A boy who did not know the voice

The chapter opens with a supply problem stated as a fact.

The word of the LORD was rare. Visions were not widespread. That is the setting, and the next verse adds a detail that reads like a comment on the whole nation: Eli’s eyes had grown so dim that he could not see.

The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple where the ark of God was.

And then a voice calls a boy’s name in the dark.

He runs to Eli. Not me, says the old man; go back and lie down.

It happens again. And a third time. And Scripture explains why, without embarrassment on the boy’s behalf:

Samuel did not yet know the LORD, because the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.

Which is a plain word about how anyone comes to know God’s voice. Not by atmosphere, and not by proximity to holy things. Samuel had both. He slept in the room with the ark.

And notice who supplies what he lacks. Eli — a failing priest with corrupt sons, a man about to receive the worst message in the book, and about whom God has nothing good left to say — works out what is happening and tells the boy exactly what to do.

Speak, LORD, for Your servant is listening. The old man gives the boy the sentence.

That is worth carrying. God used a man under judgment to teach a child how to answer Him. The instruction was right even though the instructor was finished.

And the first message Samuel ever receives is against the house of the man who taught him to receive it. He lies there till morning, afraid to tell. Eli makes him tell, and then says the sentence of a man with nothing left: He is the LORD; let Him do what is good in His eyes.

And notice how ordinary the sentence Eli gives him is. Not a technique, not a posture, not a discipline. Six words that put the boy at the disposal of whoever is speaking — and the whole of Samuel’s ministry proceeds from a child being handed a line to say.

The chapter ends by reversing its own first verse. The LORD was with Samuel and let none of his words fall to the ground — the idiom from Week Ten — and all Israel knew that Samuel was confirmed as a prophet of the LORD. The famine of the word ended with a boy who had to be told three times.

The phrase the lamp of God had not yet gone out refers to the tabernacle lamp tended through the night, which places the scene in the small hours. Several readers have also heard it as a comment on the state of the nation — not yet dark, but close — and the double sense may well be intended.

Eli’s failure is stated earlier in the book: his sons were treating the offering with contempt, and he honored them above God. His counsel to Samuel in this chapter is nonetheless correct and is the only recorded instance of anyone teaching another person how to answer God’s voice.

Verse 21 says the LORD continued to appear at Shiloh, and there He revealed Himself to Samuel through His word. Even in a chapter about an audible voice, the summary sentence attaches the revealing to the word.

The formula in verse 19 — the LORD let none of his words fall to the ground — uses the same verb as Joshua 21:45 and 1 Kings 8:56. It becomes the standard way Scripture describes a message that was proved true by events.

Samuel is the last of the judges and the man who anoints the first two kings. The book that opens with a barren woman’s prayer and a boy who cannot recognize a voice ends with a nation reordered around what that boy would go on to say.

Look it upH3368 יָקָר yaqar, rare, precious · H2377 חָזוֹן chazon, vision · H8085 שָׁמַע shama, to hear, listen · H1540 גָּלָה galah, to uncover, reveal

Then read Hebrews 1:1–2 from Week Fourteen beside this chapter. God spoke in many portions and many ways — and one of the ways was a voice in the dark to a boy who had to be told three times what it was.

Where this touches1 Samuel 3 · 1 Samuel 2:12–36 · Proverbs 29:18 (Week Fourteen, Day Three) · Amos 8:11–12 · Joshua 21:45 (Week Ten, Day Six). Josiah, Ezra, the wilderness, the chariot, Emmaus, Pentecost, Apollos, Daniel, Stephen, Timothy’s household, Jehoshaphat, Nazareth, the dry bones, Agrippa and the Sadducees were the earlier scenes.