This
week it is a smaller step along our timeline. Last week we met Samuel as a child, hearing
the voice of the Lord for the first time.
This
week he is anointing David to be king.
David
isn’t the first king of Israel. The people of Israel asked for King, so they would
be like the other nations. Samuel’s sons had not followed the ways of his
father, just as Eli’s sons had not followed in his ways, there was again no one
to lead the people, so again they ask for a king:
One day the
nation’s leaders came to Samuel at Ramah 5 and said, “You are an old man. You set a good
example for your sons, but they haven’t followed it. Now we want a king to be
our leader, just like all the other nations. Choose one for us!” [1
Samuel 8:4-5 CEV]
Then Samuel
tells the people the problems they will get with a King:
He will force your sons to join his army
Your daughters will have to make perfume or do his cooking and
baking.
The king will take your best fields, and vineyards, and olive
orchards
You will become the king’s slaves
The people would not
listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want to be like other nations. We want a
king to rule us and lead us in battle.”
[1 Samuel 8: 19-20]
Saul
is chosen to be King, he wins some battles, but he is also disobedient to God,
and God regrets making Saul the King.
Then
we get to the passage we heard read this morning, Samuel anoints David to be
king. However, it is not until after the death of Saul that David is made King.
I
told you last Sunday, I would be talking about Call this week. With the Synod report, there wasn’t much time
to think about the call of Samuel, then this morning we have the anointing of
David.
But
right back in Genesis 12, there is the call of Abram, who is later renamed
Abraham.
[Genesis
12: 1-5] The Lord said to Abram:
Leave
your country, your family, and your relatives and go to the land that I will
show you…...
Abram
was seventy-five years old when the Lord told him to leave the city of Haran.
He obeyed and left with his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all the possessions
and slaves they had gotten while in Haran.
Then
we come to Moses, out looking after his father-in-law’s sheep and goats, when
he sees a bush that was burning, but not consumed by the fire.
[Exodus3:4]
When the Lord saw Moses coming near the bush, he called him by name, and Moses
answered, “Here I am.”
And
God said: I have seen how my people are
suffering as slaves in Egypt, and I have heard them beg for my help because of
the way they are being mistreated. I feel sorry for them, and I have come down
to rescue them from the Egyptians.
…
Now go to the king! I am sending you to lead my people out of his country.
But
Moses said, “Who am I to go to the king and lead your people out of Egypt?”
God
replied, “I will be with you. And you will know that I am the one who sent you,
when you worship me on this mountain after you have led my people out of
Egypt.”
And
last week we heard a passage from 1 Samuel 3, the boy Samuel being given a
message for Eli.
God
spoke to each of these people, Abraham, Moses, Samuel and David, in different
ways; and the tasks they were given to do were also quite different.
There
are different ways of hearing a call from God: sometimes like Abraham and Moses,
there will be a clear voice and a clear task.
Sometimes
like Samuel, it will be a series of conversations with God that lead to a
variety of tasks.
Sometimes
like David, another person will bring God’s message to you.
Where
is God calling you to be active? Are you willing to stop and listen for the voice
of God?
Some
quotes:
“Vocation
is the place where our deep gladness meets the world's deep need.” ― Frederick Buechner[i]
"Work
is not primarily a thing one does to live but the thing one lives to do. It is,
or it should be, the full expression of the worker’s faculties, the thing in
which he finds spiritual, mental and bodily satisfaction, and the medium in
which he offers himself to God."—Dorothy Sayers[ii]
Work
is not primarily a thing one does to live
but
the thing one lives to do.
My
dad worked at the steelworks to earn money, that is what he did to live; but
what he lived to do was music and poetry and people who liked music and poetry.
What
do you live to do?
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