Samuel
We apologize for two brief breaks in the video. 13:13 to 14:24, and 17:41 to 17:52.
Texts: I Samuel 7:15-8:5; Ephesians 6:1-4
Pastor Phil Hughes, American Fork Presbyterian Church, Utah
March 3, 2024 Third Sunday in Lent
When it comes to great and godly people in the Bible, Samuel ranks right up there. Samuel was a priest, a prophet, and a judge in Israel. As a priest he led a life of worship and prayer and led people to God. As a prophet he spoke for God and interpreted the times for the people. As a judge he made governmental and political decisions for the tribes of Israel. For the earlier part of ancient Israel’s history the were governed by judges. Judges made decisions, heard situations, and figured out how things should be worked out.
Samuel’s mother was Hannah. She had prayed and prayed and prayed for God to give her a son. When Samuel was born Hannah gave him right back to the Lord. She left him with the priest Eli to be raised to be a priest in the Lord’s service. We are told that Samuel “grew up in the presence of the Lord.”[1]
Samuel gets great press in the Bible. We also read that “….the boy Samuel continued to grow in stature and in favor with the Lord and with people.” Samuel grew up in a day when there were not many visions from the Lord. But it was different when Samuel came. Samuel received clear words from the Lord.
It says, “The Lord was with Samuel as he grew up, and he let none of his words fall to the ground.” What he said carried weight and rang true.
We read that all of Israel recognized that Samuel was attested as a prophet of the Lord. The Lord continued to reveal himself to Samuel, and Samuel’s word came to all of Israel.[2]
Here is an incident that really lifted Samuel to almost legendary status. When the ark of the covenant – the holiest, most important relic in Israel’s possession - was taken away from Israel by the Philistines it remained away from the people of the Lord for 20 years. Samuel summoned all Israel at a place called Mizpah. When the Philistines, old and long enemies of Israel, heard it they came to attack Israel.
The Israelites were afraid because they had been under the Philistine’s thumb for many years. They told Samuel “don’t stop praying to the Lord for us so that we might be rescued.” Whose prayers would you count on more than anyone else’s if you were in trouble? Samuel was the one an entire nation counted on. He had a reputation as a man of prayer and when he prayed the Lord heard.[3] As Samuel was praying and worshipping the Philistines attacked Israel, but, it says, “the Lord thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites.”[4] After that, Israel had great peace with its neighbors.
Samuel’s praying saved Israel. Peace and blessing came to Israel throughout Samuel’s life and reign as judge.
The Lord pays a kind of backwards compliment to the memory of Samuel when he tells the prophet Jeremiah that Israel has gone so astray that, “Even if Moses and Samuel were to stand before me, my heart would not go out to this people.”[5]
Samuel is listed in Hebrews 11 as a giant of faith.[6] He was legendary. But he was not perfect. He could hear the voice of the Lord. He could speak the word of the Lord. He had a prayer life we only dream about. He had the respect and awe of the people. But he when it came to his home, particularly his sons, it was another story.
When Samuel grew old and the traveling got to him he made his two sons judges for Israel. They were named Joel and Abijah. It says that they did not walk in the ways of their father. They got things dishonestly. They accepted bribes and perverted justice. They were everything their father wasn’t. They were so bad that the elders came to Samuel and said it was time for the whole system to be changed. Samuel’s sons had messed up an entire governmental system. The people requested that Samuel end the system of judges and find a king for the nation. And that leads to a whole other thing which we won’t get into this morning.
Samuel had rebellious, dishonest, problem-causing sons. How did this happen? Samuel was a strong man of God. We don’t know anything about their family life. Samuel’s wife is never mentioned. We have this godly leader who is an imperfect parent. This is not to lay the blame on him. We don’t know why Samuel’s sons were the way they were.
Parenting is complex. It is a challenging, inexact art. Anyone who has been a parent knows you are never totally prepared to be a parent no matter how much advice or reading you do. You know how it is, a parent or parents can be the best parents in the world. They can be faithful Christians, full of love, raise their children with excellent standards, and their children, or maybe one of a bunch, just turns out really badly. And then you can have a parent or parents who are absolutely the worst. There can be dysfunction to the max. The home can be filled with abuse, alcohol, neglect - and the children turn out like jewels.
