There is a Samuel to Your Eli

God is changing things and bringing fresh wisdom through the Holy Spirit. Ministry can feel heavy, but the Holy Spirit empowers and guides. The Holy Spirit reveals what God wants to say and empowers you to speak it. Ministry becomes weightless when you partner with the Holy Spirit. The discussion tonight is about the fear of getting old and not having anyone to depend on. The story of Eli and his sons in 1 Samuel 2 shows how his sons were dishonorable and disrespectful in their behavior towards God and the sacrifices. Hallelujah! Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! Welcome friends, family, listeners from all over the world. Welcome again to our conversation this evening. If you have been following what the Lord has been doing on this platform for a while, you will realize that God is changing things around. God is always, every Sunday, there is no telling what God might do, what God might say. All we know is that at the end of every evening, God has done something. Our lives have been transformed. Wisdom, fresh wisdom has been served. And this is why we are expectant. You know, sometimes when you are in ministry, you are doing things, sometimes you can feel a little discouraged or sometimes ministry can feel heavy. You know, and I believe that because sometimes ministry can be heavy, that is why you find churches open and after a while they close or ministries open, they begin and they are very excited and they are very fervent. And somewhere down the line, you would find that, you know, nothing is happening. And that is because sometimes ministry can be heavy. You need motivation and you need something to keep ministry nice and fresh and that is where the anointing of the Holy Spirit comes in. We are so heavily dependent on the Holy Spirit. In the beginning, we were heavily dependent because we didn't know anything else to do. And as the journey began to unfold, as the ministry began to travel, we realized that there really is a grace on this ministry to serve wisdom fresh and hot. And when we realized that, it became a no-brainer to just keep doing what we are doing, which is to depend heavily on the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit has the ability to search the mind of Christ, search the mind of God and reveal what is on God's mind, what God would like to speak about. Holy Spirit knows that. And once Holy Spirit reaches into the mind of God and He digs out from the mind of God what God wants to say, Holy Spirit now brings to you, to your understanding what God wants to say. And then Holy Spirit empowers you if you allow Him. He empowers you to speak exactly what God wants to say. And once you get into that place, it's a place of divine flow. You don't struggle. You don't, you know, you're not there thinking, what shall I say? How shall I say it? As long as you report for duty when you are supposed to, meaning if your program, your platform is supposed to be recording at 6 p.m., be there at 6 p.m. Be available, be open for Holy Spirit because He's already waiting on you at 6 p.m. to come and receive your brief. Through the day, He's going to tell you. Sometimes it might be through, if it's something really heavy on God's mind, God might begin to talk to you days before the recording. But sometimes it's on the day of. And once you get into that place of alignment, you're going to receive your brief from Heaven. This is what, it's like a briefing. You know how the president of a country, how his security chiefs come and brief him and tell him what's happening, or how the president briefs his men and then the men go and brief the other people down the echelons of government. So that's how it is. There's a hierarchy once God is trying to say something because now when you answer the call like we have, like we have done, we have answered the call to be the mouthpiece of God, to tell God's people what God wants to say. And so when God wants to say something, He's going to get that information across to you via the medium of His Holy Spirit. And if your spirit is open to receive what the Lord is sending to you through the Holy Spirit, you are going to have the ability to communicate that information to God's people. Why? Because it's God's Word. It's traveling. God's Word is traveling all the way from Heaven through you to His people. So once you enter into that place of partnership with the Holy Spirit, ministry becomes interesting. Ministry becomes weightless because God doesn't need you to help Him carry the weight. God doesn't need you to help Him carry the weight of His assignment. God already has His grace available and ready for you through His Holy Spirit if only you will be receptive. And such is our assignment this evening. Our assignment tonight is to speak to those people who are gradually finding themselves getting older and in the back of your mind you are anxious. If truth be told, you are getting a little anxious about what's going to happen to you in old age. Maybe you have been thinking for a while, what's going to happen? I don't have anyone. For some people, it might be because you have no family. Maybe you have no children or you have no living family, the so-called kinless. There are people now in America who are considered kinless. They are everywhere, but now there is actually