Yesterday we did a little study on the importance of being persistent in prayer. We went over some of the examples in the Bible and there are a lot more that we didn’t even touch on. For example, there is Jesus Himself when He was in the garden of Gethsemani. How could He have the faith, how could He have the strength, how could He have the power, the peace, the calm, the presence of God with Him in the face of all that persecution and physical abuse that He received from the Jewish religious leaders and the Roman officials throughout His trial and crucifixion? How could He do what He did? How did He have the courage and the faith to go through all that humiliation and abuse bravely without complaint or fear or anguish? The only way Jesus, who had emptied Himself of the Divine nature, could do it was because He as a man got alone and spent time with His Father
We seee it many times in the Gospel s how Jesus got up early to pray, or sent away His disciples and the people and then went alone to a mountain to pray. Someimes He took His disciples to a quiet place so that they could get some rest and release from ministry and Jesus Himself could get some time alone with His father. Jesus had to get alone with God constantly. In order to have that power, that confidence, that calmness, that presence of God with Him, He had to get alone with God. In the hours before His arrest by the Jewish authorities, what does He do? He knows He is going to be betrayed. He had gone with just a few of His disciples to a mountain top outside Jerusalem and Elijah and Moses had appeared unto Him and explained what would happen in Jerusalem.
What does Jesus do that night before His arrest? He spends the night fellowshipping with His disciples, comforting them, washing their feet, telling them they should love and serve one another, telling them He’s going to the Father to prepare a place for them. After dinner they have a strange ceremony of communion where He says something about His body and His blood and a New Covenent. He sings a hymn with His disciples and walks calmly to the place of His arrest knowing that it’s all going to happen in just a few more hours. How does He manage to keep His cool? When they get to the garden, He asks His closest disciples to stay awake and pray with Him. He goes a little further away from them and cries out to God in prayer. In the Gospel of Luke we read, “He sweat drops of blood.” Todays science tells us that “sweating blood” is a phenonema of people in great anguish of heart and soul. Jesus even implores His Father to take the cup away from Him, but then submits Himself to the Father’s will.
In the Old Testament we see the same thing. We see God’s prophets getting along with God and often enough climbing a mountain to do it. Then when they come down from the mountain, they come down with power, and with something to say. They got alone with God. They got out from the multitude and went to the mountain and they heard from God. When they came back down, they had something to say. Even secular studies show that people who spend time alone are more creative. They have studies that show that people who go on regular walks also seem to be more creative.
Today we are going to talk a little more on the importance of prayer. We will be looking at 1 Samuel 8 and there abouts. The people are desiring to have a king over them. They want to have a king like the other nations round about them. Samuel tries to talk them out of the idea. He rehearses their history how God had given them judges since the death of Joshua. God’s anointing had come on a certain leader and he became the leader of the tribes and helped in judging the people. In the book of Judges you can read where it says that “Samson judged the people for so many years.” Or Jeptha judges the people for such amount of time, or Deborah judged the people. They say the Bible is a book of male chauvinism, but we see the children of Israel had a woman judge for many years. God’s spirit came down on a certain person that was yielded to Him and capable to lead and he or she would become the judge. Many times it was through some obvious miraculous feat of war against their enemies that everyone knew it was the presence of God with the leader that had given them the victory.
Samuel the prophet would travel a round in a circuit, judging the different tribes of Israel. The people would come with their complaints and problems and he would sit as a judge. In the story we will read today, Samuel is telling the people that he’s going to retire. He says, I’m old now, I put my sons in position as judges throughout the kingdom. I’m going to go home and rest. But the problem was that the sons were not like the father. The father never took a bribe. The father never extorted the people. The father made good judgment because he wasn’t influenced by money or material gain, so that he judged correctly. The people were already complaining about the sons. Your sons are not like you. They are taking bribes, not giving good judgments. Samuel was a bit upset becasue the people are asking for a king, but he went and talked to the Lord about it.
