Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Okay, let's jump into it. We're continuing our series today in the book of First Samuel. We've been calling this first series In Samuel Faithful. As we talk about what it looks like to be people who seek to keep faith at the core of our person, we want to live our life as faithful people. And research shows, by the way, that the vast majority of Americans actually do want to be faithful in their life. We want faith built into the core of our hearts, the core of our person. But for those of us who claim Christ, like, there's even more than that, right? Like, we want the pursuit of Jesus to be central to our life of faith.
[00:00:46] It's one of those things where in a context like church that's easy to agree on, right? Like, yes, we want Jesus at our core. And yet the reality of this life, that living in this world makes that really difficult.
[00:01:02] You know, we get busy, we get stressed, we get tired, and it seems like so often it's our faith that ends up on the back seat when life gets difficult.
[00:01:15] I think one of the reasons for that is simply because when we're in the throes of our busy and painful lives, it oftentimes just feels like we lose God's voice, right? Like often it can feel like God just doesn't speak to us in the midst of our actual day to day life and the actual hour by hour struggles we face.
[00:01:41] Our text today is going to speak directly into that misconception. And hear me church, that is a misconception. We're going to be in 1st Samuel chapter 3 today. You are going to have to go ahead and find a Bible and turn there because I'm going to. I don't have slides and there's no pew Bibles for you to pick up. So. First Samuel, chapter three. If you want to open up your phone or find your Bible somewhere in the living room, we're going to be there today. And my main point today is going to be simple and it's going to be directly connected to a text that's going to be familiar. For a lot of us, it's just this, guys.
[00:02:14] God speaks to those who are listening.
[00:02:19] As simple as that. God. God speaks.
[00:02:23] We worship a God, Yahweh of scripture, who makes himself known. He speaks. But if you want to live a life with faith at your core, learning to listen to and obey the voice of God, one of the most important steps you can take is learning how to actually listen to him.
[00:02:45] How do you actually hear him? And I think the problem for most of Us is twofold. Like, how do we learn to listen? Yes, how do you quiet your life? How do you quiet your head enough to actually hear from God in the midst of all the busyness and stresses of life? But beyond that, how do you discern his voice amidst the cacophony of competing ideas we experience in this world?
[00:03:12] Take a minute and pray with me, and let's look at this narrative in the life of Samuel. And I really think God is going to meet us in this and show us a path forward for us to hear his voice. Pray with me, Church Jesus, we need you on this snowy Sunday morning to be our discipler.
[00:03:30] Meet us in our living rooms for some of us as kids, run around and make noise for some of us as we're worried and stressed, thinking about the week to come or how this weather is affecting our work or even our house, for those of us who really would rather right now just be cozied up reading a book or watching tv.
[00:03:49] Holy Spirit, we need you to speak to us today.
[00:03:52] We need you to be our discipler. We need you to be our teacher and God. We trust that you delight to do this work, that you are a God who meets us and speaks to us. And so we pray this expectantly and trustingly in your name, Jesus.
[00:04:07] Amen. Okay, First Samuel, chapter three. I'm going to start in verse one and we'll go from there.
[00:04:13] The boy Samuel served the Lord in Eli's presence. Now, in those days, the word of the Lord was rare and prophetic visions were not widespread.
[00:04:25] As we step back into this narrative, let me remind us kind of what's going on here. Samuel is this son of promise who has come into the service of the tabernacle alongside the Levites because of the the faithfulness and vow of his mother Hannah. Samuel was not born in the Levite service like in the priestly line, but he has had his entire life dedicated to the service of the Lord. From infancy, he has lived at the tabernacle that is kind of the functional temple for the early Israelites in Shiloh. And he's sort of this adopted priestly Levite. He's been raised by the high priest Eli, and even in childhood he's totally given over to ministry at the temple. We're told this in the previous text, but Eli is actually a pretty terrible priest. His sons Hophni and Phinehas, who will take his role by heredity when he dies, are actively desecrating the sacrificial worship, and they're abusing their spiritual authority. For sexual sin. And Eli knows all of this. He even kind of half heartedly confronts them at one point. But it's so bad, his. His leadership is so poor that he isn't willing to intervene and actually stop their sin. He doesn't remove them from leadership. He doesn't put them under any real accountability. And because of this, God has sent word through this unnamed prophet in the previous text that he will curse Eli's whole family.