attention being made, paid now to people who are considered kinless. They don't have anyone living. Sometimes, some people live very old and everyone has died, has passed away in their family, and they're the only one living. Sometimes, it's just because maybe they have family, but they have actually cut ties with their family. Maybe they have children and their children are maybe dead or they have decided to sever connections with their family and they've been by themselves for a long time. Now, you're getting to that point where you are anxious. You're anxious about what's going to happen to you when you get old, who is going to be there for you. Some people have family and they have family, they have children that they can't actually turn their backs on these people. They can't trust them to look out for them when they get old. Right now, you're still considered youngish, and you know, based on the information available to you now, you know how these people are to you now, at your age now. You still have your mind intact now. You still can move. You're still fairly independent now, and you know now how these people are to you now. Now, imagine what they'll do, how they will be to you when you get old and defenseless, and you need to depend on someone. You know that the people you have, the children you have, the friends, the family you have, you can't turn your back on them. You can't depend on them, and you are getting anxious. This is a real fear. This is a real fear. Now, the Lord has been speaking to me about this subject, and we're going to look in the book of 1 Samuel Chapter 2. There is a story in 1 Samuel Chapter 2 from verses 12 to 20. This is the story of Eli, Eli and his sons. The whole world knows about Eli's sons. Eli would have been a man like we just described, a man who would have been anxious about his old age because of the type of children, the type of sons, the type of people there were. Eli would have been anxious, and he would have had reason to be. So now, here we are in the book of 1 Samuel Chapter 2 from verse 12 to verse 20. We are in the Amplified Bible. You know, when you get into the Amplified Bible, it's serious because you need to break down some things. The Amplified Bible breaks it down for you. Now, the Bible says, The sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were worthless men. The Amplified says they were worthless, they were dishonorable, they were unprincipled men. They did not know nor respect the Lord. Verse 13. And the custom of the priests with the sacrifices, the custom of the priests with the people that's regarding the sacrifices. Let's take that one more time. The sons of Eli, this is verse 12, we're back to verse 12 now. The sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord, and they did not know the custom of the priests with the people. When any man was offering a sacrifice, the priest's servant would come. This is now the custom. The priest's servant would come while the meat was boiling with a three-pronged fork in his hand. Then he would thrust the fork into the pan, or kettle, or cauldron, or pot. Everything that the fork brought up, the priest would take for himself. That was the custom. That was the existing custom of the priests with the sacrifices. But the Bible says the sons of Eli, they were worthless. They didn't know God, they didn't know the custom of the priests with the sacrifices, with the people. We are here now in verse 14. The Bible says, we are in verse 14. Then he would thrust it into the pan, or kettle, or cauldron, or pot. Everything that the fork brought up, the priest would take for himself. That is what they did in Shiloh to all of the Israelites who came there. Verse 15. Also, before they burned the fat, the priest's servant would come and say to the man who was sacrificing, Give the priest meat to roast, since he will not accept boiled meat from you, only raw. If the man said to him, Certainly they are to burn the fat first, and then you may take as much as you want, Then the priest's servant would say, No, you shall give it to me now, or I will take it by force. So the sin of the two young men, Hophni and Phinehas, was very great before the Lord. For the men treated the offering of the Lord disrespectfully. Verse 18. Now Samuel was ministering before the Lord as a child, dressed in a linen ephod. Moreover, his mother made him a little robe, and would bring it up to him every year, when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice. And Eli would bless Elkanah and his wife and say, May the Lord give you children by this woman, in place of the one she asked for, which was dedicated to the Lord. Then they would return to their own home. Basically, this story is about the sons of Eli. It's about the sons of Eli and their despicable behavior regarding the office, regarding the sacrifice, regarding the meat for sacrifice in the temple. The culture, the custom, was that the priest, the best of the meat, goes to the priest. The best of the meat goes to the priest. But the sons of Eli would come, and they would take the best for themselves. They were unmindful of the ways of God, the things of God, and they did as they pleased. And God was unhappy with the sons of Eli. In fact, God was unhappy with Eli because of his sons. The Bible says in verse 17, that they treated the