Good morning everyone. Sure you guys are feeling a
little tired perhaps from sleeping one hour less.
Certainly the results, the effects of it was felt the first
service. We had one person who came to
the first service. It was a very interesting
sermon. I tried very hard not to look at
that one person. So I, I don't know I, I, I
looked at the wall. I'm glad there's enough places
where I can look. Hope you guys could stay awake
today. So I just today's, that's just
the second sermon in our series on King David and the first 3
sermons are actually not on King David, but it will be a good
introductory giving us a good background once we actually
start talking about David. So I follow this Christian
counselor on Instagram and she says in one of her posts that
parenting changes at age 13. Early parenting is mostly the
parent talking, right instruction, teaching values and
world views and whatnot. And then later on, as the child
gets older, parenting becomes more of listening, encouraging,
and really a process of letting go.
But one thing remains constant in every stage of parenting.
It's communication. Without communication, there is
no relationship. And that's exactly the situation
we find ourselves in First Samuel 3.
God's people were supposed to have a relationship with God,
but it says here that communication has stopped.
No communication, no relationship.
In First Samuel 3, it says the word of the Lord was rare.
The word of the Lord was rare in those days and at this time when
the word of the word of the Lord was rare and at this time is
when Samuel is raised and God chooses Samuel so the
relationship could be restored. And perhaps this is where you
find yourselves at with your relationship with God.
Perhaps the relationship is not there, perhaps the communication
is not quite there. And to be clear, the way God
speaks to us is through the Bible and the way we speak to
God is primarily through prayer, no communication, no
relationship. And God uses Samuel to restore
that relationship. So we will learn through Samuel
how we can start hearing the word the the word of God.
So that's the question we want to answer today.
How can we hear the Word of God? Number one, we must recognize
why the Word of God becomes rare.
We have to recognize why it becomes rare in our lives.
Let's turn. I'm just going to read one verse
in chapter 3 to start off, and then we'll read a little bit of
chapter 2 to give us a background in what's going on.
So first Samuel 3 verse one, the boy Samuel served the Lord in
Eli's presence. In those days the word of the
Lord was rare and prophetic visions were not widespread.
If you guys remember from last week S sermon, Hannah gets
pregnant after her prayer of surrender and some years have
passed and she does really give up her child, her son to become
a priest and and Samuel is raised by Eli in the temple of
God. So in chapter 3 already several
years have passed. God speaking to his people,
having a relationship with his people was rare.
And really, that's a true sad, truly a sad statement.
It's like saying, oh, Pastor Tim and his two sons hung out.
Oh, that was really rare. That's a sad state of affairs.
It's his people, God and his people have no relationship.
But why was it rare? What's going on in the
Israelites life where that was rare?
We get a little glimpse of what was going on in chapter 2.
I'm going to be reading chapter 2, verse 12 to 17 and we're
going to be reading, oh, go back, go back, go back.
Yes, yes, part of 12 is underneath and we'll be reading
about Eli the priest and his sons were also priests.
And you could see kind of what what was going on that made God
not give His word to His people. Verse 12 to 17 Eli S sons were
wicked men. They did not respect the Lord or
the priest S share of the sacrifices from the people.
When anyone offered a sacrifice, the priest S servant would come
with a three pronged meat fork while the meat was boiling and
plunge it into the container, kettle, cauldron, or cooking
pot. The priest would claim for
himself whatever the meat fork brought up.
This is the way they treated all the Israelites who came there to
Shiloh next. Even before the fat was burned,
the priest's servant would come and say to the one who was
sacrificing, give the priest some meat to roast, because he
won't accept any boiled meat from you, only raw.
If that person said to him, the fast, the fat must be burned
first, then you could take whatever you want for yourself.
The servant will reply, no, I insist that you hand it over
right now. If you don't, I'll take it by
force. So the servant's sin was very
severe in the presence of the Lord because the man treated the
Lord's offering with contempt. Now, even if you don't know
anything about the the sacrificial system of the Old
Testament, some of this stuff just sounds off.
OK, Now, if you knew a little bit about the sacrificial
system, you would know that OK, the, the meat has to be burnt
first. The sacrifice has to be done.
And then from whatever is after the sacrifice, the priest gets a
small portion. But seems like Eli sons like
their meat raw. It does taste better, right?
It tastes better than boiled meat, right?
Who wants boiled meat? Yuck.
He's like, no, no, give it to me before you sacrifice so I I can
make a little nice steak. And then and then they say the
servant says, if you don't hand it over right now, I'll take it
by 4. OK, that just sounds wrong.