[00:06:04] Like, pretty wild, right? He's gonna put both of his sons to death and he's gonna hand the priestly ministry off to a different line who God says is more worthy and will minister more faithfully. Now, what's interesting is that anyone reading the text up to this point would assume that this means Samuel, right? Like he's sort of this adopted priestly Levite who is the very obviously faithful. The author's continually contrasting Eli and his family with Samuel and his faithfulness. But our text today is going to show that God actually has something else in mind. The text says in those days the word of the Lord was rare and prophetic visions were not widespread because this is a time of spiritual drought.
[00:06:53] Even the prophet we saw in the last six, he. He was unnamed and unknown.
[00:06:59] And it's obvious here that the author wants us to see this as connected to Eli's failed leadership in ministry. Because Eli's sons have treated the offering with contempt, God has withdrawn his prophetic voice, and because of that, all of Israel suffers.
[00:07:18] And that's just how sin works, isn't it? I mean, I know, like, we're just at the very beginning of the text, but. But can we just stop there for a second?
[00:07:27] Isn't that what sin does? Like, no matter what we tell ourselves, oh, this is just me, or this doesn't affect anyone else? Sin never hurts just one person.
[00:07:38] Never.
[00:07:39] It's never just us. It expounds out of us, into our family, into our relationships, and eventually into our whole community.
[00:07:48] But I also think even right here, this initial jump into our text, this points us to a larger facet of where this narrative is going. What we see here, even in just this immediate introduction, is that God has withheld his voice from his people.
[00:08:06] It reminds us of the truth that our God Yahweh, is the creator of the universe. He is the ultimately unknowable God to us mere humans. To think of something on the scale of God who creates and sustains the universe, it just doesn't work.
[00:08:25] If he doesn't speak to us, he remains a mystery. This is what theologians call revelation, that God must be revealed to be known. And specifically they talk about general versus special revelation. This is a really important idea. Paul affirms this whole idea of the necessity of revelation, that we won't know God if he doesn't know reveal himself. In Romans 1 he says on some level God is knowable simply because you live in his universe. Right? Like the existence of a painting kind of implies the existence of a painter. Living in this wonderful and beautiful universe points us to our Creator. And Paul says that anyone living in this universe can see God's power and God's divinity in the beauty of things like sunsets and snowstorms, right?
[00:09:18] This revelation is given freely, it's generally available. Hence that's where we get general revelation. But the problem is it only gets you so far.
[00:09:29] You can see that God exists through simply living in the world, but you can't know his heart for you, you can't know his plan for you. You can't know his person unless he speaks to you.
[00:09:44] Like the reality of creation can get you to theism, wow, there must be a God out there. This universe is so beautiful. How can it exist if someone didn't make it? But the reality that his name is Yahweh, that He came to earth and lived a life as Jesus, that he, that he loves you, that he wants relationship with you, that he has a perfectly formed eternity in mind for you, that he wants to forgive your sins and bring you redemption and restoration from this world.
[00:10:15] You don't get those beautiful and hear this necessary truths of the gospel unless they're told to you. They're not self evident, they must be revealed. God has to tell us what he's like. That's what special revelation is.
[00:10:36] And what we hear is that he has stopped doing this at Shiloh.
[00:10:42] Or has he?
[00:10:44] Right? Like that's kind of the push here. God's word has become so rare at God's very temple. But it should cause us as the reader to stop and step back and question, why has God stopped speaking? Or maybe like, like just maybe, right? Maybe God's priests who are supposed to mediate between God and Israel have stopped listening.
[00:11:11] Right?
[00:11:12] And before we get any further in this text, I think it's a worthwhile question to stop and consider your own life.
[00:11:23] Are you regularly hearing God's heart for you?
[00:11:27] And if you're not, or maybe if you're not hearing God's heart for you as often as you would like, a really good question is, is God actually silent in your life? Or have you tuned him out.
[00:11:39] You know, often we perceive God's absence in our lives, but actually it's our own hearts turning away from him.
[00:11:50] If you want God's voice in your life, beloved, if you want to hear the Lord speak to you, no one else but you, you, beloved, no one else, you must seek his voice.
[00:12:06] You must set aside time and effort to listen.
[00:12:11] Read on with me and you'll see what I mean by this.
