Category Archives: OT Lectionary

Old Testament Lectionary March 15th Mothering Sunday Exodus 2:1-10/1 Samuel 1:20-28

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

I’m assuming that most churches will want to celebrate Mothering Sunday this week, but when I looked up the OT lectionary passages I have to say that I couldn’t make up my mind between them, so I’m actually going to do a bit of both. Mothering Sunday is, of course, fraught with difficulties for so many reasons, but I believe that there is much here which can speak to all sorts and conditions of women.

One of the big debates of recent years, although I sense we’ve all got a bit bored with it now, is whether God is male or female, or, more specifically, whether we should use male or female language about him or her. I too am bored with this sterile debate, but what I can affirm is that God often exhibits traits which, in our particular stereotyped culture, we would tend to call female ones. I am in no doubt that God ‘mothers’ us. I want to suggest that both the mothers in today’s OT stories are in fact behaving in some very God-like ways, and by looking at these women we can learn much about what it is God’s job to do with regard to children, and how parents may reflect this. You will get it as we go on, honest!

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Jochebed, Moses’ mum, begins, obviously, by giving birth. Hannah, in 1 Samuel 1, does the same, although not until after a significant struggle and much prayer. Both of them reveal God as the life-giver, and affirm that when we create new life we are doing what God intended the human race to do, although the Bible also recognises, in several places, the heartache and grief of women who find it difficult or impossible to conceive. In a Jewish culture where this would have been a sign of being cursed by God the Scriptures take a different view, and give dignity and particular care to those agonising over childlessness.

Jochebed then has to protect her child, due to the particular circumstances in which they lived, in a hostile nation with a cruel and violent ruler. She is wise and resourceful in this protection, and reveals to us God as the giver of life but also as its sustainer and protector. She also has to provide for her baby, and does so by finding a caring surrogate mother who will even pay her to bring up her own child. Like God she is life-giver, protector, sustainer and provider.

This isn’t made explicit in the Exodus passage, but Hannah in 1 Samuel dedicates the life of her son to God. Many couples, even those with a very tenuous faith, feel the weight of responsibility on becoming parents and want in some way to ‘dedicate’ their child, through whatever ceremony the church offers them. And of course Christian parents who actually get it will want nothing more than to see their children continuing in the faith into which they were born, and eventually making the shift from family faith to personal faith and discipleship.

But perhaps the most difficult part comes, again from the Hannah story, when she has to let go. God gives us our children not as possessions to hang on to forever, but as gifts in trust. Our children are ours to bear, protect, nurture, care for, but also to dedicate to him for his service. The time times when they must make their own way in life, and a very difficult and painful parting this can be, particularly when the path they choose might not be that which we would have chosen for them, or when that parting involves them being suddenly snatched away from us. But just as they will always be in our hearts, so we, as God’s children, will always be in his caring, loving attention, even during those times when we choose to go our own way for a while.

God gives parenting, and particularly mothering, significance and dignity, because when we do it we are doing what he does. But his heart is also broken for the childless, the anxious, the lonely and, perhaps most painful of all, those bereaved of their children. Mothering Sunday is not just for nice happy nuclear families: all the joy and grief which come bundled together with children can be brought into our worship and intercession today.

Old Testament Lectionary March 8th Lent 3 Exodus 20:1-17

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

As we have looked at two previous covenants God made with his people, through Noah and then through Abraham, we come this week to a new and very different arrangement. We noted that the covenant with Noah required nothing from the human side: it was pure grace from God. Abraham had to do a bit more: walk blamelessly and get circumcised. But as we come to what might be described as a covenant through Moses, a whole lot more is required, as set out in what we commonly (but mistakenly) call ‘The Ten Commandments’.

It is true to say that this passage has formed the background to right behaviour in many societies: even if we’re not that good at keeping these ‘Laws’ we know that we ought to. Full of liars, thieves, adulterers etc as our society might be, we still know instinctively what is right and wrong, as even a most perfunctory watching of Gogglebox demonstrates. So what are we to make of this passage? If it isn’t about ‘Commandments’, what is it?