What's going on here? In essence, Eli's sons did not
take the Word of God seriously. There are very specific rules
and laws in the in scriptures of how the sacrifice should be done
and then which portion the priest takes.
It's very clear. But Eli sons disregarded the
laws. And so you know what?
I want to take whatever I want to take.
They made their own rules. They took as much as they
wanted. So what caused the word of the
Lord to be rare? Not taking the word of God
seriously. That's how it becomes rare in
our lives as well. If you don't take the Bible, the
Word of God, seriously in your life, the communication would be
rare. And you might be asking, OK,
Pastor Tim, how can you compare us to Eli's sons?
Clearly. They are literally like robbing
people who are just trying to worship God.
How can you compare us through these guys?
Well, maybe not exactly to this extent, but perhaps our
attitudes may be more similar than you think.
Perhaps what their attitude is is similar to our attitude.
Maybe our attitudes toward worship is too casual.
Maybe, like Eli sons, we do not emphasize the Word of God in our
lives. So let's take a moment to
examine if prep were too casual or we don't emphasize God's
words in our lives enough. Let's start with the preparation
of worship. Now, thankfully, in many ways,
we no longer need to bring animal sacrifices to worship.
Why? Because all that did, all the
animal sacrifices did, was to point to the ultimate sacrifice
that was coming, Jesus Christ. Now that Jesus Christ died on
the cross, no more sacrifice is needed.
He's the ultimate and the forever sacrifice.
But so while you are no longer required to bring an animal, you
are still required to bring a prepared heart.
That part never changed. Paul teaches us that we are to
offer our lives as a living sacrifice.
Paul teaches us that that is the proper and true worship.
Now our hearts, our lives is a living sacrifice.
So before during the Bible time, people had to they were forced
to prepare. You have to pick out an animal,
you have to pick out unblemished.
You have to pick up the right part.
But because those those demands are no longer here with us,
perhaps we just kind of show up. Modern day worship.
A lot of us just show up. And I, I want to compare our
attitudes to how my son Maddie prepares for his basketball
games. My son, his main sport is
baseball. And before a baseball game, I
don't want to go in through it, but it's an entire day process.
Actually, it starts from the day before, right?
He goes to sleep at like 9:00 PM if if he has a game next day
early. But when it comes to basketball,
he's very casual, Too casual. I think last week Tuesday, he
had a playoff game. OK, sure it was just a city
league, you know, but he had a playoff Game 2 hours before the
playoff game. He goes to baseball practice,
practice for an hour and a half. He he gets out of practice a
little early. He gets in my car, he's
changing, he's eating and we get to the Game 5 minutes before the
game starts. Now we're playing a team that
we've played before and the last time we played them we lost by
17. So you would think Matt would be
like, oh, it's going to be a tough team, you know, But no, 5
minutes before he shows up, he's he's the jersey is like, you
know, you got a one side is white, one side is dark.
He has the wrong side on. He's like eating and he's no
warm up, no warm up shots, no stretching.
He gets there and then he's playing.
I was like, after the game, I said, Manny, like, didn't you
want to like, do good? Like, why?
Why? Like, you just want to show up
and play. And he says, dad, I don't care
about basketball. I'm just here for my friends,
which is completely OK. Steady basketball.
Who cares? Yeah, I wish you the little
better, but who cares, right? But how do we prepare for
worship? We're not showing up here for
Parks and Rec. City of Torrance, Parks and Rec
here. We're showing up to worship the
one true God, the Almighty God, Creator of the universe.
And how do we prepare for worship?
A lot of us, we just show up. A lot of us, we come here
because our friends are here. We come here for the kids
program. We come here because that's what
Christians do. That's what good people do on a
Sunday morning. I wonder how many of us are here
because you want to listen to the word of God.
I want to know what God is speaking to me today.
I want to know how I could be changed by God's words today.
Sure, I could make this terminal vow.
You know what? Night before, sleep early.
You guys know that you're going to get one hour less sleep, so
you should have slept early and pray before worship and all of
that. Those are great things.
But the most important thing is, OK, prepare your heart for God's
Word. Prepare your heart.
All right #2 how can we listen to God's Word when God speaks?
We must listen and respond. We must listen and respond.
Now this is, we're getting finally to the the story.
This, it is a narrative and this is the story of chapter 3.
I want to summarize the first few verses and then I'll read
verses 8 through 10 and then yeah, eight through 10 for now.
So let me just summarize 2 to 7 because it's the same thing that
repeats 3 times after verse one, the word of the Lord was rare.
Verse two goes into the story and it starts off by God
calling, audibly calling Samuel boy.