[00:12:16] One day, Eli, whose eyesight was failing, was lying in his usual place before the lamp of God had gone out. And Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was located. Then the Lord called Samuel, and he answered, here I am. And he ran to Eli and said, here I am. You called me. I didn't call. Eli replied, go back and lie down. So he went and lay down. But once again, the Lord called Samuel. Samuel got up, went to Eli and said, here I am. You called me. I didn't call you, my son. He replied, go back and lay down now. Samuel did not yet know the Lord because the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. But once again, for the third time, the Lord called Samuel. He got up, went to Eli and said, here I am. You called me. And then Eli understood the Lord was calling the boy. So he told Samuel, go lie down. If he calls you, say, speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.
[00:13:12] So Samuel and went and lay down in his place.
[00:13:15] And the Lord came there and stood there and called out as before, samuel, Samuel. And Samuel responded, speak, for your servant is listening.
[00:13:29] I love this story. If you are a church brat like me, this part of the narrative might seem really familiar. Like, this is one of those, like, standard Sunday school stories that we get at vbs or kids church classes. But even if this text is super familiar to you and you've heard it a bunch of times, there's still a lot going on here. And a lot of the history really needs a little bit of explanation for us to best engage this text. And so let's look how this scene is set up.
[00:13:58] Eli is into his old age and his eyesight is failing. This detail of his physical ailment is really given to us as kind of this stark reminder, almost this metaphor for the spiritual decay that is ailing this temple. Eli, who is going blind, has gone to bed for the night. Last week we talked a little bit about how at Shiloh, the mobile Tabernacle had become a little more permanent and settled and was really kind of functioning as this sort of proto temple. Even with stone walls and permanent structures. And one of the things archaeologists tend to agree upon about this is that there were permanent structures for the priests set up within the tabernacle grounds. And so when it says Eli laid down in his normal place, it's probably talking about a little house or a hut that's inside the outer courtyard walls, but not inside the holy place, kind of in that courtyard area. And so he's laying down sleeping. But Samuel, however, is not there.
[00:14:58] He's on some sort of specific serving duty and is sleeping in. In a nook within the main building. Not in the holy of holies, where the Ark itself is, but near enough to that part. The author wants us to know that he is sleeping near the presence of God on earth.
[00:15:16] And it makes this little comment about a lamp. And that's simply a way of telling us the time, right? Like, it was likely a few hours before dawn. But what I think is interesting to note about this, oh, the lamp of God had not yet gone out. You know, the author could have picked any normal way to tell us the time of day in the text, but I think he picked this specific idea, the burning down of the holy lamp within the temple, to specifically contrast again with Eli. Right? The light is failing in Eli's eyes and in his ministry. But before the light has fully failed in the temple, God is going to intervene. This reference, by the way, is to the fact that they would light the menorah within the holy of holies and let it kind of burn down on its own each night. And so God wakes Samuel up from his sleep and calls to him, Samuel.
[00:16:08] Samuel hears the voice and he knows he's being called. But in this, what I think is a really humorous exchange, he gets up, runs out of the temple, runs to Eli and wakes him up. What do you need? I heard you calling me. He assumes he, Eli has called him like so many annoyed parents. In the middle of the night, Eli tells Samuel to go back to bed. I didn't. I didn't call you. Go to sleep. Some of you, like, listening to this, are like, that was my experience last night. Yeah, me too. And this happens twice.
[00:16:43] God wakes Samuel up. Samuel thinks it's Eli. He runs out to him. Eli says, I didn't call you. Go back to bed.
[00:16:49] I find it so interesting here that Samuel doesn't recognize the voice of God.
[00:16:55] I think the author assumes you'll question that because he brings it up. But really, guys, this shouldn't surprise us, right? Like, God is mysterious, apart from his intervention of grace. Apart from his self revelation, he isn't knowable like we need him to reveal himself.
[00:17:15] Verse 7 speaks to this. Samuel doesn't recognize the voice because the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.
[00:17:22] It's interesting that Samuel has lived his entire life in the temple of God. But because of the terrible spiritual leadership of Eli and his family, living at the temple hasn't equipped Samuel to actually recognize the voice of God.
[00:17:38] It's a stark reminder, I think, for all of us that being near the things of God is not the same thing as knowing God, right? Like there's a step beyond simply knowing about or being in proximity to faith. We have to engage it ourselves.
