But Samuel ministered before
the Lord. Now, in our last study in this
chapter, in verses 12 through 17, we saw that the sons of Eli,
Hophni and Phinehas, were evil before the Lord. It says they
did not know the Lord. They were refusing to honor God
when people brought sacrifice to be offered before the Lord.
The way the Lord ordained it was for the fat to be burnt first
to honor the Lord and to acknowledge our sin before Him and the need
for God to be satisfied first with the offering. It was an
honoring of the Lord Jesus Christ, how that He is our satisfaction. He is God's satisfaction for
sin. They refused to honor God They
would not offer the sacrifice the way that God ordained it,
and they defrauded also the people of God who brought their offering
to the Lord. They made the sacrifice itself
an abomination. It says that even people despised
the sacrifice of the Lord. It wasn't in verse 17, at the
last part of verse 17, for men abhorred the offering of the
Lord. They didn't abhor it the way God ordained it, they abhorred
it the way Hophni and Phinehas ministered it, caused it to be
done. And also they defrauded the people
not only by making the sacrifice that they brought to honor God
with, to not honor God, but by taking more than their share
of the meat of the offering than what God had ordained. Now we
learn in this passage that they also committed rape upon those
women who, it says, gathered at the tabernacle of the congregation.
There's debate about what they were doing at the tabernacle
of the congregation, but clearly it had something to do with the
worship of God. They either gathered there to pray, or some say that
they brought some certain type of offering to the Lord that
women were to bring at a certain time. Not sure about that, but
they were doing it at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation,
so they were coming to worship God, and these horrible sons
of Eli did the unthinkable. And God pronounces a judgment
in the part that we didn't read, and you can read it later. Where
did we stop? Verse 27 through the end of the
chapter, 27 through 36, God pronounces a judgment upon the house of
Eli because of the sins of Eli's sons. But Eli himself is also
blamed, as we saw. Well, I guess we didn't read
that far. We better go ahead and read let's read part of this
at least verse 27 and There came a man of God unto Eli and said
unto him thus saith the Lord did I plainly appear unto the
house of thy father? When they were in Egypt in Pharaoh's
house And did I choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to
be my priest to offer upon mine altar to burn incense? to wear
an ephod before me and did I give unto the house of thy father
all the offerings made and by fire of the children of Israel.
In other words, have I not been gracious to you and your family
for generations? Wherefore, verse 29, kick ye
at my sacrifice and at mine offering, which I have commanded in my
habitation, and honorest thy sons above me, to make yourselves
fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel, my people. Wherefore, the Lord God of Israel
saith, I said indeed, that thy house and the house of thy father
should walk before me forever. But now the Lord saith, be it
far from me, for them that honor me will I honor, and they that
despise me shall be lightly esteemed. Behold, the days come that I
will cut off that arm and the arm of thy father's house, that
there shall not be an old man in that house. And he continues
to pronounce a curse upon the house of Eli there. And though Eli himself is never
counted as a son of Bilal, as Eli's sons were called sons of
the devil, sons of Bilal, worthless. They pretended to honor and serve
God in the office of the priesthood, but they blasphemed God and perverted
the truth that God had ordained and the sacrifice that God had
ordained. And Eli, here himself though, Even though he didn't
directly, it seems, partake in the sins of his sons, he's harshly
dealt with because he tolerated the sins of his sons and benefited
personally. He said, God included Eli in
that statement, you're making yourselves fat from the offering,
rather than offering it the way that I ordained. So Eli was benefiting
personally also from the evil dealings of his sons, so called
in the service of the Lord. They pretended it was his service
at least. Now here's an important lesson in this. Eli clearly did
not approve of what his sons did. He rebuked them for it. But since he didn't stand up
to them early, Apparently when this rebuke comes they've been
at this a while. It was an established custom
for them to do these things. And Eli didn't prevent it. He
didn't confront it early and prevent this from happening.
So he's charged with a terrible thing. Look at verse 29 again. Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice
and at mine offering which I have commanded in my habitation and
honorest thy sons above me. That's a terrible charge. This
is exactly what our Lord was teaching in Luke 14, 26. Listen to this. If any man come
to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children
and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he can't
be my disciple. This is what the Lord meant by
hating your children. He doesn't mean just all things
being equal that you just hate your children. You're supposed
to love and nurture your children and raise them in the fear and
admonition of the Lord. But this is an instance where
Eli was to hate his children in comparison to the Lord. He
was to honor the Lord above his children and to do what was necessary.
