In this sermon, Pastor Chuck Smith discusses the spiritual decline of the nation of Israel and God's search for a leader to bring about a spiritual renewal. He highlights the story of Hannah, a barren woman whom God used to bring forth a great prophet, Samuel. Pastor Chuck emphasizes the universal thirst in every person's soul for a meaningful relationship with God, which can only be fulfilled through a personal connection with Him. He warns against the counterfeit voices of the New Age movement that seek to fill this spiritual void, emphasizing the importance of seeking God alone.

Oh, let the Son of God enfold you With His Spirit and His love Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul Oh, let Him have the things that mold you And His Spirit like a dove Will descend upon your life and make you whole Welcome to The Word for Today Featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor Chuck Smith Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, California Pastor Chuck is currently leading us on a verse by verse venture through the entire Bible And on today's edition of The Word for Today we'll be following the call of Samuel as we pick up today's lesson in 1 Samuel 3, verse 1 And now with today's message, here's Pastor Chuck Smith We saw that the nation of Israel was in a state of great spiritual decline God was seeking for a man that might lead this nation in a spiritual renewal There was none to be found And so God caused a woman by the name of Hannah to be barren And for years she experienced the embarrassment and the disgrace and shame of barrenness in her culture It became such an obsessive thing with her that she got to the place where she couldn't eat crying all the time And when she went to Shiloh to the feast with her husband there praying before God she made a vow and said God if you'll just give me a man child I will give him back to you all the days of his life And she came thus in harmony with the desire of God God wanted a man And so God gave to her a son And true to her vow once little Samuel, which means asked of God once he was weaned she brought him back to Eli the priest and said for this child I prayed And God heard my prayer And now I am giving him back to God all the days of his life And so he remained there in Shiloh and was trained and groomed by Eli And actually became sort of a servant to Eli there in the temple at Shiloh And so we come to chapter 3 And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli And the word of the Lord was precious in those days there was no open vision Precious in the sense of scarce The nation was at such a state that they weren't really seeking God and thus God wasn't speaking to them There was no real prophet of God to bring God's words to the people The word of the Lord was scarce There was no revelations of God No visions And it came to pass at that time when Eli was laid down in his place and his eyes began to wax dim that he could not see And ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was, Samuel was laid down to sleep So this ere the lamp of God went out would indicate that it was getting towards morning It was the time when the oil was just about spent in the lamps They were to burn all night long The oil was replenished in the morning And so in the early morning hours Samuel was asleep And the Lord called, Samuel And he answered, Here I am And he went running into Eli and said, Here I am, for you called me And he said, I did not call you Lie down again, and he went and lay down again And the Lord called again, Samuel Samuel ran into Eli and said, Here I am You did call me And he answered, I call not, my son, lie down again Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord Neither was the word of the Lord yet revealed unto him Just a child, he had not yet had any real revelation from God This was all the beginning of a new experience for him As God was now going to begin to minister to him And ultimately through him To bring his word to the nation So this was his first encounter With God speaking to him And so the Lord called Samuel again the third time And he rose and went to Eli and he said, Here I am, you did call me And Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child Therefore Eli said unto Samuel, Go and lie down, and it shall be If he shall call you, that you shall say, Speak, Lord For thy servant heareth So Samuel went and lay down in his place And the Lord came and he stood and he called at his other time, Samuel, Samuel Then Samuel answered, Speak For thy servant heareth And the Lord said to Samuel Behold I'm going to do a thing in Israel At which both the ears of everyone that hear it shall tingle That is, your ears will ring Ring as though they've been slapped on both sides And you get ringing ears It's not a tingle with excitement It's sort of tingling with awe Of having been struck on both sides and your ears are ringing Because the word that God has For Samuel is actually For Eli the priest and of the judgment that is going to come upon his house Because of his sons and their wicked behavior And Eli's failure to discipline them Here is perhaps a warning unto fathers Of the necessity of disciplining your sons Eli it seems was a fairly good man himself The scripture really doesn't indicate that there was anything wrong with Eli And his relationship with God But his sons were vile His sons abused the privileges of their office as priest They were so vile that they caused the people to abhor the sacrifices of God And Eli would not correct them He did not stop them And so the sin of Eli and the judgment is to come upon Eli