All pastors have certain themes we return to on
a regular basis. Those themes are the things that define the way we look
at God and our faith.
One of the things I tend to talk about is that we all need
to open our hearts and souls to God’s Holy Spirit. God is speaking to
each of us. There are certain things God
is calling each of us to do. It’s not
the same things for each of us, of course. The Apostle Paul wrote about
that. He used the analogy to a human
body. He said that just as each part of
our body has a role, and each part of our body is important to our overall
health, so each one of us has a role, and each one of us is important to God’s
plan. We don’t all play the same role, but each of us has one. Each of us has something that God is calling
us to do. And it’s by opening our hearts
and souls to God’s Holy Spirit that we hear God speaking to us and learn what
that role is.
So that brings us to our Bible reading for today.
Samuel is living with the high priest, Eli. Maybe you remember the story. Samuel’s
mother, Hannah, had been unable to have children, and so she prayed that if God
would give her a son, she would dedicate that son’s life to God. God
answered her prayer, and Hannah kept her word.
So, when Samuel was very young, Hannah took him to live with Eli. Eli took him in and Samuel learned to love
God and learned how to be a priest.
So Samuel is living with the
high priest Eli. And Samuel’s still pretty young at this point. We’re not told how old he was, but he’s still
referred to as a boy, not a man. It’s night. Both Eli and Samuel have gone to bed. And Samuel hears a voice, calling him. He assumes it’s Eli and goes to see what Eli
wants. Eli says, What? No. I did not call you. Go back to bed. Samuel does, and he hears the voice
again. Samuel again assumes it’s Eli,
and Eli again says no, it was not me. Go to bed. And it happens a third time. Samuel again hears a voice, and again Samuel
assumes it’s Eli. And this time, Eli
figures out that something must be going on here. He figures out that it
must be God calling Samuel. He tells
Samuel that if it happens again, just say, “Speak for your servant is
listening,” and God will tell you whatever it is God has to tell you. And
of course, it does happen again, Samuel says “Speak, for your servant is
listening,” and God gave Samuel God’s message.
But think about this. God had to call Samuel four
times before Samuel responded. The first three times God called Samuel,
Samuel did not recognize God’s voice. And in fact, Samuel might never
have recognized God’s voice if Eli had not told him it was God’s voice.
Why would it take that long? Why
was it so hard for Samuel to figure out that it was God who was calling to him?
Did God’s voice sound just like
Eli’s voice, so that Samuel could not tell the difference? I suppose it’s
possible, but I doubt it. Was Samuel
asleep when this happened, so that he did not really hear the voice very well
and was not really thinking clearly? I suppose that’s possible, but that
does not seem like much of an explanation, either.
I think the reason Samuel did
not recognize God’s voice is that he was not expecting to hear God’s voice.
After all, Samuel is still a kid at this point. He might have thought that, maybe, God might
have something to say to him some day. But not now. Not when he’s so young. Not when he’s not even a priest yet. Maybe someday, when he’s an old man like Eli,
God might speak to him. But not now.
Samuel did not expect God to
speak to him. He believed in God.
He worshipped God. He prayed to
God. But he did not expect God to actually respond to any of that.
And so, when God did speak to him, when Samuel actually heard God’s
voice, he did not recognize it. And if not for Eli, he’d have missed it
entirely.
How many of us go through our
lives like Samuel? We believe in God.
We worship God. We pray to God.
But we don’t actually expect God to respond. Not now, anyway. Maybe someday, God
will have something to say to us. But
not now.
And I do that, too. A
little while ago, after our time for praises and concerns, I said a prayer.
I talked for a while. I said,
“Amen.” And then I went on with the next
part of the service. I did not take any time to see if God might respond
to my prayer. I did not stop and listen
to hear whether God might have anything to say. I said “Amen” and I went
on.
We need to listen. And
not just listen for God to respond to us, but listen for when God wants to
initiate the conversation. We need to say, as Samuel did, “Speak, for
your servant is listening.”
There are certain things God is
calling us to do. Each and every one of us. And yes, God may sometimes do things to show
us the path God wants us to take. But God also has things to say to us. God has things God wants to tell us. And if we don’t live in the expectation of
that, if we don’t listen to hear what God might have to say to us, if we don’t
create some space in our lives to listen for God’s voice, we’re going to miss
what God has to say to us. God will call us, and we won’t hear it.
Because God does not force his
way in. God does not give up, either--God kept calling Samuel, time after
time--but God did not force his way in. God waited until Samuel was
ready. God waited until Samuel was willing
to listen.
So again, we get back to where we
started. We need to find a way to open our hearts and open our souls to
God. We need to open our eyes and open our ears, too. We need to be aware that God may have
something to say to us, and be ready to listen when God says it.
In other words, we need to live
with the expectation that God is going to speak to us. But what does that
really mean? How do we put it into
practice? How, as a practical matter, do
we live with the expectation that God is going to speak to us? How do we
say, as Samuel did, “Speak, for your servant is listening”?
That answer will be a little bit different for each of us.
But one of the things we need to do is create a time and a way for
ourselves to listen to God. We need to have a time and a way when we
clear our minds. We need to have a time
and a way to quiet our own voices and our own thoughts. We need to have a
time and a way to put away our worries, to relax, to focus, and to listen for
God’s voice.
It takes practice. This may not work the first time
we try it. We may do our best to hear God’s voice and hear nothing.
God speaks when God chooses to speak.
Sometimes we have to be patient and wait for God to speak in God’s time.
And it also takes humility. Because sometimes we
think we know what God should say. We’re trying to hear God saying what
we want God to say. We need to be
willing to accept whatever God chooses to say whenever God chooses to say it.
Again, what was Samuel’s response?
“Speak, for your servant is listening.”
We need to work on it. But now’s the time to start.
Let’s find the time to do this. Let’s find the way to do this. Let’s clear our minds and quiet our voices
and our thoughts. Let’s put away our worries. Let’s go to God humbly, and keep going to God
until we actually hear what it is that God has to say to us. Don’t give
up just because you don’t hear anything the first time, or the second time, or
even the third time. Keep trying. Eventually, you’ll succeed. If we truly
open ourselves up to God’s Holy Spirit, if we truly are open to whatever God’s
Holy Spirit may have to say, if we truly are listening, eventually we will hear
what it is that God has to say to us.
We know God has something to say. Let’s listen.
No comments:
Post a Comment