offering of the Lord disrespectfully. They were worthless men. Now, they were worthless men with the things of God. They were worthless men with their father. Because these, obviously, were men who, the Bible says, they were dishonorable. There is no way that they could have been this bad. They were a nuisance to society, generally. Now, if they were that way, evidently, they couldn't have been any other way with their father. They couldn't have... The way they were outside to everybody else had to be the way they were with their father. So Eli, if Eli, all Eli had, if Eli's only hope in his old age was these two, these sons, then Eli would have been miserable. But the Bible says that Samuel ministered before the Lord from a child. Now, Eli was the priest. And Samuel ministered before the Lord with Eli. That means Eli had another chance now. He had a chance for a do-over. He had a chance to be cared for by a child who, obviously, was so filled by the Spirit of God and who, obviously, was such a wonderful human being. Eli himself was a man filled with so much love. And probably, that's why his sons turned out the way they did. We don't know. Maybe there wasn't adequate discipline when they were young. So God, now, who is faithful to his servant, Eli, ensures that in Eli's old age, he doesn't have to depend on his sons who are worthless and dishonorable. Eli has a chance to have someone, a good person, a good child to lean on. And he has another chance to raise a child into a good human being, into a good human, into a responsible human. Eli has the chance to correct his errors which he made with his sons in the life of Samuel. And you can tell how grateful Eli is for having Samuel. You can tell. Because the Bible says in verse 20, that when the parents of Samuel were leaving at the end of the sacrifice, the annual trip they made to the temple, Eli, verse 20 says, would bless Elkanah and his wife Hannah, the parents of Samuel, and say to them, May the Lord give you children by this woman in place of the one she asked for, which was dedicated to the Lord. She asked for this child, having been barren for so long, and when God answered her, she dedicated this one child to the Lord. And I know, Eli is thinking, I am the beneficiary of this dedication. It is God's way of paying me back. God's way of looking after Eli in his old age. Because of Samuel, who is a good child, who is anointed of the Lord from a young child, Eli no longer has to depend on his despicable sons. Eli's old age is now secure because he has someone. Someone who is not going to abandon him. Someone who is not going to be unkind to him. Someone who is not going to bring disgrace to him. Someone who is going to be there for him, especially because he was old and he was getting blind. His natural sons, he couldn't depend on. You know, when you look at this really, if Samuel didn't come, if we didn't have Samuel in the picture, Eli would effectively have been kinless. Because his sons, the Bible says, were worthless. They were of no value to Eli, no value to society. He would have been considered kinless, and he would have been anxious, and he would have had cause to be. But the Lord, who is a good father, always looks ahead. Because God isn't confined by time. God is already in your old age. God is already in your old age. What makes you anxious and afraid now, God is already there. God is already raising for you a Samuel in your old age. This is what the Lord is saying, because, you know, the Bible says, when Hannah used to come to the temple to pray, Eli would think she was drunk. At that point, Eli didn't even know what Hannah's petitions were. Eli didn't know what Hannah needed from the Lord. But when the Lord gave Hannah the answer to her petition, Eli, who thought Hannah was drunk early in the morning, when she was crying to God about not having a child, Eli was going to be the primary beneficiary of the answer to Hannah's prayer. Think about that. Because the Bible says Hannah went, she went year after year, making petitions. Her rival, Penina, would mock her. So when she was crying to God for this gift, Eli, unknown to Eli, was the medium through which God was preparing for Eli's old age. God had already designed, because, you see, at some point, Eli had no idea what Hannah's issue was. But at that point, even though Eli didn't know what Hannah's issue was, Hannah herself hadn't had the answer to her petition, to her prayer, God had gone ahead and he had made provision for Eli's old age. So at that point, it is very likely that Eli, observing his sons and realizing how worthless they were, at that point, there may have been anxious thoughts in Eli's mind about his old age. At that point, Hannah had no idea if God was going to answer her prayer. But when God answered her prayer, the beneficiary of that prayer was the old man, Eli. God is saying to you, who right now, you are anxious, maybe you don't have children, maybe you have a family and, you know, that's not really family, and you know that your old age, unless God does something, unless God intervenes, it's going to be difficult. Because when you get old, when you get gray, the natural consequences of aging, they're going to kick in. Some people are blessed they're fit in their old age like Moses, because the Bible says Moses at the age of 80 