January 14: 1 Samuel 3:1-10

Key Verse: 1 Samuel 3:10
The Lord came and stood there, calling as at the other times, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’ Then Samuel said, ‘Speak, for your servant is listening.’

Devotion:
Samuel was serving under Eli at this time. One night when they were in their beds someone called out to Samuel and he assumed this was Eli because there was no-one else within earshot. When Samuel rushed to Eli’s side and said Here I am Eli woke up an insisted he had not called out. After a couple of times Eli worked out it must have been God calling out and told Samuel to stay where he was and simply say to the Lord that he was listening!

The Lord then spoke to Samuel and told him what was about to happen, but what he heard was not good news for Eli and his family.

Sometimes we find it hard to listen to God because we are so caught up in the world we loose grip of what He says to us and He tries to commune with us. This is nothing new because we have a whole history of people doing this in our bibles. The world is a place full of temptations and trappings to lead us away from God – the evil one has made sure of that!

God wants us to be able to stop in our lives and spend time trying to listen carefully to Him. Don’t be tricked into thinking other people are calling you or guiding you. They may well be being used by the evil one to disrupt our lives so we don’t get to listen to Go. It is hard to differentiate things at times and that is why God would like us to spend time alone with Him so we can get used to listening to Him...

Points to Ponder:
How often are you distracted by something in your life?

How often do you stop and give God time in your life?

January 13: 1 Samuel 9:15-20

Key Verse: 1 Samuel 9:17
When Samuel caught sight of Saul, the Lord said to him, ‘This is the man I spoke to you about; he will govern my people.’

Devotion:
One of the things I love reading about is the things we talk about as being fate or coincidences! Here is a man called Saul who has been sent out to look for his father’s donkeys and had travelled a fair way. He was now on a quest to find the seer who would hopefully be able to tell him where the donkeys had gone off to. Instead, God had planned something quite different for Saul.

Now Saul was a handsome man and very tall too so he would not be mistaken amongst a crowd of people. God chose Saul because of his qualities and because he stood out amongst men. But God also knew what Saul would be like in the end; though in the beginning he would be everything the people had asked for.

You see, God listen to the cry of his people. He listens when we call out to Him and hears every prayer. He wants to be able to answer every prayer, but sometime we are so caught up in life we forget what is going to be best for us. In these cases God does answer our prayers but will be standing by in case we forget about what we should be doing too!

God doesn’t want us to just accept the answered prayers and move on to new thing. He wants us to acknowledge the answered prayers and share them with other to encourage everyone. We are all in one church and we need to support each other because we are all God’s children!

Points to Ponder:
How often do you pray for things?

How often do you praise God for answered prayers?

January 12: 1 Samuel 8:4-7

Key Verse: 1 Samuel 8:7
And the Lord told him: ‘Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.

Devotion:
What do you do when people start questioning your faith or your relationship with God? Do you get discouraged and try to find a way out of the situation? Sometimes we have to accept what people are saying and leave them to it. Those are also the times when we need to make sure we are listening to God because He is going to have something to say to us!

Here Samuel is getting on in age and the people no longer want to listen to him. They see the countries around them who have kings and ministers who lead them; they now look to see why they can’t have a king! This is the dangerous age where people will rather follow a human being than follow God.

The difference between a king and a prophet is the king does not necessarily follow what God is telling them to do; they may well be doing things for their own good rather than the glory of God! God knew this would come and so He tells Samuel to listen to what the people say and tell them what their futures would be like living under a king instead of a prophet.

When humans gain power, they want more and with that power they demand respect in ways which are not Godly and not righteous. These are the ways which often lead to tyrants being made because the kings or queens get too greedy… This is typical human behaviour when they turn their back on God!

Points to Ponder:
Do you get discouraged by people not trusting God?

Will you continue to trust and listen to God no matter what?