Remember Samuel had been that little child who had learned to hear from the Lord as a small child. We talked about his mother in another article. She was Hannah who had persisted in prayer for a child. She was married but wasn’t having any children. So she persisted in prayer and each year she went with her husband to the important feast and sacrífice. Her husband and her husband’s other wife also went. The other wife was already bearing children. The husband loved Hannah more even though she wasn’t bearing children and told her not to worry about it. But Hannah was in anguish of heart because she had no children to give to her husband. She prayed unto the Lord and told the Lord, open my womb and I will dedicate my first child to you for service with the High Priest.
She was weeping near to where the tabernacle had been set up, where the ark of the covenant resided, and Eli, who was the High Preist, came and saw her. Thinking she was drunk, he started to reprove her and she reponded, “No my Lord, I am a woman in much anguish of heart.” Eli realized that what she said was true and said, “Let the Lord hear all thy petitions.” Hannah went back home and soon afterwards she got pregnant and in time Samuel was born. The Bible tells us that when the child was weaned, old enough to be away from his mother, she brought him to stay with Eli. He began to learn how to serve the Lord by being a servant of the High Priest. In the house of Eli he got his training as a man of God. Hannah was fulfilling her pledge and giving her first son back to the Lord.
You may remember the story of Samuel as a young child starting to hear from the Lord. Eli was getting old and Samuel would help by bringing him his water or by bringing him the parchments. Samuel would do a lot of the physical things that were getting difficult for Eli to do seeing that he was over weight and losing his eyesight. Eli wasn’t in very good shape and he needed or was using Samuel as a servant. But at the same time Samuel was learning. Samuel was like an apprentice. Eli was teaching him through the example he was setting, good or bad. Samuel would also learn from the word of God he would hear read. He was learning God’s ways through hearing His word.
One night Samuel was in bed half asleep when he hears Eli calling. He gets up and runs to Eli’s bed and says, “Hear I am, my Lord. Did you call me?” Eli is almost sound asleep but he’s an older man and so he wakes up quite easily and says, “No, no, what are you talking about. Samuel, I didn’t call you. Go back to bed now, go on.” So Samuel goes back to bed. But the same thing happens again. Eli sends him back to bed again. But again Samuel hears for sure that voice of Eli and goes running to him. Samuel comes running in saying, “My Lord, I heard your voice. I heard you call me, Samuel, Samuel. I heard you.” Finally, Eli realizes that it must be the Lord that is trying to talk with Samuel. Therefore, Eli replies, “No, no, go back to bed, but the next time you hear the voice say, “Speak, Lord, for thy servant hears. Samuel, it’s the Lord that’s trying to speak to you. Just say, Speak, Lord, thy servant hears.”
Samuel goes back to bed and after a time in bed, again he hears the Lord speak saying, “Samuel, Samuel.” Samuel responds, “Hear I am, Lord, speak for your servant hears.” We see that Samuel as a young child learned to hear from the Lord. He learned the importance of hearing from the Lord. The Lord spoke to him and tells him of all the evil that is going to befall Eli and Eli’s sons because of their sins. Eli wasn’t so bad, but the problem was that his sons were taking bribes and laying with the woman when them came to offer sacrífice. They were using their power and position for money and for sex. They would take the better piece of the sacrífice for themselves and for their friends. And the Lord was displeased with that and displeased at Eli as a parent, and as God’s leader.
Eli’s problem was that he didn’t correct his sons. If you remember the stody of Abraham. When God choses Abraham He says specifically “For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment.”[1] God chose Abraham because He knew that Abraham would instruct them in the way of the Lord. God knew that Abraham would instruct his children and teach them to follow the Lord. How many of us as parents have failed in our responsibity as parents? We’ve failed to teach our children the importance of their having a good personal relationship with the Lord. Now we can see how importsnt it is. God’s word says, “By their fruits ye shall know them.”