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The Hebrew refers simply to ten ‘Words’, which is significant in a language which isn’t short of terms for Laws or Commandments: read Psalm 119 if that’s in any doubt. I think it’s most helpful to think of these ‘words’ as ‘teachings’. In other words, if we want our society to go well, and if we want to live in ways which mean that we are walking blamelessly before God, then these are really good ways to behave. You can’t for example ‘command’ anyone to love anyone else, but to teach that love for God is a good thing makes perfect sense.

The fact that there are two tablets of stone is significant: it probably isn’t the case that they wouldn’t all fit on just one. It’s more likely to be the equivalent of copies in duplicate for each party in an agreement. But it is also true that the ‘words’ fall neatly into the first four which are about our relationship with God, and the rest which are about how we treat what Jesus was later to call ‘our neighbour’. Our society is, of course, much happier with the second category than the first, although Christians would want to acknowledge that without the first we struggle to stay motivated enough to manage the second.

So what are Christians to make of these words, particularly since we live not under law but under grace? Firstly, few would deny that a society based on the principles of respect for life, property and family would be a healthy one, our determination to destroy the latter notwithstanding. Paul noted in Galatians 5 that against good behaviour there is no law: live Christ-like lives and you will not come into conflict with the Jewish Law, even though you are no longer bound slavishly to it. Jesus, of course, upheld the Law, but made even more stringent demands on his disciples. It is interesting to note the seeds of Jesus’ teaching in the Ten Commandments themselves: the final one about coveting seems slightly unusual, not just because it is the one that every single one of us breaks regularly, but because in itself it doesn’t really appear to do much harm. So when Jesus tells us that anger can merely be the first step towards violence, lust towards adultery, and so on, we can see that covetousness is something which can lead us in directions it would be better if we did not start out down. Commandments they may not be, but these ‘Words’ are wise for us to heed, individually and as a society. And especially the first four.

Old Testament Lectionary March 1st Lent 2 Genesis 17:1-7, 15-17

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

As we move to the second Sunday of Lent we have for our OT reading the second of God’s covenants, this time with Abraham. Last week we considered the covenant with Noah, but as time has moved on there are some significant developments here. We noted last week that the covenant with Noah was entirely one-sided: nothing was required of him. It seems that that is the case here too, but actually there are two conditions, and two responsibilities on Abraham’s part. He must walk before God faithfully and be blameless (v 1), and he is to undergo, and ensure the continuance of, circumcision (v11) (although this section has been cut off by the lectionary compliers. See what I did there?)

Faithfulness and blamelessness take us back to the description of Noah in Gen 6:9, and they are not so much moral terms as terms of relationship. It isn’t that Abraham is never to do anything wrong, or that will blow the relationship for good. It is more about continuing faithfully in a relationship which already exists; not going off the rails or losing the plot.

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Circumcision can be seen as equivalent to the rainbow in the Noah story. God puts a mark on the created world to remind him of the special relationship he has with its inhabitants now that the reality of human sin has been acknowledged. Now he puts a mark in human bodies as the ‘sign of the covenant’.  Like the rainbow this is to be an eternal sign, although of course Paul has to explain later that it is not physical circumcision which means anything under Christ, but the covenant relationship with Christ through the cross.

But perhaps even more significant in this passage is the changing of three names. Abram becomes Abraham, which means that he is no longer merely an ‘exalted father’ but is now the ‘father of many’, and Sarai (the argumentative one) becomes Sarah (the princess, the mother of kings). These names stick: who ever thinks of them as Abram and Sarai today? The change is permanent, in line with their new covenantal relationship with God. But it is not just the human figures in this story who get new names. God himself is named for the first time here as El Shaddai, a name which bristles with translational difficulties, and which may mean God of the mountains, God the destroyer, God of breasts (ie fertility – quite probable in this context) but almost certainly doesn’t mean God Almighty.