And that's what our Lord was teaching there. Does this mean
now that Eli, like it says of his sons, did not know the Lord? Not necessarily, because all
of us are guilty of this at times, of honoring others above the
Lord, ourselves above the Lord. He said, remember at the end
of that verse right there, 1426 of Luke, also your own life. We've all been guilty of that.
We've honored others and especially ourselves above the Lord at times. It doesn't mean necessarily that
Eli was a reprobate like his sons were. In Eli's heart, He
did despise his children. He rebuked them harshly, and
he did despise them in this sense, in his heart. What they did was
reproachable, was reprehensible. And he reproached them for it,
but he didn't do anything about it. He didn't stop it. It's his responsibility as their
father to put a stop to it. And he didn't, and there are
consequences of it. And as we saw in the previous
study of this chapter, we see here the state of religion in
our day. And this is an important, important
lesson because this is all man's religion by nature. If left to
ourselves, religion will come up with this every time. It's
been repeated over and over throughout history. They're an abomination
to God in that they defile the sacrifice. That's the key to
all of this. What do they do wrong? It all
had to do with the sacrifice. That sacrifice is Christ. It's
the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. Something not to be trifled
with. Something not to be altered.
Something not that the will of man has nothing to do with. And
these priests imposed their will upon the matter. And that can
never happen. Under the old covenant, to defile
the sacrifice as these did here, it meant to not offer the sacrifice
or to offer it in a way that God did not ordain, did not prescribe. In our day, it means refusing
to preach the one who was pictured by that sacrifice. Nobody I know
of is killing animals in our day, so they can't pervert that,
but what they do is pervert not only the shadow, the picture,
but the very one that was shadowed and pictured. They pervert his
truth, his gospel, and change the truth of God into a lie. Think about what that sacrifice
teaches us. That Old Testament sacrifice.
What did Christ die for? What did Christ do on Calvary?
Why did he die? He died, first of all, to honor
God as a man. God created man to honor him,
and God's going to be honored by man. In spite of us, And that's
what the Lord Jesus Christ did first in his life and in his
death. He honored God. That's the burning of the fact.
God gets the preeminence. He gets the best first and foremost. He is to be satisfied. And to
satisfy God for the sins of his people. And also In dying on Calvary for our sins,
Christ became all that we need in our new life before God. All that we need, period. Christ
crucified is everything. Christ is all and in all, Paul
said. That's the provision of meat. That's the man who brought
the sacrifice and offered the sacrifice, taking that meat home
and he and his family being provided for by that. And these priests
defrauded the people and they dishonored God. By not honoring God in the sacrifice
and by not allowing the people to be provided for as God had
ordained, they were an abomination in both. In our day this same
thing is done. God is not honored nor man provided
for in the matter of the sacrifice in the matter of how sins are
dealt with by God. Both the dishonoring of God and
the defrauding of man is accomplished by the defilement of that sacrifice. If they preach not Christ or
preach another Jesus, which Paul said is not another, not legitimately.
He's not the one in the Bible, but he doesn't exist. They preach
another Jesus and in doing so, They're shaking their fist in
the face of God and they're depriving the people of what they need,
what they vitally need. Very clearly pictured here. They
change God's perfect sin-atoning sacrifice into an attempt on
Christ's part that accomplishes nothing without the will of man.
By this abomination that passes for a gospel in our day, they
dishonor God. For Christ to pay for the sins
of a person, And for that person, that sinner, yet to suffer forever
in hell is a miscarriage of justice. Just like what Hophni and Phinehas
called the sacrifice. They were offering sacrifice.
They considered it the sacrifice. It was a miscarriage of justice.
It was a crime. It was criminal. And preachers
today They exalt the will of man over the will of God when
they preach that man's will is the determining factor in the
salvation of sinners. How do Hofnei and Phinehas picture
that? They exalted the will of man over the will of God when
they did things their own way in the service of God. That's
what preachers are doing now. They say, well, I know what God
said, and they knew exactly. Phinehas and Hofnei, they knew
exactly how God had prescribed this sacrifice to be offered.