Some of us still have children at home and are very actively raising our kids. For some of us, our kids are grown and gone, though we are still parenting, albeit in a different way. Some of us are now grandparenting.
My parents were and are the greatest parents in the world. They are faithful Christian people who are responsible and good. They raised me and my two sisters in the same home with the same standards of integrity, all in the same way. But each of our lives have been different journeys. I have a sister who struggled mightily for many, many years. Her life was in the pit. Praise God she has been clean and sober for many years now.
Even for those of us who had sterling parents, and those of us who believe we were and are good parents, we know there are really no perfect parents. I know there are things I wish I hadn’t done or had done better when our three daughters were in our household.
We feel so strongly about our sons and daughters, don’t we? We absolutely explode with pride in their victories. We are devastated by their defeats. Nothing affects us more than what happens in the lives of our children. How much of our anxiety, our work, our stress, the pace and dynamics of our lives is/was over our children?
When our children go down a wrong path we take it to heart. We wonder if we did something wrong even if we don’t admit it. The best of parents can carry tremendous guilt. We always wonder, “Am I doing this right. Are they going to be OK?”
We need to remember than when they are older they make their own choices. We also need to be honest and look closely at ourselves. Where do we need to change? Be more firm? Be more gracious? We grow as parents. I am still growing as a parent with three adult daughters.
I know some of us raised our children in the Christian faith and they have distanced themselves from that. We wonder why and it grieves us. God is still working in all of us. Keep praying. Keep loving. And don’t be a stumbling block. Be an example of Christ.
Whether our children or young, or they are grown and gone and our influence is less, God can make us the parents he wants us to be. Samuel’s children went astray. Did Samuel ask himself, “where did I go wrong?” I’m sure he did. Maybe it wasn’t Samuel at all. Stellar parents can have kids that choose a different way.
The parent/child relationship gets prominent attention in the Bible. Paul writes in Ephesians that children are to obey their parents in the Lord, for this is right. And he quotes the fifth commandment – “Honor your father and mother” – noting that this is the first of the ten commandments that has a promise attached to it. If you honor your mother and father it will go well with you and you will enjoy long life.[7]
The Hebrew biblical word for “honor” is closely related to the word for “weight” or something that is heavy. To honor means to treat with weight or to see someone as being of great worth. It means to respect and prize highly. The word “honor” is frequently used in the Bible to describe what our response should be to God, particularly in worship. We are all to honor our parents all our lives even into their later years.[8] Children’s obedience to parents is close to the heart of God.
In Romans 1 disobedience to parents is listed as a sign of the decay of a society. In a list that includes slander, arrogance, and inventing ways of doing evil, Paul adds that these people disobey their parents. In II Timothy we read that in the last days there will be terrible times. “People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents…”[9]
To honor mother and father is nothing less than a commandment of the Lord. Some of us may be thinking, “What about the abusive or ungodly parent?” I think a son or daughter who is asked or led to do things against the ways of God are justified in not obeying the parent. But outside of those exceptional circumstances, children are to honor their parents.
But parents have a calling to their children. Paul writes in Ephesians 6, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” Paul was writing in the ancient Roman world. Fathers had absolute power in a family. A father could sell his child, make the child work in chains, or punish as he liked. He had power over a child for his whole life.
The word for “exasperate” means “don’t provoke to anger” or “don’t drive to resentment”. Paul is warning fathers to not use their absolute power to hurt a child. Instead – and I think in our day this applies to mothers as well – parents are to bring up their children in training and instruction of the Lord. Are some people the way they are because parents drove them to resentment?
The word for “bring up” is translated “feed” in the chapter before (5:29) in reference to how a man doesn’t hurt his body but feeds and cares for it just as Christ does for the church. The word can also be translated as “nourish” or “nurture”. It is more than just physically bringing a life into the world, making sure they have food and clothes, and getting them to school. To bring up children is about feeding, nourishing and nurturing children in every part of their lives.
