When God Speaks

SERMON: 2011-01-09--sam02--when-god-speaks-part-2 SOURCE DURATION: 00:53:19.000 PROPOSED CUTS: 2 CONFIDENCE: 0.95 APPROVED: false REASON: The entire visible segment range consists of continuous theological exposition and pastoral application material from the main sermon. The content starts with a reflection on previous teachings and builds to a point about hearing God collectively. Acoustic segmentation found sustained music at the start and end edge and moved the boundary to the adjacent transcript segment. ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE: available ACOUSTIC MUSIC INTERVALS: 00:05:14.840-00:05:24.540, 00:49:39.820-00:53:19.040 ACOUSTIC SPEECH OVERLAP: yes ACOUSTIC BOUNDARIES APPLIED: start, end Inline CUT markers identify each proposed audio boundary after the relevant word. --- ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT WITH PROPOSED CUTS MARKED --- [PROPOSED CUT 1 START at 00:00:00.000; remove through 00:05:24.540] [CUT] Well, if you were here last Sunday morning, you might recall that I mentioned that throughout Scripture God not only speaks to His people, but He speaks to very ordinary people. People like Simeon and Anna, people who were told long before Jesus came that they would see the Messiah and who recognized Him when He made His appearance in the temple. And He also said last week that when the Lord speaks to His people, it's never just to satisfy our curiosity, and it's never even just to make us feel good or to exhort us depending on what it is that we need. No, no, it's to reveal His purposes to us. It's to show us what it is that He's doing in the world with a view of involving our participation with Him, because we're called to be, as the body of Christ, co-workers with the Lord. And so, as we look to the story of Simeon and Anna, what threefold response did we note in their life to that revelation? Well, they engaged in intercession. They prayed for God's purposes to be accomplished, for the Messiah to come. They praised God. They engaged in worship to thank Him. And then they spoke prophetically to anybody who would hear and who would listen. Now as we stand at the beginning of a new year, it is good for us to remind ourselves that as God's people, we are saved to serve. This isn't just about you and me feeling good. This isn't just about you and me enjoying worship, yes or no, or I like hanging around with my friends and all the stuff that comes along with it, no, no. It's much more than that. It's being called and equipped by God in Christ to engage with Him in that ministry of intercession, in that ministry of thanksgiving and worship, and in that ministry of prophetic declaration. The church is the tool that God has chosen to use through which the waters of the river of life are to flow forth to bring healing to the nations. Now obviously if we're going to do that in the strength and in the spirit of the Lord, and not just out of our own hang-ups or mistaken ideas or whatever our own agendas might be, then it's of critical importance that we learn to hear from God. That we hear from God individually, but that we also hear from God collectively because there are a thousand and one things that you and I can engage in. There are a thousand good works that we might feel drawn to, and yet at the end of the day, the question is, for each one of us individually, and then all of us collectively, what is the one place or what are the multiple places the Lord calls us to put our shoulders to the wheel so that when history ends and we stand before the judgment seat of Christ, we can hear those words, "Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful over little, I will put you over much." I don't know about you, but that's the commendation that I want to hear for myself at the end of time, and I trust you do too. The favor of men is fickle as the wind, but the favor of God is eternal. Now there are a lot of stories in the Bible where God speaks to people, and one of the reasons I think He drew my attention to the story of Samuel this past week is because Samuel stands at the other end of the age spectrum from Simeon and Anna. I mean, if Simeon and Anna were so old as to have almost one foot in the grave, then Samuel is so young that he's barely out of diapers, and if God can speak to either of those two extremes age-wise, then surely He can speak to you and to me, who more likely than not find the age spectrum in between somewhere, would you not say? So as we look at the story of Samuel then, allow me to take the time to point out a number of things in the story that on the one hand are very self-evident, but that on the other hand I think have some powerful impact for you and for me, and the first is this. As we read the story, it becomes increasingly evident that God can speak to children. God can speak to children. I mean, that is the thrust of this story, is it not? Samuel is only a young boy. The answer to prayer dedicated by his mother Hannah to the service of the Lord came to