They didn't care. They imposed their own will on
it anyway, and that's what they're doing now. They know what the
Bible says. They wouldn't hate him so bad if they didn't know
what it said. But they imposed their own will. They make man's
will to be exalted above God's. They despised and refused to
obey what God clearly revealed is His will. And that His will
is preeminent and sovereign in salvation. They will not preach
it, they will not allow it. They will, in other words, as
Paul said in Romans 1, when they knew God, they're without excuse. They don't know Him savingly,
they don't know Him spiritually, but they know Him. And they refuse
to glorify Him as God. And the poor sinner, who desperately
needs for God to do something for him, The helpless, hopeless
sinner, he doesn't have any hope when these fools are at the helm,
when they're doing what they do. A Savior who dies for all,
and yet most of whom he dies for go to hell anyway, is no
Savior. He's no provision for a sinner. He can't do anything
for a sinner. A gospel that calls upon a lame
man to take the first step is a mockery to the souls of men. And if you think that God's judgment
on Eli's house is harsh, think about what has been destroyed
by these reprobates. And God has pronounced judgment
upon the false religion of our day too, has he not? We saw it
in the Pharisees in the New Testament. Woe unto you! Woe unto you! He
said to them, point blank, you're of your father the devil, just
like he called these sons of Eli sons of the devil. He said,
you're of your father the devil. That's why they did the works
of your father you will do. What does he do? He perverts
the truth of God. That's what he does. Hath God
said? Did God say you should not eat?
He's been doing it from the beginning. They turn the truth of God into
a lie. They turn God's house of prayer
into a den of thieves. He called him on it when he came
down here, didn't he? They turn the place of honor
and the worship of God into an abomination and not being satisfied
with not entering into the kingdom of God themselves, they bar others
also from entering in by perverting what God has ordained, what God
has revealed. They blaspheme the character,
the glorious character of God himself. They make God Almighty
to be a beggar at the feet of men instead of the other way
around like it truly is. They make God a failure. He died
to save people, everybody from their... He died to save everybody.
He didn't save everybody. That's what you call failure. They make Him an impotent spectator
as His own purposes are thwarted and manipulated by man in His
own will overruled by the will of worms. You think their punishment
was too harsh? They take that which is most
sacred, most precious to God and to sinners. The blood of
his own darling son. And as Paul put it, they trample
it under their feet. And they do all of it for their
own gain. Now the Lord's purpose, it's
important that we understand and think about this and delight
in it for a little while, the Lord's purpose is never thwarted.
Despite all their attempts. Despite the whole world gathering
together, Jew and Gentile, and despising his son and expressing
that in the most, in the fullest way they possibly
could at Calvary. God's purpose is not thwarted.
Was God's purpose thwarted at Calvary? No. That is the purpose
of God fulfilled at Calvary. And yet man did his worst. God did his best. If you can
even call anything that God does his best. How can anything that
God does be any better than anything else? I don't know, but I know
this. God's never been glorified anywhere like at Calvary. And
sinners have never been blessed and favored anywhere like at Calvary. But his purposes are never thwarted,
not at all. Job learned that on the ash heap,
didn't he? He said, I know that thou canst do anything and that
no thought of thine can be hindered. Nobody can stay his hand or even
say unto him, what doest thou? The evil of these men is not
diminished in that God uses it to accomplish his purposes. But
just as Hannah prayed in the beginning of this text, in verse
nine of our chapter, she prayed what? The Lord will keep the
feet of his saints. Even when the only place of worship
that they had was defiled and turned into an abomination, God's
still keeping their feet. Even when their world is turned
upside down, God's still keeping their feet. In the midst of all of this,
God has His Samuel, serving Him and honoring Him in the sacrifice,
and being content with God's provision the way that God provided
it, the way that God ordained it, And though the reprobate
religion of both that day and ours would deceive the very elect,
if possible, we know from God's word, Matthew
24, 24, that it is not possible. Though they changed the truth
of God into a lie, they offered the sacrifice in a way that God
did not own. They didn't fool any of God's
people. They knew it was wrong and they pleaded with those evil
men to honor God in it, and then take what they wanted. But they
wouldn't do it. But all of this somehow, in spite
of all of God's enemies, works together for the good of His
people. They're not harmed in any way. No religion today defiles
the sacrifice and deceives the hearts of the masses Our Lord
Jesus Christ assures us. Look at John chapter 10. Turn over there with me to John
chapter 10. This is so important and comforting in light of our
text. These evil men had turned the very worship of God. Imagine
if you didn't have any place. They couldn't just go to another
place to worship God. John 10 verse 1, Verily, verily, I say unto you,
he that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth
up some other way, the same as a thief and a robber, there is
no other way. It's Christ exactly the way that
God has ordained, that God has provided, that God sent him for. or you're a thief and a robber,
but he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the porter openeth, and
the sheep hear his voice. And he calleth his own sheep
by name, and leadeth them out. And when he putteth forth his
own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him, for
they know his voice. And a stranger they will not
follow, but will flee from him, for they know not the voice of
strangers. These people, some of them, the
ones mentioned there in that one verse, they weren't confused.