[00:17:55] But on this third repetition, it clicks for Eli. And you got to give credit where it's due, right? Like for all his faults, Eli finally does like, read the situation correctly and give Samuel the right advice. Like myself, I'm not 100% sure if I'm still a Christian at 3aM especially after being woken up by the throne for the third time by my children, right? But. But Eli tells Samuel to prepare for the voice. If you hear it again, if you're awoken again, you should respond, Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. And beloved, this really is at the core of what this text is teaching us.
[00:18:33] Hearing God starts with our heart posture. Do you. Do you think of yourself as belonging to God? When you think of your relationship to him, do you think of yourself as his servant? Or maybe more like his customer?
[00:18:47] Right?
[00:18:48] I think this really gets at the heart of maybe why we want to hear from God. Why, beloved, do you want to hear the Lord's voice?
[00:18:57] Is it because you want to get something from Him?
[00:19:01] Are you his customer trying to get the best deal you can get out of this life? Is God your cosmic vending machine? Your cosmic, cosmic Santa Claus? Your magic therapist whose role in your life is to make you comfortable and emotionally stable and generally happy?
[00:19:18] Or do you belong to Him?
[00:19:20] Are you his servant?
[00:19:22] Do you want to hear his voice so that you can actually live a life of obedience that he has made you and designed you for?
[00:19:31] Because this is a difficult distinction on the surface, many of us come to God if we're honest, seeking his voice simply because we do. Just like we want his blessing, we want his gifts, we want him to guide us. We want to make our lives easier to navigate. We fear if we actually lived our life dedicated to serving God, he would be asking things of us that we're not too happy to give, right? We'd rather not comply with all his commands for holiness in obedience. But fortunately, beloved Eli was on the right of it. Here God isn't some cosmic grouchy boss who's asking you to come into work on the weekend. He's your creator. He's the lover of your soul.
[00:20:19] Yes, you ultimately are his servant.
[00:20:22] But hear this church. Your God delights in you, and he made you to live in submission to his will. For your life, like serving God, is the single most fulfilling way a human life can be lived out.
[00:20:38] To come to God as a humble servant, it isn't only the best way to hear his voice, it's the best way to live.
[00:20:46] That doesn't mean serving God will be easy. It doesn't mean serving God guarantees you a comfortable life like that would be prosperity gospel. And that's a terrible heresy. But hear this. It is the best life.
[00:21:01] It is the life you were made for. It's the most fulfilling life. Often it's difficult.
[00:21:07] It costs you a lot. Obedience and holiness are inherently difficult.
[00:21:14] They're just worth it.
[00:21:16] Read on with me. In verse 11, the Lord said to Samuel, I'm about to do something in Israel that will cause everyone who hears about it to shudder.
[00:21:26] On that day, I will carry out against Eli everything I said about his family from beginning to end. I told him that I am going to judge his family forever because of the iniquity he knows about. His sons are cursing God and he has not stopped them. Therefore, I have sworn to Eli's family. The iniquity of Eli's family will never be wiped out either by sacrifice or offering.
[00:21:48] Samuel lay down until the morning, and then he opened the doors of the Lord's house. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision, but Eli called him and said, samuel, my son, here I am, answered Samuel.
[00:22:00] What was the message he gave you? Eli asked. Don't hide it from me. May God punish you and do so severely to you if you hide anything from me that he told you so. Samuel told him everything and did not hide anything from him. And Eli responded, he is the Lord.
[00:22:18] Let him do what he thinks is good.
[00:22:22] Woof. Right?
[00:22:24] It's such a hard way for this text to move on.
[00:22:28] We have this beautiful moment of Samuel clearly hearing the voice of God and responding to him as this humble and open servant like, here I am, Lord, I'm whatever you want. And God's first message to Samuel is this really, really hard word.
[00:22:46] God gives Samuel this prophetic confirmation of the judgment against Eli. Now we have no idea if the previous prophecy was public. Knowledge or not, right? But regardless, can you imagine poor Samuel receiving this message from God? A child laying there in bed, wanting to be open to God's work.
[00:23:10] Hi, it's me, God. I'd like to speak to you. Cool. So go tell your adopted dad I'm going to absolutely wreck him and his family because of his faithlessness, right? Like, Samuel is afraid to tell Eli the vision, because of course he is.
[00:23:27] Who wouldn't be?
[00:23:29] So he lays in bed the rest of that short night, I'm sure wondering how the heck he's going to confront Eli and obey God.