the tabernacle as soon as he was weaned, maybe at the [CUT] age of three or four, so he may have [PROPOSED CUT 1 END at 00:05:24.540; resume after this marked segment] been anywhere from let's say four or five years of age to 10, 11 or 12, certainly no older than that because he's clearly a very little boy. There's a very important principle there that you and I tend to overlook, I think. It's my personal conviction that as God's people and His parents, we often underestimate the spiritual capacity of our children. We see them fidget, we see them roll their eyes, doodle in their bulletins, protest that they're bored, and there's no greater sin in the world today just for the record than for a child to be bored. They need to be stimulated all the time, and sometimes as parents and as grownups, we sort of panic about that and we say, "Oh my goodness, if I don't do something, if the church doesn't do something, we're going to lose our children." And I'm all in favor of age-appropriate teaching. Don't misunderstand me. But I'll tell you something, children have a far greater capacity for spiritual truth than most of us ever recognize that they do. And when they're rolling their eyes and when they're sitting there wiggling and when they're doing all kinds of other things does not mean that they aren't picking up a huge amount of information or that they don't have the capacity to learn from God. It was Jesus who said, "Unless you become like little children, you cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven." Bill Hyblen, a story that I shared with you a while back, was a young boy of seven maybe in grade two when he was deeply stirred when Miss Van Zolen, the teacher in his Christian school, told the story of Samuel. And you may recall that he went to the teacher after class when everybody else was running out for recess and he said to his teacher, "Does God still speak to little boys today?" And his teacher, bless her soul, was a wise woman and she said, "Oh yes, Billy, he most certainly does. And if you learn to quiet yourself and listen, he will even speak to you, I'm sure of it." And that, you may recall, became the foundation of a life in which Bill Hyblens has learned to listen to the whispers of God and that has led to a ministry that not only has swept thousands of people into the kingdom, but that has revived thousands of churches around the world. And I was only seven or eight, I remember it very well, profoundly stirred by a pastor's message that I am sure was way over my head, certainly geared to adults, but powerfully impacted me and led me in the direction where I find myself today. And just to bring it closer to home, a couple of weeks ago, a young girl in this church came to me after the service, if she could please talk to me, tears in her eyes, speaking about how God had been speaking to her and how she wanted to be closer to him and would I please pray with her. Please don't ever underestimate children's spiritual capacity. God can speak even to children. Now that having been said, there are in Samuel's story two extenuating circumstances that contribute to his spiritual sensitivity, and the first of those is his godly heritage. Don't know this morning how much you know about the history of Samuel. You can read about it in the first two chapters leading up to chapter three, which we have been reading together. But Samuel was the result of much prayer. His mother's name was Hannah. She was one of two wives married to a man from Ephraim called Elkena, his other wife was Panina. And Hannah had the misfortune of being barren, and of course in Middle Eastern culture in those days, that was not a very good thing. It really made you a second class citizen. Panina, on the other hand, had babies falling out of her at the drop of a hat. And she had no hesitation about rubbing Hannah's nose into that because while she was the one who had the children, Hannah was Elkena's favorite wife. Talk about a recipe for disaster. And people talk about reviewing legislation in this country about polygamy. You may have heard some of that, and why anybody in the world would want to be married to more than, don't misunderstand me, dangerous territory I know, but married to more than one woman at a time. It is our recipe for envy and jealousy and nothing but trouble, yes. So Hannah prayed much that God would deliver her from her barrenness, and as a result conceived Samuel and made a covenant with God that if God would give her a son, she would dedicate him to God and that he would serve the Lord all the days of his life. And true to her word, when Samuel was weaned, which in that day would have been about three or four years of age, she took him to the tabernacle and dedicated him to the service of God, and every year she would visit him and she would bring him a new little outfit as he was growing up, and that's the story of Samuel. And so Samuel had a godly inheritance that in fact overrode any abandonment issues that you think he might suffer at being left