They weren't deceived by what these priests were doing. They
didn't just go along with it. They said, wait a minute. God's got
to be honored. Honor God. And then if you must
take all of the meat, take it. We come here to honor God. What
are you going to do? They weren't deceived. They didn't
hear their voice. A stranger they will not follow.
In this parable, verse 6, spake Jesus unto them, but they understood
not what things they were which he spake unto them. They didn't
understand in the book of 1 Samuel. They didn't understand in John
10. They don't understand now. Those who know him not, but his
sheep will hear his voice only, and they will follow him. We
have an account of some of them in this very passage in which
this horrible abomination was taking place. And though we today
are grieved and angered at the evil of the world around us,
and especially the evil that goes on in the name of our Lord
in religion, what do we do? What do we do about it? What
do we... What about us? Is there no hope because this
world is so wicked and vile? Right after verse 17 in our text. Look back in our text again.
Verse 17. Wherefore the sin of the young
men was very great before the Lord. For men abhorred the offering
of the Lord. They made it so that people couldn't
even stand to bring their offerings to God because they couldn't
stand to see how these evil priests were perverting things and imposing
their own will. And how evil they were. So apparently
they just quit bringing it, bringing sacrifice. They hated it. But, verse 18, but Samuel ministered
before the Lord, being a child girded with a linen ephod. Moreover,
his mother made him a little coat and brought it to him from
year to year when she came up with her husband to offer the
yearly sacrifice. There's some wonderful language
here. This is not just a story of a
mother bringing her child a coat. He wore a linen ephod. That was
a picture of the righteousness of Christ. Samuel wore that ephod. And his parents came. What did
they come to do? Not just to give him a coat.
That's enchanting and all. And there may be some symbolism
in that. But look at the last part of verse 19. She came up
with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice. And Eli blessed Elkanah and his
wife. While God pronounced a curse
upon Eli's family, Eli's sons, God pronounced His blessing upon
Elkanah and his wife, and said, The Lord give thee seed of this
woman for the loan which is lent to the Lord, which was Samuel.
And they went unto their own home. And the Lord visited Hannah,
so that she conceived and bare three sons and two daughters.
And the child Samuel grew before the Lord. And then right after
the passage, look at verses 22. We have that dark verse, verse
17. They were horrible. I don't even
want to talk about what they did because it's disgusting.
They were an abomination to God. They knew not the Lord. They
were sons of the devil and they manifested that. But God's blessing
was on a few people in this passage. And then look at this next passage,
verses 22-25. Now, Eli was very old and heard
all that his sons did unto all Israel, and how that they lay
with the women that assembled at the door of the tabernacle
of the congregation. He said unto them, Why do ye such things?
for I hear of your evil dealings by all these people. Nay, my
sons, for it is no good report that I hear you make the Lord's
people to transgress. What a horrible thing. People
didn't have any other, anywhere to go. He said if one man sin against
another the judge shall judge him, but if a man sin against
the Lord in this Now the priests entreated there was a mediator
for people that committed sins all other sins Adultery theft Covetousness,
whatever it was. There's a sacrifice for that.