[00:23:38] Because faithfulness is hard.
[00:23:41] It's difficult. Obeying God often requires difficult tasks like speaking the truth, speaking the truth to power, delivering hard news to people that we love who may or may not receive it.
[00:23:57] But look how Eli does receive it. Look how he responds. Well, God can do whatever he wants.
[00:24:03] I don't know about you, but for me, that's such a strange, like, almost resigned response, right?
[00:24:09] Is it because Samuel didn't know about his convo with the last prophet and he's embarrassed? Is it because he. He really is like, well, yeah, I deserve it. And he's just accepting it?
[00:24:19] We don't know.
[00:24:21] But what we do know is this.
[00:24:23] Eli hears this word now a second time.
[00:24:27] God has spoken to Eli through two prophets, and he does not respond in repentance.
[00:24:35] He still hasn't removed his sons from leadership. He doesn't come to God on his knees in repentance. And by the way, as we'll see as the text continues next week, he never does.
[00:24:48] He never holds his sons accountable to their grievous sin. He doesn't come to God on his knees in repentance, seeking forgiveness.
[00:24:59] Beloved, you have to know something. I know that when we read this text, this word from God, like, it's intense, it's harsh, and that's on purpose.
[00:25:08] But our God is a God of grace and patience.
[00:25:13] He delights to forgive sins. He delights to relent in his judgment. The scripture is chocked full of examples of God giving these stark pronouncements of judgment for sin, only to joyfully relent when people actually repent. Like, go read Jonah, right?
[00:25:36] The heart of God is a heart of compassion and love for terrible sinners like Eli and like you and me.
[00:25:43] But Eli doesn't repent.
[00:25:47] He resigns himself. Once again, we see his passivity as he sits and just goes, well, oh, well.
[00:25:56] Beloved, you have to understand something.
[00:26:00] To listen to the voice of God, to actually hear from him, inherently involves submission. And obedience.
[00:26:10] Jesus said that if we love him, we will obey his commands. And this isn't some weird manipulation where Jesus is saying, if you love me, you'll do what I say. Rather, Jesus is pointing out a fundamental aspect of of living in faithful relationship with the God of reality.
[00:26:28] Like Yahweh does love you, he does long to live in your life as your friend. But Jesus isn't your co worker or your drinking buddy. Jesus is God.
[00:26:39] He's perfection. He's wisdom. He's power. He's love. He's the creator and sustainer of all of right life and reality. To hear his voice is to hear truth.
[00:26:53] As Peter said to Jesus, you have the words of life.
[00:26:57] To love God, to really engage him as he is, to really know him requires obeying him. Because loving means growing in understanding of who he is and the power and the authority that his words carry.
[00:27:13] We cannot claim to love God or to know him if we filter out all the words that call out our sin.
[00:27:22] Our Eli, like passivity, our Phineas and Hophni, like secret or public sins.
[00:27:30] When we say that we're not hearing the voice of God, sometimes it's not that God isn't speaking, and it's not even that we don't hear, but rather simply that we don't like what we hear.
[00:27:43] God lovingly speaks truth into our areas of sin and selfishness, and we don't engage them.
[00:27:51] God might speak truth into your life. Maybe it's through a discipleship class or a Gospel community, or a Sunday sermon, or a conversation with a friend over coffee, or your personal Bible reading. And all of a sudden you're in this moment where God is speaking truth into your sexual ethics and how you're sinning sexually, or the substances you use for escape, or the ways you numb out your brain, or the ways you let anger conquer you in your marriage or your parenting or your work, or the ways that your friendships have become idolatrous or your spiritual disciplines don't exist, or your treatment of others is substandard. Right? Like whatever it is, God calls us out on something.
[00:28:37] And you don't actually want to submit to Him. You don't actually want to deal with what he's calling you out on. And so it's easier to just push away his words and then later complain that God isn't speaking to you.
[00:28:52] Beloved, this makes me sorrowful. But as a pastor, I've seen this time and time again when Christians will jump ship from a church or a small group or a discipleship relationship and they'll say something like, oh, I don't know, I just wasn't being fed, wasn't being challenged. And listen, like there are real times when there's just unhealth in a spiritual body or relationship and you do have to step away, right, to actually be immersed in the Gospel and immersed in the Word. But I have found that much more often when those words are used, what the person is really saying is that there's some area of repentance and holiness where they're being challenged to engage it and they just put their foot down and given God a hard no.