How many of us as parents have good fruits? I guess it still remains to be seen. Maybe our parenting wasn’t as good as it should have been. Abraham had Isaac who followed the Lord. The fruit of Isaac was Jacob and Esau. We see that Esau didn’t follow the Lord, but Jacob did. Whether he ended up following God because of influence of his father or his mother, we don’t know. But from the Scriptures, in Jacob’s case, we know his mother did have a big influence over him. Because we see the hand of the mother, also in the story. Remember, when God gives the blessing to Abraham, calling him the father of many nations, God said, “I know Abraham will command his children after him”, or in other words, I know Abraham will instruct his children to follow after him, and therefore, after the Lord.
Getting back tothe story of Samuel, we see that Samuel learned to be a man of God through his living in the house of Eli, the High Priest. Samuel learned to spend time with the Lord. He learned to listen to the still small voice of the Lord. That’s what made him become a good judge of the people, his relationship with the Lord. Finally, Israel has a battle with the Philistines. The two sons of Eli decide to take the ark of the covenent into the battle with them thinking that it is going to save them. But they have been disobedient and therefore don’t have God’s presence in their lives. They figure, “We’ll take the ark, that will save us even if we are full of sin.” But the Lord didn’t go with them, nor bless them. They get killed in the battle.
When the word comes back to Eli, he’s sitting on a bench near a wall. He was waiting anxiously to hear how the battle has gone and what has happened to the ark of the covenent. He hadn’t wanted his sons to take the ark with them. But the sons argued with their father and took the ark in anyway. During the battle the ark of the covenent gets taken by the Philistines. When Eli hears the bad news, he falls backwards off the bench and breaks his neck on the wall behind him and dies. But it doesn’t end there. His daughter-in-law was giving birth to a son at the same time. When she hears of the death of her husband and her husband’s brother, and that the ark of the covenent has been taken, she dies in child birth. The whole family got judged in one day by the hand of the Lord, because of their transgressions.
Apostle Paul tells us that these things all happened to them as an example so that we could learn from their mistakes. We could learn to have a fear of the Lord. King Solomon wrote, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of understanding.” Getting back to the story of Samuel, we remember that the people wanted a king. Samuel first goes and talks to the Lord and the Lord tells him to explain to the people what the king will be like. Samuel goes and tells the people, “He’s going to take away your daughters to be his cooks and bakers and maids. He’s going to take away your sons to be his soldiers and cradftsmen and work his fields and care for his animals. His going to take ten percent of your grain increase and 10% of your flocks.” Samuel tries to discourage the people from wanting a king, but the people continue to insists in their desire for a king. Samuel doesn’t do anything more, but goes back and reports to the Lord. The Lord says, “Okay, if that’s what they want, we are going to give it to them.”
Samuel tells the people that Lord says He’s going to give you a king. As he dismisses the people he says to the them, “God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you.” Samuel, God’s prophet, says, “Far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you.” He’s telling us, that for a man or woman of God, it’s a sin if we don’t pray for others. Samuel was praying for the whole country. He knew many of them personally because he had judged their disagreements. He was praying for all the tribes of Israel daily. He tells them, “God forbid that I should sin in ceasing to pray for you,” or “Far be it from me that I should sin in ceasing to pray for you.”[2]
Yesterday, we went over the verse, “Pray without ceasing.”[3] We as God’s ministers, as God’s people, as God’s ambassadors need to be people of prayer. We need to be praying, we should be known for our prayers. When someone is sick they should say, “Oh, I know that woman in the town who prays for the sick.” We should pray and be praying, and be known for our prayer. We should be going around praying for people, praying in our homes, praying daily. We should be spending that time with God daily to make sure we have our priorities right. We should not sin by ceasing to uphold our loved ones in prayer. We should have a time of regular prayer vigil to bring our petitions before the Lord. Prayer is not the least we can do, but the most. Put God first. Spend time with Him in prayer today, tomorrow, and every day as often as possible. God will bless you and your loved ones because you prayed. Prayer moves the hand of God.
To go to a related or part two click HERE
[1] Genesis 18:19
0 Comments:
Post a Comment