at the tabernacle so early, for scripture goes on to say in 1 Samuel 2.26, the boy Samuel continued to grow in stature and in favour with the Lord and with men. Very similar language used in the New Testament about Jesus, even as the song of Mary in the New Testament is a very close parallel to the song of Hannah after she had given birth to Samuel. So he had a godly inheritance and I got to tell you the older I get personally, the more I appreciate the nature of covenant, because if you as a mom and dad serve the Lord and leave that out in a realistic honest way, there is a spiritual environment that is created that God uses to impart grace to our children. And that doesn't mean as we often say that they automatically become Christians, but I'll tell you there's a world of a difference between a child who grows up in a home where God is honoured and where God extends his grace to a child who grows up in an environment where the opposite is true. Samuel had a godly legacy. Not only that, but Samuel of course was raised in the house of God. For scripture goes on to tell us Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the Ark of God was. Now that kind of makes it sound as if he was sleeping in the Holy of Holies next to the Ark of the Covenant, doesn't that? That's not what that means. First of all it wasn't really the temple because the temple wasn't built until many years later. This was the tabernacle in a little bit more permanent form stationed in Shiloh. And in order to accommodate the priests and the service people at the tabernacle they had built booths either inside the courtyard or just outside of the courtyard where these people stayed. In the Old Testament wilderness wanderings they all lived in tents, but that having been passed by something more permanent they now lay and dwelt and lived in these rooms. And this is where Samuel found himself and that's why he and Eli could talk back and forth because they were fairly close together. And so the significance of that is that Samuel was around the things of God all the time. And even though Eli's two sons were wicked and perverse, the proximity to the things of God resonated with Samuel's own spirit and helped him to grow up into things of God. And again there's a profound lesson there for all of us, particularly those of us that are parents. Faith, as you've often heard me say, is better caught than taught. And if we want our children to grow up fully devoted followers of Jesus, if we want them to resist the pull of the world which is present in powerful ways every moment of every day, we cannot change their hearts. We can pray for them, we can encourage them, but we can also try to create an environment where they are exposed to the things of God. It means we pray with them, it means we read scripture with them, it means we drag them to church even if they don't want to go to church, it means we allow them to be part of our conversations where the reality of Jesus is being discussed because what they will see in you and me will make a huge impact on who they are. And if you think you can drag your kids to church once a week for two hours and then spend all the rest of your time talking about everything else under the sun showing that is a higher value to you as a parent than the things of God, then don't be surprised if your children grow up saying, "I don't understand the relevance of this. I would much rather be out in the world where I can see it and feel it and hear it and taste it." Believe me in what I'm saying. Our kids benefit from a spiritual legacy and our kids benefit from a spiritual environment. And I'm not suggesting we preach at them inappropriately or try to make a spiritual lesson out of everything under the sun. But we need to be alert, we need to be in tune with teachable moments and in those teachable moments we need to be able to connect our own walk with God with their walk with God. And so God becomes real in their own lives as He did for Samuel as opposed to just another theory that is out there somewhere when the world has much more to offer that can sneer me and that gives me a greater sense of satisfaction. So God can speak to children, would you agree that God can speak to children? Can we pray in this coming year that God will send His Spirit among our children and that our children will prophesy, our children will pray and our children can speak prophetically. Don't ever underestimate the power of God in the life of a child. There's more. There is a second lesson we learn here and that is that there is a learning curve to hearing from God. In the story, how many times does God call Samuel before Samuel responds, do you remember? In total four times, first three times he thinks it's the voice of Eli and he goes running over and I can just picture poor old Eli getting a little irritated after a while. You don't know what kind of time lag there was in between but I can imagine him dozing off and there's Samuel again and again and again and it's not until Eli