years, his natural abilities didn't abate and his vision never grew dim. So Moses was blessed like that. Not everybody is blessed like that. So it's natural to be anxious that when I get old, who's going to be there for me? Some people are even anxious about when they die, who's going to bury them? Who's going to do this and who's going to do that? The Lord is saying to you tonight, that as he went before Eli and made arrangements for his old age by answering the prayer of Hannah and blessing Hannah with a son, God is saying that your Samuel is on his way. Your Samuel may not be someone who is yet unborn. Your Samuel may be someone who is alive right now, but hasn't come into your picture. Or maybe someone in your picture, but hasn't assumed the role of Samuel to your Eli, because the need hasn't risen. This is why it is very important for us to build relationships as we grow older. Sometimes for people who are very independent, people who are introverted, people who have trouble allowing people into their space. It's important to build relationships as we journey to old age, because there is coming a time when we are going to need those people around us, especially people who are younger than we are. And even more dire is the need for those people who have no children, who have no immediate family, or you know that your family, maybe that's not the best family you would have wished for. It's imperative that we begin now to begin to build our circle, our network of relationships, because you don't know who your Samuel might be. When Eli was accusing Hannah of being drunk in the morning, when she was crying her heart out to God, Eli had no idea that that very woman was going to be the vessel through which God would bring his help for his old age. I heard a story of a man who had many children. In this United States, he had many children. He was now retired, a wealthy man. He had money because he was a professional. He had a good job when he was younger, and now he's old and he has no relationship with his children. In his old age, his children never called. They never checked on him. They just didn't care about him. And then he falls sick. He has a terminal disease. At this point, his children completely abandoned this man. Eventually, he dies. But the beauty of this story is that this man found a local church. He found a local church before he fell ill. And so he made friends in this local church. He found the Samuels, not just one. He found young men, ministers, members of that church who were willing to be children to him, who were willing to take care of him. And when he fell ill and was now terminal, he was not alone. Even though his children didn't live far away from where he lived, they never checked him up. They never looked in on him. But his Samuels, whom God had prepared, in fact, he came down to another state, from another state. He had children in one state. And because of this illness, he had to move over to another state. It was in this other state where he joined this church. Now, it could very well be that God designed his life so that he would have to move to this other state in order to join this church, in order to be loved and embraced by all these Samuels in the church, so that in his final days, he missed nothing. He lost nothing. In his final days, total strangers became his family. They were the ones who would go with him to his chemo treatments. They were the ones who would drive him to church. They were the ones who would stay with him. He had children living nearby, but not one showed up for him. God went ahead of this man to make sure that there would be a local assembly, members of a dedicated Bible church who took this man as a father and made up in their minds to be Samuels to him, to be children to him, so that his last days would be okay. And eventually this man dies, and his Samuels in the church, his sons in the church, they organize his funeral. They give him a befitting funeral. They invite his children to come, and they come as guests to their father's funeral. I say that to say this. When your life is in the palm of God's hand, he goes ahead of you. Like I said earlier, God isn't needing your help to carry the weight. He already has everything planned. All you need to do is be assured that if God kept you alive till now, if God preserved you and provided for you till now, surely your end is also in his hand. You can't worry about things like that because they're out of your control anyway. Now in closing, I have to balance this message, because you see, everything, there is two sides to every coin. Everything, when you have a message, you need to always find the balance. Find a balance, because it's very easy for us to examine children and family when things like this happen, when there is an elderly person who has been abandoned by his children, by his family. It's convenient to examine them and to judge them harshly, but, you know, sometimes there is a reason. Sometimes there is another side to the story. Sometimes we need to ask the question. This old man now, this old person who has been abandoned by his children, all of them, is he reaping something that he sowed? There is a high possibility that all his children were worthless. Oh, not even one cares. It's highly likely. But also, the question, there is a question to be asked. Is