This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “I Samuel 1-7” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, February 1, 1998.
Our scripture reading begins in 1 Samuel 7, beginning at verse 3. This is God’s word. And Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do return unto the Lord with all your hearts, then put away the strange gods and the Ashtoreth from among you, and prepare your hearts unto the Lord, and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.’ Then the children of Israel did put away Baalim and Ashtoreth and served the Lord only. Samuel said, Gather all Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray for you unto the Lord. and they gathered together to Mizpah, and drew water, and poured it out before the Lord, and fasted on that day, and said there, We have sinned against the Lord.’ And Samuel judged the children of Israel in Mizpah.”
Then turning to the New Testament, Acts chapter 3, picking up with this account at verse 11, Acts 3, verse 11, And as the lame man which was healed held Peter and John, all the people ran together unto them in the porch that is called Solomon’s, greatly wondering. And when Peter saw, he answered unto the people, Ye men of Israel, why do ye marvel at this? And why do ye look so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or holiness we had made this man to walk?
The God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his son Jesus, whom he delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate when he was determined to let him go. But ye denied the Holy One and the just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you, and killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead, whereof we are witnesses.
And his name, through faith in his name, hath made this man strong. whom ye see or know, yea, the faith which is by him hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all. And now, brethren, I know that through ignorance ye did it, and did also your rulers, that those things which God before had shewed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled. Repent ye therefore, and be converted. that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord.
And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you, whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.” For Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren like unto me. Him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you. And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that prophet shall be destroyed from among the people. Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days. the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in my seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. Unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, and turning away every one of you from his iniquity.”
Father, by your Spirit you give us life, and that Spirit joined inseparably with your Word. We, having received the Word and treasured it, receive your Spirit and treasure him. O God, he is as a witness to your Son, and Lord, we would receive that witness gladly joyfully, even as we hear him exalted in the proclamation of the word. May your church so proclaim Christ, even to the close of the age. We ask it in his name. Amen.
It is not easy for us to understand the significance of sin. It is not easy for us to understand the full meaning of his reappearance here in 1 Samuel 7 verse 3, after he had last been mentioned to us in chapter 4 verse 1. To do justice to either of these matters, his significance and his reappearance in the text, our hearts must be truly alive to God and His worth. Now, the reason I say this to you is not that I want to make you feel small, because you haven’t come up with the things that I’m going to come up with as we preach through this portion of Scripture.
God gives us teachers for our benefit. and may he continue to give us very good teachers in abundance. Now, the reason I tell you that your hearts must be alive to God and his word in order to grasp Samuel and to appreciate more fully his re-appearance here in 1 Samuel 7 is because it is the heart alive to God and his word that will resonate to the opening up of the man, the presentation of the man, and the flowering of the text, as that is laid bare before you. And it is that heart, alive to God in his Word, that will rejoice in greater appreciation to God at the marvels of his revelation. God continually enables us to see many things in his Word.
As we mature, may he grant us greater insight and illumination, always. But it is important to remember that here at the outset of this message and in these prefatory remarks, I have joined God to his word, and that we dare not separate the two. even though many do.
How sad it is, therefore, to observe those who say that they are alive to God, who claim that they are alive to God, but have no real or genuine interest in His Word. By some route or other, they have come to the spiritual vitality. that it is not specifically related to his Word. They have notions of God, they feel after the Deity and after the Divine, they have mystical experiences, but none of this is specifically related to the Word of God. For such as these, I dare say, a sermon on the significance of Samuel or the full meaning of his reintroduction in 1 Samuel 7 will be of little or no consequence. Such people, sadly, are not in need of the history of redemption or the history of God’s dealings with his people. They have God, very self-assuredly. They have God by way of their experience, and that satisfies them.
Of course, we might well reverse the matter. say that they have great interest in the historical figure of Samuel, and their names and claims do have interest in the details of 1 Samuel 7, while at the same time not being alive to the true God who speaks in his Word. College and seminary libraries have shelves lined with books from just such people.
May we all be alive to God and his word. reprising that word from our Lord more and more, more than money, more than silver and gold. That word being sweeter to us than honey dripping from a honeycomb. Our hearts bursting with spiritual delight as our God is more fully disclosed to us, even in the figure of Samuel. and in a text like 1 Samuel 7. As for the significance of Samuel, let me direct your attention once again to that classic we being committed to compare scripture with scripture in order to understand the full meaning.
That classic text, Acts 3.24.
This verse appears, as you know, in Peter’s second great sermon recorded in Acts. His first great sermon being his Pentecostal sermon found in the previous chapter, Acts 2. But here, in his second great sermon, preached to all the Jews who had run to him after the healing of the man born lame, Peter identifies Samuel as the head, the first of the line of the Old Testament prophets proper, who had spoken from God. Peter says, all the prophets who have spoken from Samuel and his successors onward announced these things, which Kela declares to these Jews.
According to Peter, then, Samuel is a pivotal figure. He is a significant figure, an important figure. There he may be eclipsed by others in the pages of the Old Testament Scriptures, by Abraham, by Moses, by Joshua, by David, by Isaiah, by Elijah. According to Peter, Samuel is a pivotal figure, one in whom the prophetic office and ministry are given unique expression, certain defining qualities.
Often we meet a personality like this in scripture, an inaugurating, unique, pivotal, even redemptive historical transitional figure in whom we are faced with someone who in fine covenantal style includes in himself those who will follow after him, includes in himself Those who follow after him. Those who, in God’s scheme, are bound to him. The two foundational figures for all human existence, for all human history, in this regard, are Adam and Jesus Christ the second Adam.
Think of Romans 5.15 in this regard. For if by the transgression of the one, that’s Adam, the first Adam, the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ, here’s the second Adam, abound to many. Or what about this verse? For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” 1 Corinthians 15, 22.