tells him, listen, I'm not calling you so if you're hearing a voice it's got to be the voice of God. So you just lie there and you say Lord speak for your servant is listening and then God comes to Samuel the fourth time and then Samuel hears the message of the Lord and starts as a young boy, his prophetic ministry. So what do we learn from this? Two things I think and the first is this, whenever we experience something new we put it in the context of what we know. Think about that with me. Whenever we experience something new we have a tendency to put it into the context of what we know. I was thinking about this a number of weeks ago in an entirely different context but the story that came to my mind was the story of Jesus in John chapter 12, Jesus is facing the cross and all of the tragedy that would befall him and he cries out and he says, Lord my heart is troubled, what shall I say, save me from this hour and then he says no it was for this very reason I came to this hour, Father glorify your name. In other words, when Jesus has to choose between his own comfort and the will of the Father what does he do, not my will but your will be done, Father glorify your name. Who can tell me what happens in the story next? Heaven opens and God speaks and he says I have glorified it and I will glorify it again. Now who can tell me the response of the crowd? There were those who said an angel just spoke to him but most people said it thundered. Now isn't that fascinating? Here you got God speaking from heaven clearly one of those rare occasions when he speaks with an audible voice because the other people said it's an angel who is speaking so they heard something but most of the people didn't recognize it as the voice of God did they? They said it thundered. You know what I draw from that? When you don't know what is happening you put it in the framework of what you know. And when God thunders with his voice and all through scripture it is always associated with thunder. If you don't know how to recognize his voice you put it in the context of it thundered. And you've got the same thing happening here with Samuel. Remember the scripture tells us that Samuel did not yet know the Lord. The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. In other words he had no framework for hearing God speak. Not only that but most of his culture didn't either because the Bible goes on to say in those days the word of the Lord was rare. There were not many visions. How many of us know? God doesn't always speak equally clearly or equally loudly. You look at history there are moments when the heavens are opened and God is right there. And then there are huge seasons where God seems to have forgotten his people and he quit speaking to them. Many reasons for that. But in the context of one Samuel it's because Israel has declined religiously. Haphnei and Phineas the sons of Eli who are the priests serving at the tabernacle are sleeping with the women who work there and they are defrauding people of their offerings. They are as crooked as crooked can be and God has remained silent for a long time. So Samuel has no personal experience of God and his culture by and large has lost an experience of God. And so Samuel does hear what most of us do. He puts it in the context of what he knows and what he knows is the voice of Eli. And so three times he goes to Eli until Eli straightens him out. Now why do I make a point of that? I'll tell you why. My experience is that whenever we talk about God speaking to his people there is often a high degree of discomfort. And one of the most common things that you will hear is, well I don't think I've ever heard God speak to me. And does that mean I'm not a Christian? Or does that mean God doesn't love me? Or does that mean somebody else is a much better Christian than I? Or does that mean that other people are holy rollers and they think they're better than I am and what's the matter with them anyway? Now listen to me carefully. It is perfectly possible for a person never to hear the voice of God because if we're not in right relationship with God we will never hear his voice unless he chooses supernaturally to reveal himself to us. It's our sins that often make separation. That said, if you are in Christ today and you have as best as you know how committed your life to him and put your hope and your faith and trust in Christ, then you are privileged through Scripture and through the Holy Spirit to hear the voice of God. Jesus says, "My sheep hear my voice and they follow me." So then why do so many people get insane? I'll tell you why. Because we fail to recognize the voice of God when it comes to us. More often than not, God does not shout from heaven in a big voice. I've never heard the voice of God in an audible fashion. There are very few instances in my own life that I could say without any hesitation, "God spoke to me." Don't you get a little irritated sometimes when people are always pulling the God card on you? "God said this!" Most of us don't