[00:29:40] They want God to move on to something else to give them cool hip new Bible knowledge and historical facts and context. They don't want to deal with their sinful hearts.
[00:29:50] There's a really good self diagnostic question inherent in that.
[00:29:55] And it's just simply this, why would you expect God to speak a new truth into your life if you're refusing to engage the truths he's already spoken?
[00:30:08] If you're ignoring what he's already said to you, why would you want him to speak something new?
[00:30:16] I think the reality is, beloved, your God really loves you. He really loves you. He sees you, he cares for you. He is speaking to you like this is the heart of the Gospel message. But the reality is your God loves you too much to not speak the truth to you.
[00:30:39] He loves you too much to let you go on in deception, sorrow.
[00:30:46] And so he speaks hard truths to us and sometimes he doesn't move on from them until we're willing to engage them.
[00:30:55] Read on with me and let's close out this passage and see if we can connect a couple dots. Verse 19.
[00:31:01] Samuel grew and the Lord was with him and he fulfilled everything Samuel prophesied. All Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was a confirmed confirmed prophet of the Lord. And the Lord continued to appear in Shiloh because there he revealed Himself to Samuel by his word. And Samuel's words came to all of Israel.
[00:31:22] Our text lands out by telling us that Lord confirmed Samuel's prophetic ministry, right? God fulfilled everything Samuel prophesied. This is the mark According to Deuteronomy 18 of a true prophet in old school sense of the word. The office of the prophet God is blessing Samuel's ministry and because of it God's people begin to hear from the Lord again at Shiloh.
[00:31:48] The text ends by telling us that all of Israel is blessed by this ministry. Just as Eli's family sin hurt all of Israel, Samuel's prophetic ministry now blesses all of Israel.
[00:32:02] It's a beautiful way for God to wrap up this sorrow into a redemption. Right. But there's also an interesting detail here.
[00:32:10] Last week we talked about how this prophecy to replace Eli's priestly ministry would eventually be fulfilled under Solomon's reign and the priest zodiac. That's true, but it's also kind of strange because the story kind of sets you up to assume Samuel himself will be the fulfillment of the prophecy. Right. But God doesn't call Samuel to the priesthood.
[00:32:31] Instead, God calls Samuel to a prophetic ministry that brings life and joy back to Israel in the midst of a dark time.
[00:32:41] You know, this is a little bit of a theological nuance, but I think it's actually important for us.
[00:32:46] The office of the prophet as it's described in the Old Testament for the nation of Israel was a sacred and unique positions specifically for the ancient kingdom of Israel. The priests were the mediators who helped Israel stay in relationship with God. But the prophets spoke God's very words to his people. And just like the priestly prophecy last week pointed forward to how Jesus perfectly fulfills the priestly ministry for the church, now he is our true mediator, our true high priest.
[00:33:20] Samuel's prophetic ministry points us forward to how Christ perfectly speaks the word of God for us today. You know, one of the earliest names for Jesus in the church was Logos or Word. Jesus is the word of God, going back to where we started today in Romans 1. It tells us the world is out excuse for believing in God specifically because of what's visible in creation. Right? Like you have no excuse to deny the existence of God if you live in God's universe. But like I said earlier, it's a big step from theism to the cross.
[00:33:54] We need God to reveal himself to make his gospel plan known to us. If you guys have ever been to my house, you know that we have a massive dog named Beverly. Beverly is a Newfoundland. She's 130 pounds of love and fluffiness and she believes completely and totally that she is a lap dog. She's glorious in every way and also crushing, right? I love my dog Bev. She's wonderful. She snuggles, she's great. I love taking her on walks. I love everything about her.
[00:34:26] But the thing you have to understand about Bev is as great of a dog as she is, she's stupid.
[00:34:32] And that's not a dig on her. She's a dog, right? Like dogs only have the mental capacity they have.
[00:34:41] And so if you think about the relationship we have with creatures like dogs. It's interesting because Bev comes into my house and she lives with me, but she's too dumb to speak English, so we can't really talk to each other.
[00:34:55] And so there's all sorts of things Bev can learn about me from living in my home and being my dog, right? She learns that I bring her food at night. She learns that she's not supposed to be in the house, but outside the house. And if she scratches on the front door, we'll let her out. She learns all these bits and pieces based on what she can observe about me and about our relationship. But at the end of the day, my heart, my mind, my person, my loves, my hopes, my dreams, my fears, the things that make me me are simply above her.