So what? I hear you cry. I think the key verses, and the key character here, are v 15-17 and Sarah. Thirteen years earlier, in response to God’s promise that Abram would have a son and heir, he had slept with Sarai’s servant who produced Ishmael. Almost certainly they had assumed that because of Sarai’s infertility Ishmael was the fulfilment of God’s promise. But here El Shaddai specifically names and renames Sarai, and spells it out to Abraham that he will give him a son by her. Amazing though that seems, the story speaks of a God for whom nothing is impossible, and of humans who happily settle for less than a downright miracle. Thirteen years is a long wait, indeed it is twenty five years since the promise of a son was first made. But God is faithful, and to hold on to his promises, and to remain faithful and blameless before him, will eventually bring its rewards. And to be renamed by God is a deeply symbolic reminder of our remaking in Christ. One of my favourite songs is loosely based on words from Isaiah 62:

I will change your name

You shall no longer be called

Wounded, outcast,  lonely or afraid

I will change your name

Your new name shall be

Confidence, joyfulness, overcoming one

Faithfulness, friend of God

One who seeks my face

Old Testament Lectionary Feb 22nd Lent 1 Gen 9:8-17

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

One of the things you often hear is that after the events of 9/11 ‘the world will never be the same again’. Sometimes cataclysmic events do leave the world a different place, and the Flood narrative tells of such an event. This event, however, has even more far-reaching consequences: it leaves God different.

There is a really difficult text in the lead-up to the Flood story: in Gen 6:6-7 God ‘regrets’ that he has made the world in the first place. I leave the philosophers to argue over whether an all-knowing God can regret anything, but the point here is that the world has lost its innocence, and God must as it were renegotiate his relationship with it. The paradise of Eden has been well and truly lost, and as an act of mercy God decides to put an end to the violence and pain once and for all, whilst in even greater mercy he saves a remnant of his creation with which to start again. Paradise having been lost, though, it is never going to be regained. Human sin has become an indisputable part of earthly life, and so God has to make some new rules about the way in which he is going to cope with it. This is described as him ‘establishing a covenant’ not just with human beings but with every living creature. This is unusual in that here a ’covenant’ is not an deal made by two parties agreeing the terms: it is purely God’s initiative and God’s rules. It sounds much more like a promise than a treaty. He promises that never again will total destruction be the solution to the problem of sin, and in token of this he will use the rainbow to remind himself of this policy.

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When seen like this, the new deal tells us some radically surprising things about the nature of God. The first chapters of Genesis show us an all-powerful divine being at whose words creation springs into existence, an immutable unchangeable God for whose pleasure were all created. But now, almost as though he were sadder and wiser, we see his as someone who is moved, who has regrets, who shows mercy rather than legalistic judgement, who makes new promises, and above all who guarantees an ongoing relationship with a less-than-perfect world, but who might need a visual aid to remind him of all this. This really is radical stuff! There is a sense in which we might describe this almost as though God were becoming more human.

This is a highly radical and dangerous thought, but it might also be a helpful one. It isn’t of course, that the events of the Flood changed the nature of God, but it did change the way in which humans thought of him and relate to him. In the church we can get so used to all the ‘omni-‘ stuff we believe about God that it is easy to slip into the belief that the Father is the rather scary and inflexible member of the Trinity, so we need Jesus, the nicer one who really understands real life, so plead our cause for us, or, in some circles, the even nicer, even more human Mary. That God the Father understands the mess which is our world yet remains committed to it gives the lie to this kind of heretical but all too common thought. This passage is one which brings God closer to us. It doesn’t compromise his sense of justice, but it certainly sets it alongside his mercy.

Secondly, this text, calls us in a different direction, to a respect and care for creation. God insists that his covenant is with all living creatures: how can we treat the world with any less respect that our Father does?