The boy Samuel is sleeping in the temple and God calls him
Samuel. Samuel and Samuel wakes up.
He assumes that this had never happened before, so he assumes
his boss is calling him. So he goes to Eli.
Here I am, Eli says I did not call you, go back to sleep.
Samuel goes back to sleep and God calls him again, Samuel,
Samuel and same thing. Samuel wakes up, goes to Eli.
Here I am and Eli says, I didn't call, you go back to sleep.
And now let's pick up the story from verse 8.
Once again, for the third time, the Lord called Samuel.
He got up, went to Eli and said, here I am, you call me third
time this happens. Then Eli finally understood that
the Lord was calling the boy. He told Samuel, go and lie down.
If he calls you say speak Lord, for your servant is listening.
So Samuel went and lay down in his place.
The Lord came, stood there and called as before.
Samuel, Samuel, Samuel responded, speak for your
servant is listening. Let's stop there.
Eli finally realizes what's happening.
He says, oh, God is speaking to him and he he instructs Samuel
how what to say. And Samuel responds, speak for
your servant is listening. This response is one of the most
important verses, not just in this chapter and not just in
this book, but in the entire Bible.
Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.
There's no debate, there's no resistance, there's no
negotiation. Samuel says speak.
I'm willing to listen. I'm willing to take it in.
It is humble listening. I'm not saying when you read
God's word you shouldn't question things.
You shouldn't try to look it up and study more.
Sometimes we don't understand it.
Sometimes you do understand it, but you don't understand why God
is commanding you do such things and it's OK to to pursue those
things. I'm not saying that, but I'm
saying listen to God's words with the humility saying Lord,
you are God, you are the Creator, I am your creation,
You're there, I'm here, so I'm listening because you are God
and I am not. That's humility.
And this is a stark contrast to Eli's sons.
I want to quickly read 2 verses from the previous chapter
because we didn't. We skipped chapter 2 and this
shows really the heart of what's going on in among the people.
If you could find back there chapter 2 verses 22 and 20.
Three, there we go. Now Eli was very old.
He heard about everything his sons were doing to all Israel
and how they were sleeping with the woman who served at the
entrance of to the 10th of meeting.
He said to them, why are you doing these things?
I have heard about your evil actions from all of his people.
It's not that Samuel is doing good things and Eli's sons were
doing bad things. It's not just that it is really
has to do with everything has to do with their heart of how they
are accepting God's words. What Eli's sons are doing here.
They were sleeping with the woman who served at the entrance
to the 10th of meeting. It is actually.
They have adopted a certain, a very specific Canaanite Pagan
ritual. It's the fertility ritual.
Women who want to have a baby, they go to the temple and they
sleep with the priest. And Eli's son somehow adapted
that into their worship of God. For a lot of people in this
time, their faith is just a buffet of beliefs and values.
It's like they got a big plate and they're going through a
buffet and they're like, OK, I like this about this religion.
Oh, Canaanite Pagan religion. I like that.
It seems like Eli's sons are like, I like, I like the free
meat. I like, oh, but I want more of
that than what's allowed. Oh, I like that.
Looks like they're picking and choosing what they like from
other religions and their own. It's a buffet to them.
There is no you are creator, I'm creation.
I bowed out to our one true God and I accept what you taught.
No, it's like God is below him and oh, I like this.
Nah, I don't like that. It's the posture.
And I think many Christians approach God's words.
Maybe not several religions. I think that's, I don't think
that happens, but we do approach God's words like a buffet.
We take what we like and we leave what we don't.
Forgiveness. Yes, I'll take that.
Like that. Oh, loving one another.
God loves me and God accepts me. I like that.
Those are all good.
Anything to do with sex? No thanks.
It's outdated. Anything with money, usually
it's like, Nah, no thank you. We take what we like and we say
no thank you to the things that it seems for us, outdated.
It seems like we want God to comfort us and love us and
accept us, but we cannot let God contradict us.
We only let God be God in the areas that we let him.
We want God to agree with us. You can't imagine a God.
Many of us can't imagine a God that disagrees with you.
And I want to say our attitude, it should not be of a buffet,
but perhaps a omakase. You know what that is?
You go to Japanese restaurant and you just pay him a lot of
money and you don't get to order.
You eat what the chef gives you. Someone told me that it is
literally translated. I leave it up to you.
You give them money and you eat whatever the chef gives you.
I've been to Omaha a couple of times.
They don't ask for allergy. They don't, they don't ask for
anything. Well, that dude didn't even
speak English. He just just gave me money and
and I ate it and it was good. But it's that, it's that you
have this empty plate before God and you say, Lord, I eagerly
await what the next meal is. Lord, I want to enjoy the next
bite you give me of spiritual food.