For his failure to discipline his sons Now in verse 1 The word of the Lord was precious there was no vision in those days God often times spoke through visions But there were no visions at this time Throughout the Old Testament we find many times God speaking to people In visions In the New Testament times God also spoke through visions Paul the Apostle speaks of the visions And he doesn't recount them in details But he just speaks of many visions that he had That capacity to see and to perceive in the spiritual dimension Now for everything that God does Satan has a counterfeit And today floodgates have been unleashed upon the public Of the many different voices that are coming from the New Age movement As this channeling and all of these things of the New Age movement Where people are being made aware of the spiritual dimension And thus the soul crying out for God Was reaching out for anything David in the 42nd Psalm said As the deer panteth after the water brooks So panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God For the living God David was not talking about an experience that was unique to himself David was talking about an experience that every man has That experience of his soul thirsting after God for the living God There is universally that thirst in man's soul For God That was created by God when he made man As we are told in Romans chapter 8 For the creature man was made subject unto emptiness And that by reason of him who created him When God created us he created us with that need for God to be complete No man is complete without a meaningful relationship with God Before you have a meaningful relationship with God your spirit is dead You're living in the body conscious realm which is the animal realm And men were aware of the missing ingredient And yet they didn't know what it was And now suddenly here come all of these people who are channeling These spirit forces and these spirit entities And they are speaking these lies But people are gullible because of this desperate need for God Now the Bible tells us that in the last days There would be many who would come claiming to be the Messiah Many false Christ And there will come One who will have all kinds of lying wonders And will declare that he is God and demand to be worshipped as God And all of the world will wonder after this man because of his unique powers Uncanny abilities And many will worship him as God The stage is being set This whole movement today Are setting the stage for the unveiling of the Antichrist And Jesus said that's what it would be We shouldn't be alarmed at these things The Lord said that's what it would be But in 2 Thessalonians it says that the Lord Will give them over to a delusion that they will believe a lie Because they did not have a love of the truth I mean it's just God letting them become What they have become Because they did not have a love for the truth God lets them believe a lie Tragic indeed That the word of God Is rejected Because the minute you reject the truth of God I want to tell you something You are a sucker And you're going to grab on to something That's really weird So the Lord began to speak to Samuel And he said I'm going to do a thing in Israel When the people hear of it Their ears are going to ring In that day I will perform against Eli All of the things that I have spoken concerning his house When I begin I'll also make an end of it In other words what I start I'm going to finish Now in the previous chapter Chapter 2 Verse 27 There came a man of God unidentified Unto Eli And he said unto him thus saith the Lord Did I plainly appear to the house of your father When they were in Egypt and in the Pharaoh's house And did I not choose him that is Aaron Out of all of the tribes of Israel To be my priest to offer upon my altar to burn incense To wear the ephod before me And did I give unto the house of your father All of the offerings that were made by fire For the children of Israel Why then do you kick at my sacrifice And my offerings which I have commanded In my habitation And you honor your sons above me That is he let them get by with all of this wickedness Rather than obeying God and really Dealing harshly with his sons He just let them go Wherefore The Lord God of Israel saith I said indeed that your house and the house of your father Will walk before me forever But now the Lord saith be it far from me For them that honor me I will honor Those that despise me shall be lightly esteemed And the days will come that I will cut off Your arm and the arm of your father's house That there shall not be an old man in your house And you'll see your enemies And he then prophesies concerning Jesus The faithful priest that will be raised up But the Lord is saying to Samuel I'm going to do it to Eli It's coming And I'm going to perform against him All of those things that I spoke Concerning his house And when I start it I'm going to finish it I'm going to cut them off For I have told him That I will judge his house forever For the iniquity which he knows Because his sons made themselves vile And he restrained them not The responsibility of a parent To restrain their children And therefore I have sworn unto the house of Eli That the iniquity of Eli's house Shall not be purged with sacrifices nor offerings In other words There's no sacrifice that he can offer at this point And Samuel lay until the morning And he opened the doors of the house of the Lord And Samuel was afraid to tell Eli the vision Then Eli called Samuel and he said Samuel my son And he answered here I am And he said What is the thing that the Lord has said to you I pray