge army or fancy weapons but because other nations knew that the Israelite God was far superior to their gods. Despite their faults (of which there were many) Israel made a name for itself simply by living their lives in faithful devotion to their Creator God. Then Joshua died and everything changed.
When Joshua died, there was nobody to take his place. In all of Israel there was no one who had truly encountered God and desired the level of holiness that he demanded. They followed his rules but didn't allow their hearts to be changed and that was when the enemy was able to strike. Over and over and over again the the people were distracted by the sin of the other nations, pulled into the darkness, enslaved and mistreated by the enemy and then pulled out by their faithful God whose heart they had broken. Even the priests became corrupt and did not respect God's demand for holiness. Yahweh became so angry that he began to look for someone else to lead the people. Someone in tune with his heart, who would be receptive to his leading and would have the strength to lead the people in the direction they needed to go. But he looked and found no on. At least no one who was born yet.
Then a woman came to the Tabernacle who had reached the end of her rope and Yahweh smiled. She wanted nothing more than the honor of having a child. A simple task for the God of all things. She had asked so many times before but he refused time and time again because he needed her to be different, he needed her to know him in a way that none of the others, not even Eli the high priest knew him. He needed her to be desperate so that he could step in and fill her empty places. She came and knelt before him with open hands, weak knees, and a voice that wouldn't even work and he granted her request. The son that was born, Samuel, was dedicated to the Lord and raised in the Tabernacle. 1 Samuel 3:1 tells us that the people no longer heard from the Lord and the visions and prophecies that had led Moses and Joshua were rare occurrences. But God had been preparing Samuel from conception to be his mouthpiece.
Samuel would sleep "where the ark of God was" (1 Samuel 3:2). There are many commentaries about whether or not Samuel was actually within the Holy of Holies or somewhere just outside of it. The Holy of Holies was the center of the Tabernacle and was considered to be so filled with God's holiness that any who entered there could potentially be struck dead if they did not go through the proper procedures. Whether Samuel was in the Holy of Holies itself or right outside we know that Samuel was in the place that was as close to God as he could possibly get. Like Joshua before him he was taking every opportunity to be in the presence of God. He didn't allow anything to get in the way of knowing Yahweh. That's when Yahweh spoke. That's when a boy no older than 13 was called to be the mouthpiece for an entire nation.
Unfortunately, Israel had had enough of listening to Yahweh. They were corrupt and did whatever they pleased. They followed whatever whims made sense to them at the time, even going so far as to remove the Ark from the Holy of Holies and bring it to war with them...without the permission of Yahweh. A little spoiler for you, God does not like when people mess with his house. The Israelites lost the war, Eli and his two sons died, the ark was stolen and the presence of Yahweh was lifted from Israel. God still put the attacking Philistines in their place. He made them seriously sick and defamed that temple and humiliated their god not once, but twice. Finally, the Philistines brough the Ark back to Israel
All of this sets the stage for what I have come to call The Second Defining Betrayal of History (the first being eating the forbidden fruit). Since the very beginning, Israel had been a kingdom of priests. While other nations were defined by their armies and politicians, Israel had always been defined by its priesthood. The priests and prophets brought purity and guidance to the people, they listened to the whisper of the Holy Spirit from the Holy of Holies and brought the word of Yahweh to the people. He spoke to them clearly and told them his desires. But the people looked to the other nations and saw what seemed to be "greener grass". Samuel had led them throughout his life but he was getting old and sons did not follow his ways. The people were afraid that they would be leaderless again and instead of trusting that Yahweh would raise up a mouthpiece as he had always done, they demanded a king. The other nations had human kings to lead them, why couldn't they? In this moment, the people demanded something that would bring an even greater separation from God then they already had.
After this moment, there is a shift in the people Yahweh speaks through. The king was not the mouthpiece of God like Moses, Joshua or even the Judges had been. He was a human ruler who would follow his own whims. He was someone who could be bribed and manipulated. He was a man who could take what and who he wanted and could use his position for selfish means. If he was wise he would listen to the prophets and priests that Yahweh chose to speak through and lead Israel in faithful submission to God. The foolish kings would reject the prophet that God had chosen and go his own way, leading the people of Israel in idolatry and faithless rebellion. Before the second betrayal there was no separation between leaders and prophets. The prophets were the leaders and the leaders heard God's voice. After the second betrayal you were either a king or a prophet but rarely both. With only two exceptions...
To Be Continued...
Digging Deeper: The story of Samuel can be found throughout 1 and 2 Samuel, this week's story was taken from 1 Samuel 1-8. For more on the kings of Israel check out 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. The story of the Philistines taking the Ark of the Covenant can be found 1 Samuel 4-6. Israel's request for a king can be found in 1 Samuel chapter 8.
For more on Samuel in the Holy of Holies click here. This article may be a bit difficult to understand for the non-academic but it draws some intriguing parallels between Joshua and Samuel toward the end.
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