Lord you are, Lord, I am. I am just a sinful human being.
You give me the word and I want to be fed.
Can we go back to three? One.
I'm sorry, not 31 the previous verses.
One more sorry. One more, one more sorry.
There you go. Speak shows that he is
available. Your servant shows that he has
humility and he says I am listening.
He's ready, he's available, he has humility, He's ready to
listen and act on God's words. You know what the crazy thing
is? It says the word of the Lord is
rare. It means that God didn't show up
much because no one's listening anyway.
But when Samuel, and God knows Samuel's heart, even before he
says anything out loud, when God sees Samuel, he sees his heart.
And you know what he does? It says the Lord came.
The Lord stood there and spoke to Samuel.
The Lord showed up. Samuel knew his presence.
I am listening. When you have the right heart
before God, when you have humility, you, you're available.
You're ready. Then when God speaks, it will
come to your heart. Spending time with God will be
delightful and listening to his words on a Sunday or a sermon
that you're listening throughout the week or when you do your
quiet times, when you hear or listen or read God's words, it
will be a treat. And what does God actually say
to Samuel? Right?
Your servant is listening and then God says things to him,
right? What does he say, Samuel,
Samuel, I love you Samuel, Samuel, you were raised without
a mom and I am your heavenly Father.
It was something like nice and kind.
Well, all this time God was silent, and he shows up to say
this verse 11 to 14. The Lord said to Samuel, I am
about to do something in Israel that will cause everyone who
hears about it to shudder. On that day, I will carry out
against Eli everything I said about his family from beginning
to end. I told him that I'm 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 by
either sacrifice or offering. You know what God's saying?
I will destroy Eli and his two sons.
And if you read on, that's exactly what happens.
They all die. Wow.
Like, really, God, you, you waited this long to say that
this is a boy Samuel. He's like, here I am, Lauren,
speak to me, and then I will destroy your boss and his two
sons. But that's the thing though.
God chose somebody who was humble enough to receive even
parts of Scripture. That is not so easy to hear.
Anybody could hear I love you or you are lonely.
I was there for you the entire time.
Anyone could hear that. Anyone could accept that.
But not everyone can necessarily hear about sin and the
consequences of sin. So I wanted to ask you, Are you
ready to listen? Are you ready to go to God and
say the words that we actually just saying about the last song,
speak, O Lord, that actually is from It's based on First Samuel
3 and the lyrics. Whether you remember or not,
you, you saying these words you said, speak, O Lord, to receive
the food of your holy word. Can we go to God and say, teach
us, Lord, full obedience, holy reverence, true humility.
Can you go to God with the heart of that song and say, speak, O
Lord, and renew our minds? Help us grasp the heights of
your plans for us. Teach us full obedience, holy
reverence, true humility. Is your heart ready for all of
those things? During the series, this series
on King David, I will be asking more than once, we'll be asking
who are you in the story? Who are we in this story in
chapter 3? Who are we?
Are we Samuel? Are we Eli?
Are Eli sons? Are we God?
We are actually the closest match is Eli sons.
We ignore God's words. We treat worship casually.
We pick and choose the parts of Scripture we want to follow.
At the same time, I want you to remember today's sermon is not
get yourself perfect before you come back next week.
You got to be perfect before you you could hear God's words.
That's not my sermon. Then how could if God did not
speak to Eli's sons, Eli and his sons, then why would God speak
to us? We're sinners.
I just said we're similar to Eli's sons.
See, in this time, God's people needed a mediator.
They couldn't just go to God. They needed a human mediator, so
God spoke to through the mediator and then the people
spoke back to God through the mediator.
And when that mediator was sinful, like Eli and the sons,
the communication will be stopped.
But in this story is actually a story of grace.
The communication stopped, but God, through a miraculous birth,
through Hannah, he chooses A righteous, holy mediator so the
relationship could be restored. Story of grace, actually.
And that's exactly what God does for us permanently.
Samuel didn't live forever. Jesus is our high priest.
Jesus is our forever mediator. And because Jesus, our high
priest, is forever holy, he's perfect.
We always have a relationship with God and God could speak to
us whenever. All we have to do is open up the
Word and read. All we have to do is come here
on Sunday and listen. God looks at Jesus perfection,
not our sins. Because of Jesus we are
forgiven, our hearts are renewed and we could approach God again.
So you don't have to be perfect. All you need is a heart that
says speak. O Lord, your servant is
listening. Main point.
We can hear God's word when we approach Him with humble
obedience. Let's take time to pray.