live that way. But that doesn't mean God's not speaking to us all the time. Bible says He speaks through nature, Bible says He speaks through Scripture, and Bible says He speaks through the Holy Spirit, deep down in our spirits. And I've had to learn over the years that part of being led by the Spirit is learning to recognize the promptings of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes it's a thought that comes to mind and you say, "Well, is that my thought or is that God's thought?" Or maybe the devil put it there. Sometimes it's just a gentle impression deep in your spirit and you say again, "God, is that you? Is that the bad pizza from the night before? Is this just my..." How many of you know what I'm talking about? Put up your hand, you see? God speaks in myriads, in myriads of ways. But our job is to learn to listen. Because as we learn to listen, we will learn to discern His voice, and though we may get it wrong multiple times over, eventually we'll learn to get it right. And as we get it right, we become that body of Christ that is harmoniously bound together by the Holy Spirit so we can be the hands and we can be the feet of Jesus and we can carry out His ministry of intercession. We can carry out His ministry of prophetic declaration and we can carry out His ministry of worship in a way that truly honors God and that builds His kingdom. So in order to accomplish that, however, we need mentors along the way. For note again how it happens in this story. The Lord called Samuel a third time. And Samuel got up and he went to Eli and he said, "Here I am. You called me." Then Eli realized that the Lord was calling the boy, so Eli told Samuel, "Go and lie down, and if He calls you, say, 'Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.'" Now here's what's really interesting because Eli is an old man. And while the word and the vision of the Lord in Israel had been rare, he was godly enough to recognize what was happening. And so he was able to take Samuel by the hand and he could guide Samuel into a correct understanding of God and an ability to respond to the voice of God. He didn't just write Samuel off as a little boy or having a bad dream. That's what you and I would say. You know, it's a nightmare. No, no. He understood what was happening and he was able to mentor Samuel because remember, Samuel ministered according to the opening part of this chapter at the tabernacle under the tutelage and the leadership of Eli. And though Eli was a very weak man who didn't know how to control his own wicked sons, he was in his own heart a godly man who could impart godly wisdom to this little boy. And not only do our own children need that kind of mentoring, but you and I too, as we come to Christ, we grow up in Christ, we need to learn to discern the voice of God. And one of the most outstanding experiences in my own life in that regard happened many years ago, and some of you may remember this story. When I was in college and Dale and I, Dale Evenhouse, some of you will remember him. He was on staff here for a number of years. In the early stages, especially of our Christian life, we were trying to figure out this thing that we called guidance. How do I know it's the Lord? How do I know it isn't the devil? How do I know that it isn't my own wishes and all of this sort of thing? And we were in the school of trial and error and we made some goofy mistakes, I got to tell you. But one of the best sellers at that time was brother Andrew's book, God's Smuggler. How many of you have ever heard of it? If you haven't, you need to read it, 10 million copies in print. Brother Andrew is now, as best as I can gauge, 82 years old, was dramatically converted, born in the Netherlands in 1928, and took on a mission to smuggle Bibles behind the Iron Curtain in the days when that was still all in place. And when you read his book, God's Smuggler, it's a fascinating study, as some of these books are, about God coming into the lives of his people and directing them in such a way that they don't get caught and that they carry out the mission that God had entrusted to them. So we were quite intrigued by how easy he made this sound. And we heard that he was coming to Grand Rapids to speak and we made arrangements, we prayed as a matter of fact, that we would be able to meet with him for a certain delineated period of time. And we were successful. Dale's uncle at the time was the secretary of the Board of Home Missions in our denomination or something and lived in this lovely house. And I remember Dale and I spent a couple of hours that night with Brother Andrew and we quizzed him about how do we know when God is speaking? And how do we know if it's us? And we had a good conversation about that. But the bottom line was that when push came to shove, he didn't know a lot more than we did as a matter of fact. When we told him how many times it hadn't worked out for us, he said, "Well, same thing happened to me, it just never got put into the book." Well, you know, long