But when you profane the sacrifice of When you despise the Lord
Jesus Christ and reject him, who's going to intercede for
you now? If you have no mediator, if you reject the mediator of
God, there's one God and one mediator between God and man,
the man Christ Jesus. If you defile yourself in the
sacrifice, who shall entreat for him? Who
shall entreat for the one who rejects and perverts the sacrifice
of Christ. Notwithstanding, they hearkened
not unto the voice of their father because the Lord would slay them. Again, interesting order there. It doesn't say the Lord would
slay them because they hearkened not to their father and didn't
do the right thing. It says they didn't do the right thing because
the Lord was going to kill them. Reserved to the blackness of
darkness forever. But look at verse 26 again dark
and then some light. The child Samuel grew on and
was in favor both with the Lord and also with men. Now Elkanah and Hannah and Samuel
the three blessed of the Lord in favor with God serving the
Lord, worshiping him the way he ordained by the sacrifice
that God ordained, by the successful, powerful, glorious sacrifice
of Christ, the way he is in reality, pictured here. And these three,
Elkanah and Hannah and Sam, they knew what was going on. They
knew what Eli's sons were doing and what they caused the others
to do in the priesthood. And I'm sure it was a grief to
them. I'm sure it made them mad. Don't you imagine? How could
it not? But it didn't change them a single
bit. It didn't change them at all. They came and worshipped
anyway. They came and brought their sacrifice anyway. They
prospered in the blessing of the Lord anyway. They grew in the service. Samuel
grew in the service and they continued to come and bring the
sacrifice and in the knowledge of our Lord Anyway, the Lord
prepared a table Before them in the very presence of their
enemies It doesn't say they argued with
them or confronted them in any way They just went about their
business of honoring God in their life. They brought the sacrifice
and they went home and Samuel, his whole life was dedicated
to the service of the Lord, as some are now. But what about
Elkanah and Hannah? They did what God had ordered.
They honored the sacrifice of the Lord and went home. They
served the Lord at home. It doesn't matter what you do.
Honor the Lord in it. Honor the sacrifice. Exalt the
Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever you do, whether you're
at home or at the grocery store or at work, wherever you are.
Not everybody is a preacher. Not everybody is even a great
witness in the sense that you can talk to other people that
way. Honor the Lord where you are with what the Lord has blessed
you with. With all your heart. And this is us. They just did
what God told them to do. They just honored the Lord the
way they knew how. By God's grace. In spite of all
of it. While all of that was going on
around them, they just honored him. And this is us. I don't
want to debate heretics, do you? I don't want to talk to them.
I'm sure not going to put a microphone in front of one of them. I don't care what all the false
religions of our day teach. I don't care. I don't study heresy. Don't want to. Don't want to
know what they teach. Doesn't matter. It's not Christ. It's anti-Christ. That's all
we need to know. By God's grace, we study His
Word, we hear His Word, we learn of Him. He said, take my yoke
upon you and learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart.
And you'll find rest unto your souls. And look at the language
of verse 26 for a minute. The child Samuel grew on and
was in favor both with the Lord and also with men. We've got to see a couple of
things here now two things At least first of all, this is in
complete contrast to those who did not know God And I want to call your attention
to that verse because I've been I keep saying that tonight that
it says that about them But we saw this last time in verse 12
of our tech now the sons of Eli were sons of the devil Malala
and They knew not the Lord. That's the problem now. That's
the problem. To know Him is life everlasting.
To know Him is everything. And we know Him because
He knew us eternally. But notice that this is in complete
contrast to those who did not know God. These reprobate sons
of Bilal. We learn from the text that Hophniah
and Phinehas not only provoked the wrath of God, but the people
hated them too. The people couldn't even stand
to come before Him and offer sacrifice. They hated Him so
bad at what they were doing. In verse 17 we saw that. God
and men. They dishonored God and they
defrauded the people. God first, and then man. And notice that it was the ones
who desired to honor God that they had a problem with Eli's
sons. In verse 16, it was the ones
who said, you honor God in this, you're not honoring God in the
sacrifice. That was what bothered them the most. It wasn't that
they were getting cheated out of some meat. Now you see the
grace of God in these people here. They didn't say, look now,
you're taking more meat than you, I can't even feed myself.
They didn't complain about that at all. In fact, they said take
all of it. But you honor God. This is what the sacrifice is
for. You burn that fat before the Lord and then take whatever
you want. So it was the ones who honored, who knew and honored
the Lord and honored His Son by faith. They honored Him in
that sacrifice. Those are the ones who had a
problem with Eli's sons. They are the ones that matter.