Old Testament Lectionary Feb 18th Ash Wednesday Joel 2:1-2, 12-17

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

An extra for you this week for the occasion of Ash Wednesday. I’ve chose to comment on the Joel passage as I like it better!

One of my big beefs with the way in which we so often use the OT is about reading it as though the only purpose it had was to prophesy stuff about Jesus, or to provide spiritualised insights for 21st century Christians. This passage reminds us that these words were first addressed to real people, with a real relationship with God, but in a very different time and culture. People with a real and pressing crisis to face. The first rule of hermeneutics, or interpreting Scripture, is that

‘a passage can’t mean anything which the original writers didn’t mean the original readers to understand by it’.

So what was going on back in Joel’s day? We know from the context that the nation had been subject to a massive attack by locusts. If you’ve seen this happening on David Attenborough-type programmes you’ll know the devastation which these little creatures can cause, but what we don’t often realise is that it is much more serious than that. All the crops being stripped doesn’t just mean no food: it also means no seed to plant for next year. This isn’t just a tricky situation for a while: it could literally mean the death of the nation. What are people to do?

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The prophet knows very well what they should do: they should repent. He clearly sees this devastating plague as a divine punishment, or at the very least a removal of divine protection. So in the strongest terms, this book is a call to deep, heart-rending repentance, at a national level.

Nowadays, of course, we don’t really have big disasters like that, at least not in the developed world. If we did get attacked by locusts we’d probably spray them with something or other and it would all be OK. And the idea that a prophet could get the nation to do anything at all is laughable.

So we do our repentance a bit differently. It’s all about me and God, my bad temper, the fact that I let out a rude word when I hit my finger with a hammer, and those days I missed reading my morning Bible passage. Not earth-shattering sins, but it’s good to have a little clean out once in a while, isn’t it, and Lent seems a good time to do it and to try harder to be nice.

I can’t help but contrast the way we think of Lent with the gut-wrenching desperation of Joel, crying out to God for their very survival. I can’t remember the last time I heard a priest weeping with penitence during public worship, or such a commitment to intercession that it even takes precedence over food and sex. I wonder whether the personalised and individualised observance of Lent which is the stock-in-trade of the C of E is a bit like rearranging the deckchairs while the ship of state that is contemporary Britain is sinking before our very eyes.

Old Testament Lectionary Feb 15th Sunday before Lent 2 Kings 2:1-12

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

A commentary I read on today’s OT passage suggests that it is a story of boundary-crossings.

There is the obvious transition across the Jordan out of the Promised Land, but there is also the passing on of the prophetic anointing across generations, and the tearing open of the boundary between heaven and earth. As such it provides a helpful model of the transition which we are to make this coming week, from Ordinary Time into Lent.

Why is Elijah’s assumption into heaven to take place outside the boundaries of the Promised Land? We don’t know, but there is something about a prophet being without honour in his own land. As a parish priest I have known the freedom and creativity which comes simply from leaving my patch for a quiet day or a time of writing or preparation. Whether in the former El Tico’s in St Ouen’s Bay, at Dobbies’ Garden Centre or at a friend’s bungalow in the Wolds, there is freedom which I don’t feel at home. Maybe after all his conflict and confrontation Elijah had to get out of his ‘parish’ in order to be free to return to his Father. Maybe some kind of ‘getting away from it all’ will form a part of our Lenten refreshment, where we withdraw in order to return to our Father (although hopefully not permanently).

Elijah Elisha

The second motif is that of passing on the baton to his successor. Elisha is a willing pupil, reluctant to leave his master’s side for a second, and his request for a ‘double portion’ of Elijah’s spirit isn’t a request for twice as much, but rather that he officially become his heir. Lent is indeed a time for personal spiritual renewal and refreshment, but it might also remind us of our responsibility for others. What are we doing which will influence, train or disciple those around us, with whom we share a calling to speak and live the values of the Kingdom of God? Maybe for some of us it provides an opportunity to pass on some area of ministry in which we have found our identity to a new, perhaps younger, generation, never an easy thing to do if we have come to believe that we are saviours of the universe and that without us life as we know it simply cannot go on.