To train a child in the instruction of the Lord is to teach our children, and maybe our grandchildren as far as our children allow us, that all of life relates to God. We parents need to be trained and instructed in the Lord first. We can’t do it for them if we haven’t and aren’t doing it for ourselves.
Churches have a place in this. If a church wants or has children or teens it needs to nurture them. You may be long past your parenting years, but if there are children in your church you have an obligation toward them.
And a church can be super supportive of parents, maybe even have a wonderful Sunday School and youth program, but parents cannot rely on that. The first line of offense in any child’s faith is the parents. We need to be praying for and with them. We are the ones who need to be in the stories and books of the Bible with them. We are the ones who need to search answers to questions with them. We are the ones who need to involve them in serving and worship and being disciples. Just bringing our kids to church once a week is not enough. Never was.
We make sure our children have the best doctors, we try to put them in the best schools and make sure they can play piano and soccer. We also have to take responsibility for their spiritual life.
Several years ago I read a book called Thoughtful Parenting. It was by Paul Stevens, a theology teacher in Vancouver, Canada. I am going to close with six principles of parenting that he shares.
1. Parenting Is a Vocation. It is given to us by God. It comes before our work outside the home. It’s easy to think what we do outside the home is the most important and our children can’t stand in the way of that. It is the other way around.
2. Parenting is Stewardship. Children are gifts from God and they are to be cared for. We have to give up ownership of our child to God. God gives us children to care for them and make them the people he wants them to be in all the joy and all the struggle. Sometimes when I have counseled with parents whose children are going through a difficult time, or maybe have special health difficulties or learning difficulties. I remind that God, in his sovereignty, trusts you enough to give that particular life to you. He didn’t do it with someone else.
3. Parenting is a Ministry. As we go through the everyday issues of family life we are given the opportunity to minister unconditional acceptance and self-worth,
…grace
…service
…washing one another’s feet in any number of ways.
We have the chance care for one another. That’s what ministry is.
4. Parenting is Priesthood. Our New Testament tells us that all believers are priests to God and to one another. Priests serve God and serve others. Every member of a family has the potential to help one another in our relationships with God. Perhaps nowhere are we more a priest than when we pray for our children, and when we encourage and teach them to pray for us and others in the family.
5. Parenting is Discipling. What Jesus did with his disciples is a helpful model for parenting. Jesus didn’t teach in a classroom but in life-on-life relationships and through experiences. Learning takes place all the time and doesn’t follow a set schedule. Learning takes place not so much through passing on information but mainly through imitation. Nancy and I tried to give our daughter’s a heart for God and nurture relationship with him. They are all in different places when it comes to faith. But this is what we tried to do as best as we could.
6. Parenting is a Covenant. A covenant is a binding personal agreement to belong. It involves relationship, love and loyalty. Covenant isn’t just about me, but about we. As much as my daughters may have wanted to trade me in at times, we were and still are in a covenant. And in covenants people change and you have to learn to navigate those changes. And it is often in the roughest times that we can teach our children about loyalty and commitment.
Parenting is a gift. It is a challenge. It is a blessing. It is a calling. Even the best of parents make mistakes along the way because all fall short of the glory of God and we all live by his grace. No one was more spiritually effective than Samuel but he couldn’t get a handle on his sons.
We aren’t disqualified because of our imperfection because with God there are no perfect people allowed. He can work through us even with our imperfections.
In some way or another we are all parents – literal, adoptive, surrogate. Let’s do it with God’s grace.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, we pray for every parent in this church. We pray for your love, grace, and peace to bless our homes. We pray for grandparents and great-grandparents. Help us to see the role you give us in the lives of our children. May we honor our parents and honor our children. And be our help when that becomes a challenge.
Thank you for your faithfulness and love for us. Amen.
[1] 1 Samuel 2:21, 26; 1 Samuel 3:1, 19;
[2] 3:21-4:1
[3] See Psalm 99:6
[4] I Sam. 7:10
[5] Jeremiah 15:1
[6] Hebrews 11:32-34. See also Sirach 46:13ff. Sirach is a book in the Apocrypha.
[7] Deuteronomy 5:16
[8] Patrick Miller, Interpretation commentary on Deuteronomy, pp.84-85
[9] 2 Timothy 3:2