Bible Commentaries

Solitary Power

1 Samuel 7:3

SAMUEL is now in full office. Eli died when the messenger told him that the Philistines had taken the ark. Up to this time we have had no express communication from Samuel himself. From pregnant sentences, here and there, we have known that he has all the while been moving in the right direction. The Lord was with Samuel, and did not suffer any of his words to fall unto the ground. "All Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord." "And the Lord revealed himself unto Samuel in Shiloh." "And the word of Samuel came unto all Israel." These assurances indicate that Samuel, in his comparative obscurity, has been steadfastly moving onward according to the purpose of God. From this time we shall see more of him. His position in this chapter is most conspicuous, and his deeds are most instructive. Verily, in this case, the child was "father to the man." As prophet of the Lord, Samuel's will was supreme;—all the main features of the history derive their expression from the spirit of Samuel. There is authority in his word, there is inspiration in his encouragement, there is death in his frown. Under these circumstances you see how naturally we are led to meditate upon the profound influence of one life. Such is the subject. We shall develop it, by reviewing the three remarkable attitudes in which we find Samuel in the course of this chapter.

In the first place, look at the sublime attitude which Samuel assumed in relation to the corruption of the faith. Samuel distinctly charged the house of Israel with having gone astray from the living God; solemnly, with the pathos of a godly tone, with the solemnity of a righteous, indignant, yet pitiful heart, he said, "You have been guilty of high crimes and misdemeanours against the God of heaven; you have trampled underfoot your convictions and your traditions. You have bowed yourselves before the altars of forbidden gods." Distinctly, without reservation, without anything that indicated timidity on his part, he laid this terrible indictment against the house of Israel. In doing so he assumed a sublime attitude. He stood before Israel as a representative of the God who had been insulted, dishonoured, abandoned. His was the only voice lifted up in the name of the true God. It is in such cases that men show what stuff they are made of:—when they stand face to face with the crowd, and say, "You are wrong;" when they mount the popular whirlwind, and say, "Your will is moving in the wrong direction,—it is corrupt, debased, utterly foul, and bad!" Is there a grander spectacle anywhere on the earth than to see a lonely man confronting a whole house or an entire nation, and upbraiding the whole community with a common apostasy—with a common determination to go down to darkness and death? Samuel said, "You must put away Baalim,"—a plural word, which stands for no god in particular, but for all the progeny of false gods. "You must put away Ashtaroth,"—a plural word, which signifies no goddess in particular, but the whole company of feminine idols. "That is what you must do." We find sublimity in the attitude, imperial force in the tone. How did Samuel's influence come to be so profound upon this occasion? The instant answer 1 Samuel 7:11).

There is a great law here. To some minds this must, of course, be sentimental. To men who have seen prayer under certain aspects and circumstances,—who have known godly persons, hard driven in life, unable to conduct a successful struggle, and yet who have been praying all the time,—this must appear to be little better than mockery. But many others have known precisely the same thing under a different class of circumstances leading to the same gracious and undeniable results. The Philistines came against a praying army. We must consider not what the praying army did in the first instance, but what God did. The Lord thundered, and the Philistines were deafened; the Lord touched the heads of the Philistinian army, and they went crazy; the Lord wielded his hand before the eyes of the Philistinian leaders, and they were blind! It is nothing to him to save whether there be many or few.

In this case it does not appear from the text that God took the rod of his lightning and utterly discomfited the Philistines. He thundered! When God's voice rolls over human life, it is either a benediction of infinite peace or a malediction no human force can turn aside. Observe when it was that Samuel said he would pray for the house of Israel. The great lesson here turns upon a point of time. When Israel returned unto the Lord with all their heart; when Israel put away the strange gods and Ashtaroth; when Israel prepared the heart unto the Lord and was ready to serve him only; when Israel had done this part, then Samuel said, "I will pray for you unto the Lord." Under other circumstances prayer would have been wasted breath. We find a great law here, which applies to the natural and the spiritual. Is there a plague in the city? Purify your sanitary arrangements, cleanse your drains, disinfect your channels, use everything that is at all likely to conduce to a good end,—then pray unto the Lord. After nature has exhausted herself, there may be something for the Lord to do, may there not? Who are we? Where did we obtain our education? Who put us up just one inch above the infinite that we might be able to say to God, "Now the people have done everything, there is nothing for thee to do"? Who are we? A man ought to have a good many certificates, credentials, and testimonials before he is able to establish a status which will justify him in suggesting that when all natural processes have been exhausted, God cannot do anything. What if God should be just one iota wiser than we are? What if after we have exhausted the resources of our skill and the efforts of our strength, God might be able to say, "See, there is one more thing to be done"? It would not be according very much to God, would it? Blessed are they who believe that after they have exhausted themselves, God can do exceeding abundantly above all that they ask or think!