Thirdly, there is the heaven/earth boundary which is crossed as the river opens miraculously, as heaven sends down the fiery taxi to pick up Elijah, and most significantly as Elisha sees Elijah’s departure and is thus confirmed as his heir. Slightly after the end of our passage Elisha checks this out dramatically, as he strikes the river, calls out for the God of Elijah, and re-enters the battlefield.  Those who are keen on Celtic spirituality will be familiar with the concept of ‘thin places’, where the boundaries between heaven and earth seem to be particularly flimsy: maybe Lent is a ‘thin time’. As we give ourselves to deepening our discipleship, paying attention to our walk with God, and growing in our faith, maybe we will cross some boundaries ourselves, know a new anointing of the Holy Spirit, and re-enter that battle which is Christian living with new heart and new confidence in the God of miracles.

Old Testament Lectionary Feb 8th 2 before Lent Proverbs 8:1, 22-31

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

Elsewhere I have written a brief introduction to biblical Wisdom Literature: today we celebrate with God in this hymn of praise to Wisdom, who is here personified as a woman who, in the verses which have been filleted out for us, calls to people to come and learn from her. Wisdom in the biblical sense is best thought of using the French term savoir faire, or ‘knowing what to do’, and Wisdom sets out the justice and purity of her words, and calls those who would hear her to acquire that which is more precious than silver, gold or rubies. To know the wise and prudent way to behave in any situation is worth more than anything else: kings rule with her help, and where there is justice it is because wisdom has been heeded.

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But then things get more interesting, as we come to the part of the chapter which our lectionary compilers have graciously allowed us to read. The picture changes and we see wisdom less as a woman but as a figure involved at the creation of the world. The very first thing God did was to create Wisdom, before oceans, mountains, fields or even the heavens. Once brought into being, Wisdom stands beside God and watches him creating everything else, delighting more and more in what is appearing at his words. The climax is the delight of wisdom in the human race. Wisdom is either a ‘master builder’ or a ‘little child’ depending on how you translate the Hebrew of v 30. If you go for ‘master builder’ you see wisdom as the one whose very skill was used in the foundation of all things; if you prefer ‘little child’ you get the sense of sheer fun and delight which comes through in this and the following verse. Therefore, our passage continues, seek wisdom and you will find life and favour from the Lord.

Some have seen here a picture of Christ, present at creation, but this doesn’t quite work, most obviously because he was of course ‘begotten, not created’. It may be rather that we have a personification of God’s delight in his work. It is worth noting that Wisdom is definitely a Tigger and not an Eeyore: hers is not the voice of a prophet condemning the foolishness of the human race, nor calling them to account because of their injustice and cruelty. She has no hint of an apocalyptic voice either: she does not cry out ‘How long, O Lord?’ and call for his sorting out of the problems of the world. She simply celebrates.

I reckon it is pretty easy to divide Christians into two camps: those who believe that the world is essentially good, and therefore needs celebrating, even though it might have a few nasty bits in it for now, and on the other side those who see the world as fundamentally fallen and in need of rescue from itself, even though there might be a few positives round the edges. Churches tend to be either world-affirming or world-hating and –fearing, and this fundamental view colours everything they do. Of course both are true, but we do come at it from one end or the other most of the time. So it is refreshing to read a poem which wholeheartedly celebrates the goodness and creativity of God. Maybe to focus on this, in spite of the world’s problems, is a refreshing tonic as we prepare to enter the austerity of Lent.

Old Testament Lectionary Feb 1st Candlemas Malachi 3:1-5

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

I’ve gone for the Candlemas theme for this week, on the assumption that it is likely to be celebrated a day early in many churches, and also because it is an occasion I enjoy. The familiar words of Malachi, mediated via the gift of Handel’s Messiah, raise an interesting question for us.