[00:35:30] They're above her pay grade.
[00:35:32] She doesn't understand them. She can't comprehend them on her own.
[00:35:37] And even the level of relationship we do have, we only get there because I reveal myself to her.
[00:35:45] When Bev first came to our house, she was anxious and scared. She's a pound puppy. We got her from the pound. She was already over a year old. She had no idea who we were. And when she came to our house, she was scared.
[00:35:55] She didn't know what to do.
[00:35:57] So we had to reveal our will to her and to show her, I'll bring you food every night. I just show her, if you pee in the house, I'm upset. If you pee outside, I'm not upset, right? Like, I had to reveal myself to her in a way she understood, in a way that made sense to her little dog brain. And now, years later, we have a wonderful relationship where I love my dog and my dog loves me. And she knows me as well as a dog can know a person.
[00:36:27] Beloved.
[00:36:28] To move from theism to the cross, God must reveal Himself.
[00:36:34] We simply don't have it in us to understand him fully, to simply observe him and to take him in. He must share his heart with us. And he must share his heart with us in a way that makes sense to our puny human brains.
[00:36:53] Beloved Jesus is how God does this.
[00:36:58] Jesus is the word of God made flesh.
[00:37:03] He shows us the heart of God. He reveals the glorious mystery that is God's glory. Gospel plan In John 1, John calls Jesus the Word born into flesh. And this is so important.
[00:37:19] So important. He is the greater prophet, greater than Samuel, greater even than Moses. While Samuel had to deliver a message of judgment to Eli's house. Jesus, the true word of God, shows us his heart by taking the judgment of our House upon himself because of the Christ, we get to hear God say, welcome, good and faithful servant, not depart from me. I never knew you. This is God's heart spoken and revealed to the person and the work and the words of Jesus, he loves you. He's making a way for you from death to life.
[00:37:57] It's wonderful.
[00:37:59] So what do we actually do with this?
[00:38:02] If the gospel is this glorious spoiler it is, how do we hear it in a way our hearts need?
[00:38:12] How do we hear the voice of Jesus as real servants, open, humble, ready to live into our design and to find life and freedom?
[00:38:25] Like, aren't we? Back to the initial question I asked of how we actually hear God in our rushed and anxious world. I mean, if we're to take our story on its surface reading, are we just supposed to sit around and wait for God to raise up another Samuel, another prophet to tell us what God is saying?
[00:38:45] Well, the answer to that is no, because beloved Jesus already is the greater prophet.
[00:38:53] He is the very word of God himself in flesh. We simply need to hear Jesus. And what does that look like?
[00:39:03] Well, you know, in a very practical sense. At Emmanuel Fellowship Church, we do believe the spirit of God works supernaturally and speaks in the world. We believe in the continuation of all the gifts described in the New Testament. And the Bible does talk about believers speaking in prophecy in the process. Power of the spirit. Now, there's a major difference between, you know, that and the office of the prophet. In the Old Testament, Israel needed the words of the prophets because they didn't have the scripture. But today, the church has a supernatural, amazing gift beyond simply the words of the prophets. We have the Bible.
[00:39:40] God has preserved his very word for all of us. And we have, let's be honest, ludicrous and access to it.
[00:39:48] I'm confident that everyone at home listening to this sermon right now has multiple copies and translations of God's word in their homes. And if you have access to a computer or a smartphone, you have free access to every translation of the Bible ever made through services like the Bible app.
[00:40:09] So you need to hear me very clearly here.
[00:40:13] We hear God today primarily through the written word, the scripture, which reveals to us the living word of Jesus.
[00:40:23] Does God still speak in supernatural ways and in whispers and dreams and prophecies and all those things? Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. But the primary way, the primary main way that God's people hear God's voice is through his written word, supernaturally preserved for you and for me. I am convinced the reason supernatural signs are so much less common in the modern Western church is because God has already accomplished the miracle of preserving and providing His Word for you. If you talk to missionaries on the front lines of unreached people groups, they'll report very much like much more often. They'll report supernatural, spiritual, revelation and prophecies and those sorts of things much more often than places where the word of God is readily available.
[00:41:13] That's because the word of God is readily available. And this is God's voice of revelation for you right now.
[00:41:21] If you want to hear God speak, hear this church, read His Word.
