December 20, 2009
Scripture:
Genesis 40:14
Joseph is a well-known type of the Lord. “Remember me when it is well with you”, he told the butler. Surely things are well with us, because of what the Lord has done; He’s brought us out of bondage and darkness. The Lord has asked us to remember Him. It was our desire and privilege to do that this morning. V23b. This reminds me of what we had in our hymn, “Oh, that we never might forget what Christ has suffered for our sakes”. Lamentations 3:19. Here we are called to remember the Lord’s sufferings. He went through all of them for us, and has made known to us that blessed desire to have us remember Him. We’ve had the privilege of responding to that call to, “Remember me”.
Hymn - 282
Prayer
1 Samuel 7
We read last time about how the Israelites prepared their hearts for the Lord; and how they confessed their sins and returned to the Lord.
When the Israelites fought the Philistines last time, they were defeated and the Ark of the Covenant was taken. The Philistines were their worst enemies, they were always fighting with Israel. Now, when the Israelites confessed their sins and returned to the Lord, they were doing a good thing. However, Satan is ever trying to get us to do wrong things. He is our worst enemy.
V7. The Philistines heard that Israel was gathered together and thought, “This is our chance!“. When Israel heard that the Philistines were coming to fight, they were afraid. Last time, when they heard the shouting in the Israelites camp, it was the Philistines that were afraid. Now Israel is afraid because the Philistines won last time. Before the Children of Israel had their hearts right, God hadn’t helped them. But now that they are back to serving Him, they ask Samuel to pray for them. V9. So Samuel offered a lamb, prayed, and the Lord heard. This lamb can speak to us of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was the Lamb of God. Because of His death on the cross, we can have the victory over our enemy.
They asked Samuel to pray for them. We can pray for each other, just like Samuel did. V10. Now, who were the Philistines really fighting? Were they fighting Israel? No, they were fighting God. Samuel prayed, and God answered. God smote the Philistines for the Israelites. That’s the way it can be for us. If we pray, the Lord will come in in our times of need. Vv. 11-12. After we have prayed, and after the Lord has answered, then we can thank Him. We are able to praise Him, because we know that He is the One Who helps us. Here, we see Samuel giving thanks to the Lord for his help. He set up a stone of remembrance which he called ‘Ebenezer’, that means “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us”. V13-14. This was no small victory. The Israelites went on and won back some cities that the Philistines had taken from them. Once their hearts were right, the Lord was able to help them. Samuel reminded them that it was God who was their Helper.
And the Lord is able to help us, too, if we keep our hearts right toward Him. May we always go to Him in prayer when we’re in need, and then thank Him for His help.
As we know, this is a remnant we are seeing; they have done many amazing things in this chapter; we saw the reading of the word and how that brought them to confession and worship. Now, they are recounting some of their history; we started with Abraham. As we go on, we’ll review their time in Egypt, their crossing the wilderness, and their going into the land, and finally into captivity. However, many of the Jews we are reading about were never even in the captivity; how did they know about all this? They read the Word, and they were taught by the Levites. We can read all about it, too; “For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning” (Romans 15:4). Can we see the parallels and types in their lives? How important for us to get into the Word; we should have scriptures for what we do and where we are.
First, in v. 8, we find that God made a covenant, a promise, with Israel. He hold this told take over the land of Canaan. however, in v. 9, they were in afflication in Egypt. The Egyptian’s didn’t acknowledge God; they had their own gods. In v. 9, we find that God saw the afflictions of their fathers in Egypt. We just saw in Samuel that after their humiliating defeat with the Ark of the Covenant, they cried to the Lord when the Philistines came to fight. We don’t read that about the Jews, even if we go back to Exodus. We’ll find that they cried and groaned, but not to the Lord. They were so far away; yet, God heard them and wanted to work on their behalf. It seems that He was not only convincing Pharaoh of His power; He was convincing the Israelites as well.
It’s amazing to see God work because He loves His people; it’s precious because this is a type: we can get away from God, too. Although it doesn’t mention it here, we know how the blood was required. That is a type of redemption.
Read vv. 10 & 11: The Egyptians were greatly humbled; they sunk in the Red Sea. In this story, God got a name. He was well-known for bringing Israel out of Egypt. Rahab and many others had heard about it. It is no wonder that the Jews in Nehemiah were worshipping God. He had done so much for them. And we must remember that in every step of Israel’s history, we can identify with them. Their story holds so many parallels that are true in the Christian walk.
Hymn 219 - His be “the Victor’s name”
Prayer