This week I have been involved in a long facebook conversation which came out of a friend’s blog. Somehow we got onto the subject of ‘niceness’. We started off on why men hate going to church, but we soon arrived at the suggestion that church was too ‘nice’ for most blokes. I put the word safely inside inverted commas so you’ll know what I mean, but it was suggested that being nice is fine: kindness, gentleness and so on are good Christian qualities. But to me the problem is when we’re only ever allowed to be ‘nice’; when the harsher realities of life, and church life, are brushed under the carpet because they’re not ‘nice’. Stuff like conflict, reality, death – you know the kinds of thing.

Candlemas is basically a nice festival. You’ve got some all-age worship as an elderly pair of people encounter a little baby, you’ve got the beautiful words of what the Church has called the  

Nunc dimittis, and some lovely prophecies about Jesus’ life and ministry. But the OT reading, and indeed even some of the Gospel story, give us a different picture. This sweet baby comes bringing judgement. Many are going to fall because of him, Mary herself will know the pain of a pierced heart, and her son will naturally enough stir up great hostility. The truth is, he is not being born into a ‘nice’ system. Malachi, writing after the completion of the rebuilding of the Temple, is telling people not to get too up themselves just because a building project is complete. If the God in whose honour this building was raised were actually to come among the people some things would be anything but ‘nice’. The images of launderers’ soap and refiners’ fire are violent images, and the testifying against various categories of naughty people sounds scary for those people. They must surely reflect some of what was currently going on, and the images of  occultism, adultery, lying, injustice and oppression are not a pretty sight. In the same way Jesus’ ministry was going to be one of comforting the disturbed and disturbing the comfortable, as many of those around the Temple were to find out. Following him was no easy option, and he never told anyone it would be.

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On a larger scale Candlemas is about a change of direction: we face away from Christmas, and all the lovely birth narrative stuff with its shepherds, little lambs and the like, and turn towards Lent and Passiontide; away from birth towards death. This too is a turn away from ‘niceness’ in the direction of something far less comfortable and far more demanding.

To follow Jesus is to be challenged, judged and purified until the offering of our lives are ‘offerings in righteousness’ (v 3) Purification is not ‘nice’, but it is essential, and the end results are much nicer without the inverted commas.

Old Testament Lectionary Jan 25th Conversion of St Paul Jeremiah 1:4-10

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

One of my quibbles with small-c catholic spirituality, with its emphasis on the ‘Saints’, is that for ordinary Christians like you and me it can seem very de-skilling. Often based on a mediaeval and unbiblical distinction between ‘saints’ and ‘souls’, the language is usually that of emulating and being inspired by the great heroes of faith. But the reality is that actually I have never had a baby through virgin birth, I’ve not done much at all in terms of miracles, and I hope to goodness that I never get martyred. So I’m just an ordinary Christian, as opposed to the saintly super-heroes of the faith. I know my place.

However other bits of the church can be just as guilty, even when their heroes and heroines are found within the pages of Scripture. The calls of both Jeremiah and Paul are often preached as ‘types’ of calling for all Christians. Fortunately we have moved away from believing that if you couldn’t time and date your conversion experience you probably haven’t had a genuine one (although some people still can, and they need to be recognised as valid too). Jeremiah’s call is often held up as a good paradigm for present-day Christians, although the experience of most of us is a lot less dramatic. Nevertheless, there are some elements of this call to which we maybe do need to listen carefully.

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First of all we note that looking at these two stories together, conversion equals call. In both cases the call of God is a call to action. Jeremiah’s is specific, Paul is merely told to go to Damascus where he will receive further instructions, but both incidents imply a call to ministry. Too often today we concentrate on conversion as encountering Christ, and surrendering to him for the first time, as stage one, and we may or may not get round to stage two, our call to serve Christ, at some later point. Leave it too long, and we have actually allowed new converts to relax into ‘passenger’ rather than ‘crew’ mode, and it will be all the more difficult to recruit them into action.