What this godless world thinks about you or anybody else, what
they think about Joel Osteen, what they think about you, it
doesn't make any difference. It's meaningless. Their praise and
favor is meaningless and their wrath is meaningless. Abraham
showed what he thought of the praise and favor of men in genesis
14 at the battle of the kings after the battle of the kings
When king the king of sodom offered abraham all the spoils of war
He said give me the people and you take all the spoils and abraham
said in verse 22 of genesis 14 to the king of sodom I have lift
up mine hand unto the lord the most high god the possessor of
heaven and earth Everything is His, and my hand is held open
to Him. I receive what I get from Him,
that I will not take from a thread even to a shoelatchet, that I
will not take anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say,
I made Abraham rich. Now the Lord uses people, He uses evil people to bless
His people financially, monetarily, in everything. But when it comes down to the
honor of the Lord, Abraham said, keep it, keep it. And regarding the wrath of man,
David said in Psalm 118, six, the Lord is on my side. I will
not fear. What can man do unto me? That's a good question, isn't
it? What can man do unto me? The Lord is on my side. That's the first thing we see
in the language of verse 26 there. And secondly this in Luke 2 52
it says our Lord Jesus as a child he says he increased in wisdom
and stature and in favor with God and man. As he is, so are we in this world.
So it was with his people, his three people, his three elect
who are identified in our text in 1 Samuel here. Samuel grew
in favor with God and men. As he is, so are we. Our Lord
Jesus Christ grew in stature and wisdom and in favor. with
God and men. Now we know that our Lord was
not always in favor, didn't always have the favor of all men. That's
certainly true and in some sense he doesn't have the favor of
any of the people of this world. Again it's the people of God
that matter to God. And I tell you that he didn't
want to have the favor of all men did he? He didn't look for
it. He didn't expect it and didn't
want it. When there was contention though
with him, when there was opposition to him, when there was hatred,
and they attempted to kill him, it was all on their part, wasn't
it? Not his. If he came down here to kill
them, how long would that take? It was all on their part. He went about doing nothing but
good. He never did anything to harm
anybody while he was on this earth. He went about doing nothing but
good, but they hated him so bad that even the one, the perfect
son of God who did nothing but good things, they hated everything
he did. They hated everything he said. They tried to kill him every
chance they got. And I pray that if we have any problem, if we
have a problem with anybody in this world, then we may. I pray that it will be because
and only because they hate the Lord Jesus Christ. I don't want
to have a problem with anybody in this world for any other reason
than that. If you hate my Savior, we may well have a problem. Other
than that, not that important. Now one final thing here look
at verse 18 back in our text 1st Samuel chapter 2 verse 18
I've mentioned these things already but I want us to see this Samuel
ministered before the Lord being a child girded with a linen ephod
you can study that through the scripture And you'll see, as
I'm telling you right now, that Lennon Ephod was a picture of
the righteousness of Christ. That's what the priesthood wore.
That's what those in service of the Lord wore. They were pictures
of Christ themselves. They ministered unto God for
the people and to the people for God. They served as mediators,
in a sense, between God and men because they were picturing the
one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And
that Lennon Ephod pictured his righteousness. And then verse
19 we saw the last part of verse 19 that his parents They brought
their yearly sacrifice to the lord The sacrifice The righteousness
and samuel was able to wear that righteous that the righteousness
of christ. Why because of the sacrifice?
Who are these arrayed in white? Well, they're the ones that washed
their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. That's
who So it's the blood it's the precious blood of Christ and
with the sacrifice that they brought the blood of Christ again
and then in verse 29 Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice
and at mine offering The ephod pictured righteousness
because the priest pictured Christ And that righteousness is had
by the blood of the sacrifice. So in one verse we have one clothed
in righteousness Because of the sacrifice in another we have
a married couple honoring God in the offering of the sacrifice
and in the last one there We read verse 29. We have someone
accused it of kicking at God's sacrifice. Do you know what that
means? To kick at the sacrifice interesting word. It means to
tread on or to trample down Turn to Hebrews chapter 10 Hebrews 10. I quoted this verse a while ago.