[00:41:28] And some of you say, well, Pastor, that's not what I'm talking about. I just read that story, Samuel. Like, I want to hear God's voice out loud. I want to hear his words through my ears. Well, the solution to that is simple. Beloved, read your Bible out loud.
[00:41:42] This is the words of God preserved for you, his very words. This is how you know Him.
[00:41:50] This is how you hear from him. At Immanuel, if anyone were to have some kind of supernatural experience they believe to be a word from God, a dream, a prophecy, a word, anything like that, do you know what we're going to do with that experience?
[00:42:04] We're going to compare it to this.
[00:42:07] We're going to hold it up next to the written word of God, because we don't have a way of knowing if your dream is the Holy Spirit or your indigestion. But we know this is God's words for us here and now.
[00:42:23] So what do you do with a text like today's?
[00:42:27] How do you learn to hear God's voice and to grow in faith? Well, beloved, God is speaking.
[00:42:35] The question is whether or not you are listening, whether or not you are seeking Him. And hear this, beloved, seeking him in His Word.
[00:42:45] And don't mishear me, I get it. The Bible is complex. It's. It's often difficult to understand. But guess what?
[00:42:52] God is complex.
[00:42:54] He is difficult to understand. He's the creator and sustainer of reality. He loves you and has a perfect, eternal life in store for you. I think that's worth a bit of mental and emotional effort to engage.
[00:43:08] Come on, church.
[00:43:10] We explore the Scripture in depth. Every Sunday, jump into a community group or a discipleship group. We'll dig into Scripture and help you consider how to apply those words of God to your specific circumstances in life. Read the Bible on your own. Spend time with it. Learn the stories. Even if you can't connect the dots or don't have access to commentaries or things like that. Learn the stories. Pray your Questions to God, journal them out. Pray every time you read that you would hear from him. Pray that he would give you a humble heart to listen and obey. And you say, oh, Pastor, I don't have time.
[00:43:47] I don't like reading. I don't get anything out of it. My schedule is crazy. My kids get up early. I get distracted. Look, I get it, I get it.
[00:43:58] I really do. I'm right there with you.
[00:44:01] But at the end of the day, beloved, you do what you want.
[00:44:08] You do what you want to do.
[00:44:10] We all do. You partake in the things that are important to you.
[00:44:17] And if that's where you're at, look, it's okay.
[00:44:21] You don't have to be ashamed. You don't have to be embarrassed. Everyone is on their own spiritual journey. We love you. Like, as your pastor, I love you, care for you. You will walk with you.
[00:44:34] But don't fool yourself for a moment thinking that God is distant and not speaking to you, when the reality is that he's simply not important enough to you for you to engage Him.
[00:44:49] And again, we're all there sometimes. We all run that math on our priorities and deprioritize our priority Creator sometimes.
[00:45:00] But just be honest about it, confess it, and move on.
[00:45:05] Today, let's be encouraged with the truth that we worship a God who speaks to us clearly, who makes Himself in all his mystery, knowable and approachable.
[00:45:18] And let's do this to land out today.
[00:45:21] Let's take a moment right now, like right there in your living room, and let's talk to him for a minute. Like I would encourage you, get into a real posture of prayer. If you need to get on your knees, if you can sit on your sofa, but like get some space for just you and the Lord real quick and talk to Him. Ask him to show you, to remind you what keeps you from hearing his voice in your life.
[00:45:49] See what he might say to you in this very moment.
[00:45:52] Because guys, here's the deal.
[00:45:54] It doesn't matter where you've been. Tomorrow is a new day with a blank slate.
[00:46:00] By the power of the Spirit, you can be a follower of Christ who lives day to day hearing his voice.
[00:46:09] You can.
[00:46:11] If you're listening to this and you're not yet a believer, I have great news for you.
[00:46:15] God is real.
[00:46:17] He loves you. He's speaking to you. He's calling you. And here's the thing, guys. If you're listening to this right now, whether you've been a believer for decades upon decades and you're needing to step back to spiritual life and disciplines, or you're still considering if you want to submit your life to Christ for the first time, or you're anywhere in between on that spectrum. The answer for us is all the same. God is calling to all of us. He's speaking to all of us. And. And our best answer is speak.
[00:46:46] Your servant is listening.
[00:46:49] Let's take a moment to connect with the Lord in prayer.