But we must not stop with these foundational and most important figures when it comes to this matter of the bond that exists between strategic, biblical personalities and those who follow them, those who come after them. You are given the pattern of covenantal arrangement and bond in Adam and in Christ, but that becomes the means by which you will read other relationships as you come across them in Scripture. Think about Abraham, one of my favorites from the Bible. when considered along these lines. Take stock of Abraham’s life, at least as much as is recorded for us in Genesis 12-14.
He comes into the land of Canaan from the north, from all the Chaldees and then Shortly thereafter, he travels down into Egypt, where he deceives Pharaoh about Sarah. Then he comes up out of Egypt, back into Canaan, where he has conflict with his neighbors, the Philistines, Abimelech, once more concerning Sarah, his wife. only then to get into a dispute that divides his family, a dispute with Lot, his nephew. Then to see Lot carried off captive by the king of Shinar, that is, the king of Babylon, Roth then subsequently graciously restored as Abraham and his entourage greet the mysterious figure of Melchizedek, the King of Salem, upon return to the land at the conclusion of Genesis 14.
Now, if you are paying close attention to this itinerary, You will have noticed the striking similarities between it and the history of the Jews as a nation. The history of that nation over which Abraham stands as covenantal head. Listen to the rehearsal of it once more. Jacob, descendant of Abraham, the one who’s given the name Israel, also comes down into Canaan from the north, from his uncle Laban’s home. His family descends into Egypt into slavery, only as a nation to come back up out of Egypt into Canaan where it has conflict with the Philistines, but in surviving only to become entangled in civil war that divides the nation, tribes separated from one another, then to see the captivity with Judah led away by the king of Babylon, with Judah later restored graciously, and the remnant nation finally brought to greet one even more mysterious than Melchizedek.
This one, the Prince of Peace, the King of Eternal Zion. You see now, if you have not seen it before, Abraham, the father of the Jews, stands covenantally bound to the nation. and the entirety of the history of that nation, that nation which he as yet carries within his loins.
By looking at him, we see the pattern of the life and the history of the people over whom he is the head. This should build you up in your confidence in the doctrine of predestination. Should it not? before the nation is even formed, you are seeing the history of the nation and the man. Is it not apparent to you now, the kind of God that you serve, who is surveying the whole from the conclusion of the matter? He sees it all, he knows it all, he has an ordainment all. This should build you up in your confidence in the Reformed doctrine of predestination before it happened. It is telegraphed.
Before Israel as a nation is formed, its history to which it is predestined is played out in its covenantal head. by way of extension, if you will, Romans 8.29, for whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. My friends, the case is closed. The matter is determined, it is settled. The Bible is thoroughly, from beginning to end, predestinarian and covenantal.
Now I don’t want you to think more highly of yourselves than you ought, but you are in the right place this morning. Because you see, this is where these doctrines will be honored and will be preached. Without apology. But this brings us back to Samuel and to his significance. You will want to see him in connection with those with whom he is biblically bound.
According to Acts 3.24, he is bound to the prophets. things will work themselves out here similarly to the way they have worked themselves out with Abraham and the nation of Israel. By looking at Samuel and the events related to his labors as a prophet we witness, he being that inaugurating, unique, pivotal, redemptive, historical, transitional figure that the entire history of the prophetic ministry to Israel.
That ministry will perform its service to Israel as the nation falls into corrupt religious and judicial decadence, as seen in the house of Eli earlier in the book of 1 Samuel. This nation will, yes, ultimately collapse to a double defeat at the hands of its enemies. Northern and southern kingdoms in Israel will be destroyed, with the sanctuary of God decimated and the Ark of the Covenant lost from view, just as occurs in the account in 1 Samuel 4.
But after the exile shall come restoration for Judah, returning from Babylon just as the ark returns from Philistia in 1 Samuel 6. We’re going through the beginning chapters of the book. But once restored, the continuing corruption of the Jews will show itself once more, demanding the Lord’s discipline and judgment, just as the Lord brings judgment upon the mammoth that is Shemesh for looking into, or even better, gazing at or upon the ark.” That’s the conclusion of 1 Samuel 6. Finally, as the prophetic ministry runs its course. there will be a move away from the accoutrements of that adored worship for God that characterizes the Old Testament order, with attention redirected toward the Prophet himself.
Just as in 1 Samuel 7, the ark in the beginning verses is taken out of view, off center stage, and Samuel now comes striding again into view. We haven’t heard a word about Samuel since chapter 4, verse 1. But now he re-emerges at the conclusion of this preview of the prophetic era for Israel’s history.
He re-emerges with a message of what? He comes with the message of repentance. Sound familiar? Are you with me? Just as John the Baptist will step forward with the message of repentance, John then being the last in the prophetic train, the last figure. in this march of the prophets. So it is, then, that Samuel leads us to John the Baptist. That is his significance. And John the Baptist leads us to Christ, the very one whom you have acknowledged to be the goal of the entirety of the prophet’s ministry, the one to whom you, by way of repentance, have the one to whom you even now have come to partake by faith, even in the supper which he has set for you. Your covenantal head, Jesus Christ, whose life includes you. Is that not so? Is that not so for you? I trust that it is. and may we all rejoice. Let’s pray.
O Lord, may we profit from your word and from those servants which you set forth for us in the word May we benefit more and more from them even as we work with your word and you are pleased by your spirit to grant us mercy. Father, may the significance of your prophets and Samuel himself be accented for us even as we are recognized now. according to the words of Peter, your servant, to be the sons of the prophets. Indeed, those who inherit the message and the reward of the prophets themselves. Father, bless us then as we come to the table, for we are those who come having been benefited by the prophets. having heard the message of repentance, having responded to the gospel for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.