Now you know where I'm going. This is nothing new. Those who
know not God, they hate God and they reject God. But how do they
do it? It's always been the same. They trample the sacrifice. They
despise the blood. They despise the sovereign savior
of sinners. The successful, victorious, Christ
who made his very soul an offering for the sins of his people And
obtained eternal redemption for them Hebrews 10 26 For if we
sin willfully After that we have received the knowledge of the
truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin Just like it
said in our text in 1st Samuel chapter 2 you remember he said
if you sin If you sin against the Lord Who's gonna who's gonna
intercede for you? I? And clearly he's not talking
about just every sin that we commit by nature because the
priests interceded. There was a clear answer to that.
But he's talking about there in 1 Samuel 2, if you despise
and defile the sacrifice, the atonement, then what hope do
you have? That's exactly what's being said
right here in Hebrews chapter 10. He's not talking about just
a willful sinning that you sinned on purpose. All sin is on purpose.
It's not the sins of omission. We sin sometimes and don't even
know we sinned. It's just because of our nature. But when we sin,
we sin willfully, don't we? But he said, if you sin willfully
after you've received the knowledge of the truth, what kind of sin
is he talking about then? Verse 27, But a certain fearful
looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour
the adversaries. There's no hope for you, in other
words. He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under
two or three witnesses. Of how much sore punishment supposing
he shall he be thought worthy who have trodden underfoot the
Son of God. There's the sin he's talking
about. Don't ever take anything out of context. Don't listen
to anything out of context. That's the sin he's talking about.
It's not just talking about every sin that we do on purpose. There
wouldn't be any hope for any of us. But when you trample underfoot
the precious blood of Christ, where's your hope now? When you reject the sacrifice,
then where are you going to go? And hath counted the blood of
the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing, and
hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace. Now here's the lesson. Back to our text in 1 Samuel
2, those three verses we saw. The linen ephod, which again,
you're only wearing a white robe because it's washed in the blood.
There is no righteousness without blood. And also the sacrifice
that they brought, and then the accusation against Eli and his
sons was, you've kicked at my sacrifice, you've trodden underfoot.
The blood of the sacrifice. Here's the lesson. Everything
hinges upon the sacrifice. everything. Why was Eli's family
cursed? Because of the sacrifice. Why
was Elkanah's house blessed? Same reason. Our Lord said in John 5.22, The
Father judges no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the
Son, that all men should honor his Son. And he that honoreth
not the Son honoreth not the Father. which hath sent Him. It all hinges on Him, doesn't
it? What think ye of Christ? Whose Son is He? Who's going
to get the glory? Whose will is preeminent? Whose will decides the matter
of salvation? Yours or His? First John 511,
and this is the record that God hath given to us eternal life,
and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life. Samuel, Elkina, and Hannah. They had the Son. They stood before God, righteous. offering the sacrifice that God
ordained, the only sacrifice that can take away sin, not the
blood of bulls and goats, but the one pictured by them, the
blood of God's Son. He that hath the Son hath life,
and he that hath not the Son of God, he that kicks against
the sacrifice that would come to God some other way, as we
saw in John 10 there, that would trample underfoot the precious
blood of God's Son, the blood of the covenant as we saw in
Hebrews 10, hath not life. There were three people in our
text who though everything around them was an unmitigated disaster,
they prospered and they grew and they were in the favor of
the Lord and men. because of the sacrifice. Whatever favor there is to be
had in this world with the one who made it or with anybody in it that's
worth having is had because of the sacrifice. My favor with you is because
of the sacrifice. And to think that God, to think
that God would look upon us and be well pleased. To think that God Almighty would
work all things, no matter how horrible, would overrule them
all for our good. To think that God has loved us
with an everlasting love and therefore with loving kindness
brought us to himself. To think that he loved us so
much that he gave himself for us.
To think that we have all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ. It's all because of the sacrifice. He said, herein doth my father
love me, because I give my life for the sheep. Now why do you
reckon he loves you? Because Christ gave his life
for you. May God give us grace to honor
the sacrifice, to not kick, to look at the word, God's revelation
of the sacrifice. This is what this book is. From
cover to cover, God is revealing His Son and what He did for sinners.
May we receive that with gladness and not kick against anything
about it. to look at what God did. God sent his son to be the
propitiation for our sins. And he came and did everything
necessary to make us acceptable and well-pleasing in the sight
of God in his life and in his sinatonic death. May we look
at this and hear from God and say, so be it. It is well. Amen and amen. and rejoice by
his grace in Christ crucified. Let's pray.