that you will not hide it from me And then he did a rather dirty thing He said God do so to you And more also If you hide anything from me of all of the things Which he said unto you I mean man he put the kid under a curse you know If you don't tell me everything God do so to you And more also If you hide anything and don't tell me all That God said And so Samuel told him everything He did not hide anything from him And he said And Eli responded It is the Lord Let him do what seemeth him good Interesting There's no sign of repentance And you wonder about this When he hears the word of the Lord He said well it's the Lord Let him do what he wants you know Rather than repenting And at least trying to correct things at this point He just accepts it It probably gives you an interesting insight Into the man's character and nature And so Samuel grew And the Lord was with him And he did let none of his words fall to the ground That is He began to speak the prophecies And they were coming to pass And all of Israel from Dan The other part of the north Even to Beersheba in the south Knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord And the Lord appeared again in Shiloh For the Lord revealed himself to Samuel in Shiloh By the word of the Lord So God began to work Through this young man Who God raised up To be a prophet And priest In Israel Now again to just Give us insight to the confusion of those days When God was raising up Samuel The word of Samuel came to all of Israel And now Israel went out against the Philistines to battle And they pitched beside Ebenezer And the Philistines pitched in Aphek And the Philistines put themselves in array against Israel And when they joined battle Israel was smitten before the Philistines And they slew of the Israelites about 4000 men And when the people were coming to the camp The elders of Israel said Why has the Lord smitten us today before the Philistines The men again Sort of just blamed God for their defeat Rather than getting on their faces And seeking the Lord and repenting before God They just sort of blamed God for their calamity Why has God done this to us It is interesting to me how that so often when calamity strikes People just want to blame God Why did God allow that to happen to me And they want to accuse God for the wrong things that are happening in their lives Now had they come to Samuel And had they said Samuel Seek the Lord for us and find out if God wants us to go to battle against the Philistines Then surely the Lord would have directed them If they had had a time of national repentance and prayer And seeking God, God would have no doubt directed them And they would not have experienced defeat It is interesting to me that people who don't really Want anything to do with God They don't want to seek the guidance of God They don't want to submit their lives to God They only want to blame God when things go wrong And thus was Israel and thus are so many people today Just blaming God for the tragedies and the calamities But never seeking God for guidance and direction for their lives We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse study of 1 Samuel in our next lesson As Pastor Chuck continues his venture through the entire Bible And we do hope you'll make plans to join us But right now I'd like to remind you That if you 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Box 8000, Costa Mesa, California 92628 And be sure to include the call letters of this station with your correspondence And now, on behalf of The Word for Today We'd like to thank all of you who share in supporting this ministry With your prayers and financial support And be sure to join us again next time As Pastor Chuck Smith continues his verse-by-verse study Through the book of 1 Samuel That's right here, on the next edition of The Word for Today And now, once again, here's Pastor Chuck Smith If ever there were a time where we needed to make a real commitment of our lives to Jesus Christ And a real commitment of ourselves to the Word of God it is today Because we're going to need God's power and God's strength to stand In these evil days that are coming And so I pray that God will strengthen you And that God will fill you with His knowledge And the knowledge of Himself And that you might grow in grace And in your walk and relationship with Jesus Christ May this be a week of spiritual growth May we not forsake the assembling of ourselves together And so much the more as we see that great day of the Lord approaching But let us be diligent in our commitment And in our service to Jesus Christ God bless you And keep you in His love Hey, have you ever seen a person who was once a drug addict or an alcoholic And then all of a sudden they became a Christian And they're like a different person They're responsible, they're happy, they're excited about life They've been changed from the inside out If you know someone who is struggling with sin Whether it be with drugs or alcohol Prescribed painkillers, an eating disorder Or a problem with gambling or pornography I'd like to recommend ordering this year's One Step to Freedom Conference and DVD entitled Inside Out Hear guest speakers Pancho Juarez, Jerry Brown and myself, Tommy Cota And see for yourself some extreme and amazing life-changing stories Of people who have been changed from the inside out To order this year's conference for a friend or a loved one Call the Word for Today at 1-800-272-WORD Or visit us online at thewordfortoday.org Again, the number to call is 1-800-272-9673 This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today In Costa Mesa, California