story short, it wasn't all bad because at the very least we recognized that the problems that we were struggling with were not just our problems, they were universal and it's simply a growing up part in the process of being one of God's children. So there's a lot more that I want to say. We need to come back to it another time, but let me leave you with this. What do you sense God has been saying to you for the coming year? If we're all God's children and the Spirit of God is operative in our lives, then what are the nudgings of the Holy Spirit that you sense? What is he calling you to step out into? What fear is he inviting you to face? What challenge is he urging you to step into? And you know, just as well as I do, how easy it is to ignore the promptings of the Holy Spirit, how easy it is to just write it off as whatever, but you know, if we're ever going to be successful in engaging in the ministry of Jesus, then it's of critical importance that we pray for God to tune our ears to hear his voice. It's not arrogance, it's not claiming something more than what we can claim. We need to do it in the context of community because it is the mentors around us, people who are more mature in the Lord than we are, who can help us discern what is the voice of God versus what is the voice of our own heart or what are the whispers of the devil. But just because we can be led astray by the whispers of our own hearts and just because we can be tempted by the voice of the devil doesn't mean we ought not to be trying to listen to the voice of God. I would like to think the voice of God is stronger and louder and clearer than the voice of the devil. Let me put it this way. In the early years when Dale and I were trying to get into this whole business of God do you speak to people, there were a lot of people around us who said well, God doesn't speak that way to his people anymore, and there are all kinds of theological reasons that people can come up with, none of which match Scripture very well just for the record. But what delivered me from that was the realization if you ask people does the devil ever talk to you, everybody agrees the devil can talk to you. Well, my response is to say if the devil can talk to you, don't you think God can talk to you? And I'm not saying we ought to sit around waiting for the big moment and the big revelation, no, no. But we abide in Christ, he speaks to us by his word, he speaks through his spirit, he speaks in the context of community, can we pray together? Lord give us Samuel's ear and heart to hear so that we can do what God is calling us to do. Let me invite you to try that for this year, and then if you have questions whether it is the Lord or no one, talk to somebody who can help you discern that. And let's go forward in the confidence that Jesus said I'm with you always, even to the end of the age, and that when push comes to shove, he can give us what we need when we needed so that you and I can be faithful to the call of God. And then we come back to this Lord willing, we'll talk about how God uses his word in Samuel's life to affirm his calling. Because at the end of the day, you know what is the test? Does the word of God bear fruit? Does it pan out? And will God establish me in my calling, whatever that might be, in whatever area of life? And I believe that as the body of Christ grows up, matures as the hands and the feet of Jesus, we have not yet seen what it looks like when Jesus is fully alive among his people. And we go forth into the world with his love, and with his power, and with his authority. Will you join me in praying for that? Will you join me in being committed to that? If you're sitting on the fence, will you get off the fence? Will you give it your all, knowing that that's what Jesus did for you and for me? [music] Lord, pour out your Spirit On all the peoples of the earth Let your sons and daughters Speak your words of prophecy Send us dreams and visions Reveal the secrets of your heart Lord, our faith is rising Let all heaven sound the coming of the day There's gonna be a great awakening There's gonna be a great revival in our land There's gonna be a great awakening Then everyone who calls on Jesus' name Will be saved Lord, pour out your Spirit On all the nations of the world Let them see your glory Let them fall in reverent awe To your mighty power Sing to heavens and the earth Lord, the world is waiting Let creation see the coming of your day There's gonna be a great awakening There's gonna be a great revival in our land There's gonna be a great awakening Then everyone who calls on Jesus' name Will be saved There's gonna be a great awakening There's gonna be a great revival in our land There's gonna be a great awakening Then everyone who calls on Jesus' name Will be saved Then everyone who calls on Jesus' name [PROPOSED CUT 2 START at 00:49:39.820; remove through 00:53:19.000] Will be saved [CUT] [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 2 END at 00:53:19.000; resume after this marked segment]