Sometimes worldly people say—"Pray for us." Men have said that to us. What kind of men were they? Sometimes men who have made wrecks of themselves, who have gone as far devilward as they could get, whose hearts were like a den of unclean beasts, men who had no longer any grip of the world—the whole thing was slipping away from them—they have said to the minister whom they had previously characterised as a canting parson, "Pray for us." But one condition must be forthcoming on their part. There must be not only consciousness of loss, and consciousness that they cannot fight against God any longer, and that their next step will be into the jaws of the devil—there must be more than that. There must be self-renunciation, contrition, moral anguish, pain of the soul, repentance towards God. When these conditions are forthcoming, the servant of Christ may say, "I will pray for you unto the Lord."

In the third place, look at the exalted attitude which Samuel assumes in relation to his whole lifetime. We read in the fifteenth verse of this chapter, "Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life." Think of being able to account for all the days of a whole human history! Think of being able to write your biography in one sentence! Think of being able to do without parentheses, footnotes, reservations, apologies, and self-vindications! When we attempt to write our lives, there is so much to say that is collateral and modifying in its effect,—so much which is to explain the central line. When we have written our biography, we have seen great blank spaces—we do not know what we did then; we have seen great black patches, and we have known that these indicated service of the devil; we have seen blurred, blotched pages, with erasures and interlineations, and we have said, "This reminds us of the daily and terrible mistakes of our life." So our biographical record becomes anomalous, contradictory, irreconcilable. Here is a man whose lifetime is gathered up in one sentence. "Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life." We have seen him in his childhood, we have had glances of him as he was passing up to his mature age. To-day we see him in three impressive and remarkable attitudes. His whole history is in this sentence: He was a judge of God all his days. Think of giving a whole lifetime to God. There are those who cannot do that now. But young men may be able to give twenty, thirty, perhaps fifty years all to Christ. Fifty years in succession; no break, no marring interruption,—half a century given to Christ! Some grey-haired old men may be following this study. Perhaps they are not within the circle that is divine; they may not be numbered amongst the members of the redeemed family, and now all that they can give is just the fag-end of a life. To such we would say: Death cannot be long in meeting you! Perhaps next year only,—perhaps to-morrow. The young may die, the old must. You may only have six weeks left; you had better give them than not give anything at all.

See then the profound influence which may be exerted by one life. We are dealing with Samuel, and with Samuel alone. Samuel's life is not confined to himself; it is a radiating life, streaming out from itself and touching thousands of points in the social and national life of others. Who can tell what may be done by one man? We shall not quote the testimony of a friend on this point, because he might be partial in his judgment. But once an enemy gave explicit testimony upon this point, and we shall accept his words just as he himself gave them. His name was Demetrius; he was an idol-maker; trade was slipping out of his fingers fast; he was not making so many gods as usual; and he spake to the people of the city in these words: "Ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul persuadeth and turneth away much people, saying, that they be no gods, which are made with hands." It was a valuable testimony. It was an enemy writing the report of the Church for the last year. It was the devil, reading a secretarial report of what one man had done. This Paul! Not ten thousand Pauls, not a great army of Pauls, but one little 1 Samuel 7:17.

What has Samuel been doing all the time but this very work?—How delightful to think of a whole life being consecrated to altar-building and altar-service! Where did Samuel build this altar?—He built it at "Ramah."—But what made Ramah more conspicuous than other places?—" there was his house" is the answer.—Where his house was his altar was.—Blessed is that house that gathers itself around the altar, making the altar the centre and the principal force in the entire building.—Not only was the house of Samuel at Ramah,—at Ramah Samuel "judged Israel." He did his official work in that city, and where he did official work he built his altar.—The man could not do without the altar; the judge could not do without the altar; the altar is essential to the entire development of life.—Have an altar in your house; have an altar in your business; have an altar in the very centre of your life.—When you return to your Ramah, forget not your religious duties; let them have the first and foremost place in your thought.—Samuel was now a great man—"he went from year to year in circuit to Beth-el, and Gilgal, and Mizpeh, and judged Israel in all those places."—But though his mind was thus occupied with intricate questions or vexatious details, as certainly as he returned to his house he returned to his altar, and when at the very centre of his administration he ascended the seat of judgment, he passed to that judgment seat from the altar of God.—Blessed is the country whose judges worship the true and living God. Blessed still more is the country whose houses are churches, whose homes are consecrated to the service of the Most High.—Peeps of this kind into the private life of great men enable us to estimate somewhat the secret of their influence.—He who prays well judges well. He who honours God in his house shall be honoured of God, by his house becoming a pavilion, a resting-place, a sanctuary of the divine presence.