Wednesday, August 20, 2025
Scripture Readings
- Primary Reading: 1 Samuel 1-3
- Secondary Reading: Psalms 96
Key Verse
1 Samuel 2:15 — “Also before they burnt the fat, the priest’s servant came, and said to the man that sacrificed, Give flesh to roast for the priest; for he will not have sodden flesh of thee, but raw.”
Devotional Thought
The story of Samuel begins in sorrow before it begins in song. Elkanah, a man of Ramathaimzophim, went up yearly to Shiloh to worship the LORD of hosts, and he took with him two wives: Peninnah, who had children, and Hannah, who had none. In that ancient world, barrenness was a heavy reproach, and Peninnah played the adversary well, provoking Hannah year after year until she wept and could not eat. Even her husband’s tender words—”am not I better to thee than ten sons?”—could not quiet the ache inside her. So Hannah did the one thing left to a grieving soul: she went to the house of the LORD and poured out her heart. Eli the priest, watching her lips move without sound, mistook her for a drunken woman. But God does not mistake the prayers of the afflicted. He remembered her, and she bore a son whom she named Samuel, “because I have asked him of the LORD.”
Then comes one of the most striking scenes in Scripture. Hannah, who waited so long for this child, gave him back. She brought him to Shiloh with three bullocks and flour and wine, and lent him to the LORD for all his days. Any parent knows the weight of that surrender; any Christian knows its pattern. But notice what follows: Hannah’s prayer in chapter two is not a lament of loss but a song of triumph. “My heart rejoiceth in the LORD… the LORD killeth, and maketh alive: he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up.” She had learned that the God who closes the womb also opens it, that He raises the poor out of the dust and lifts the beggar from the dunghill. Her song echoes down to Mary’s Magnificat, and it echoes into our own August days, when so much around us seems to be fading or failing.
Meanwhile, in the same tabernacle, a darker story unfolds. Eli’s sons, Hophni and Phinehas, were sons of Belial who knew not the LORD, seizing the choicest portions of the sacrifices and lying with the women at the door of the tabernacle. Eli rebuked them weakly and “restrained them not,” honoring his sons above God. So the word of the LORD came through a man of God: the house of Eli would be cut off, and both sons would die in one day. And into that failing priesthood stepped a small boy, girded with a linen ephod, ministering before the LORD.
Chapter three gives us the call. The word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no open vision. Eli’s eyes were waxing dim, and the lamp of God had not yet gone out. Three times the LORD called Samuel, and three times the boy ran to Eli, saying, “Here am I.” Only after the third time did Eli perceive what was happening and teach him to answer, “Speak, LORD; for thy servant heareth.” Samuel grew, and the LORD let none of his words fall to the ground, and all Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that he was established as a prophet. Here is the hope of this passage: God is not finished when a priesthood fails or a womb is shut. He is always raising up a faithful voice.
Reflection
- Hannah “poured out her soul before the LORD” even when her prayer was misunderstood, and she gave Samuel back to God before she ever held him. What are you holding so tightly that God may be asking you to lend back to Him?
- Eli heard of his sons’ sin and rebuked them, yet “he restrained them not.” Where in your own life have you settled for words of correction without the courage to act?
Prayer
O LORD of hosts, who remembered Hannah in her bitterness and raised up Samuel when the word of the LORD was precious, hear us as we pour out our souls before You. You are the God who kills and makes alive, who brings down to the grave and brings up; there is none holy as You, and no rock like our God. Teach us to answer when You call, “Speak, LORD; for thy servant heareth.” Give us hearts that honor You above all else, and let none of Your words fall to the ground in our lives. We ask it in the name of Your anointed King, Amen.
Psalm Verse
Psalms 96:1 — “O sing unto the LORD a new song: sing unto the LORD, all the earth.”