Secondly, we see in many biblical call narratives (although not, interestingly, in Paul’s story) the motif of reluctance. This lack in Acts 9 may be the result of God having had, as it were, to hit Paul so hard that he was too stunned to object. But when we sense some kind of a call from God, there are two things to learn: a) if we feel nervous we are in good company, and b) our reluctance cuts no ice at all with God, so get over it!

Thirdly, I am interested, because of my particular personality type, in the negativity of Jeremiah’s calling. There are four negative tasks for him (uproot, tear down, destroy, overthrow) and only half as many positive ones (build, plant). Again, in Acts we do not get details of Paul’s specific calling, other than to stop destroying and overthrowing, but as we see his career panning out there is a certain amount of confrontation and resistance to the old ways of Judaism in which he was schooled and zealous. But I wonder how much of the uprooting and tearing down had to happen within himself, as the encounter with the living Christ turned his life, and his beliefs upside down.

Calling people to turn to Christ, which is surely the most important ministry the Church has, must, I believe, involve a good, clear account of just what it is we are calling them from, and what we are calling them to.

Old Testament Lectionary 18th January Epiphany 2 1 Samuel 3:1-20

Regular thoughts on the oft-neglected Old Testament Lectionary passages.

The story of Samuel’s prophetic ‘coming of age’ is set in a time when ‘the word of the Lord was rare’. What we might call the ‘supernatural’ action of God ebbs and flows throughout the Bible, and indeed has throughout church history too. Samuel appears at a time of low ebb, and his prophetic career is launched solely by the sovereign intervention of God.

I’ll leave you to decide for yourself whether we too live in a time when there are ‘not many visions’, but this passage raises two different questions: how do we hear and recognise the voice of God, and what is the place of children and parents in this area?

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Many of us, I guess, will have had times when we have sensed in some way that God is trying to get through to us. Those more used to this kind of thing, perhaps through charismatic renewal, will know what it means to have thoughts come into their heads which kind of feel like God, or see a mental picture, or experience a dream which feels significant. But so often we are quick to write these kinds of experiences off as our own thoughts, or even a result of that late night cheese we had. Samuel fortunately has Eli as his mentor, and he is quick to recognise what the young boy does not and to encourage him to respond appropriately. I don’t know how good experienced leaders are at encouraging others to learn to trust their instincts and listen actively to the Spirit, but it surely ought to be part of our ministry. The twist in the tail of this story comes, of course, when the message God wants to give is an uncompromising message of judgement on the very man who is encouraging Samuel to hear it. The message is totally without hope: those of us older in the ways of the church need to be prepared, when mentoring younger people, to hear sometimes about the death of our old and sometimes corrupt ways.

It is ironic, therefore, that Eli, who is so good at nurturing and encouraging Samuel in his prophetic career, is condemned because of his failure to disciple his own family. We’re told in chapter 2 about his sons Hophni and Phinehas, and their behaviour in terms of greed, the dishonouring of God’s sacrifices, and sexual immorality, and of Eli’s somewhat feeble attempts to discipline them, and it seems to contrast greatly with his care of Samuel. But we all know that it can sometimes be easier to deal with other people’s kinds than our own.

So how might your church encourage people of all ages to listen to God, and to expect that he might speak? We’re often told that prayer is as much about listening to God as it is to speaking to him, but rarely in my experience are we given any help in actually knowing how to do this. It’s a whole subject on its own, but my top hints would be to give God significant time and space, and learn to believe that the first thing which pops into your head is most likely to be from God, and is usually followed quickly by our own self doubts and rationalisations. My own experience is that children take to this like ducks to water, without the all-pervading self doubt of adults. We also need to help people to know how to handle what they think they may have heard, whom they might share it with, and so on. I personally would also encourage people to believe that the stuff in Deuteronomy 18 about putting false prophets to death no longer applies, and it’s Ok to have a God even if you don’t quite get it right. And let’s pray that the word of the Lord might not be so rare any more.