this person, this man, this woman, are they reaping something that they sowed? Who were they to their children when their children needed them most? When their children were young and needed them most, who were they then? Are the children being to them now who they were to their children then? Are they reaping what they sowed? That's a viable question. But still, regardless, we always have to follow what the Bible says, because the Bible says we must honor our parents without conditions. The Bible doesn't put a condition for honoring our parents. We are not admonished to only honor our parents when they are good to us, or when they are to us what we want them to be. The Bible says that we must honor our parents so that our own days can be long. We must always, regardless of what our parents do, when we grow old, and our parents are still living, we must be there for them as much as we can. Sometimes, some children don't have enough love for their parents, because maybe they've been hurt so bad. But the Bible, if you follow the Bible and you believe the Bible, you have a responsibility under God to take care of that parent. You don't even have to be there. But you need to make sure that what you can do in your power to ensure that this parent is taken care of, to ensure that everything that is supposed to be done by a child is being done. You can pay to have it done. You can just make sure that within your own power, you do what's right by God. That is also necessary, because like I said, there is a requirement. Once you do that, your days shall be long. You also will live as long as your parent, maybe even older. And in closing, finally, I want to encourage anyone who is listening, and you're in the middle of beginning to think now, wonder now, what's going to happen. Remember, Jesus says, I am with you always, even till the end of time. Because Jesus is with you always. Because Jesus is omniscient. And Jesus is omnipresent. Jesus is already in the end. Your end. Jesus is already there. That's what he means. By law, I am with you always. I'm with you now. I'll be with you tomorrow. I was with you when you were born. I was with you before you were born. When the end comes, you won't be by yourself. I'll be there with you. And I'll be there waiting on you when you cross over. However, between now and that time, anything and everything you need for your journey to be smooth, you will have. Anyone you need, when the time comes for them to come into your frame, the frame of your life, they will come in. And they will do what is necessary for you at that time. So there is no point worrying about children who have left your life, about family who you don't really have. You have them, but you don't have them. Some of us, when we were young, we expelled ourselves on our children, on our families. And the children grew up to hate you. Some of us, like Eli, loved our children to the point of worthlessness. No boundaries. No discipline. Any and everything they needed, we gave them. We ensured that their lives were so comfortable that they really effectively became the sons of Eli. Many of them have been to prison because we didn't give them that firm foundation. And some have grown to hate those who gave up their lives to make sure that they became someone, that they became someone, that they became somebody in this life. Some children and some family members are so chronically ungrateful that it boggles the mind. There are people who, listening to me now, who gave everything they had to those whom they loved. You gave your life to them because they were all you had. What you didn't know is that they had you, but you didn't have them. And now, in your old age, your eyes are waking up. You are waking up to find out that you didn't have them at all. You would swim the English Channel for them, but they won't skip a puddle for you. But you didn't know that till now. And so, because you are waking up now to realize that the people you gave your life to, many of you had no childhood, because you were raising maybe your younger siblings. Many of you gave up a life that you could have had because you were raising children, and they grew up to despise you. They grew up to hate you. They don't value your sacrifice because they feel entitled to it. There are all kinds of reasons for why people really, truly get kinless. But God is saying to you right now that he sent you. It was an assignment for heaven. You came to be an older sibling, to raise your siblings. You did it for God. You came to be a parent to these children, and you did the best you could. And today, they are giants in their industries. You did it for God. It was an assignment. And so, your reward is in God's hand. That's why Eli had Samuel as his reward. And the reward came at a crucial time when he needed a good person to lean on. So your reward, even as Samuel became Eli's reward, your reward is in the hand of God. You don't know who God is going to raise, but God will never leave you without somebody. God will always have someone waiting for the time, the time frame for when God says, okay, now go. I need you on this assignment. Go and be Samuel to my Eli. And so shall it be. And I pray, as I pray for myself, I pray for you, that in your old age, when you get to the end of your life's journey, you won't be by yourself. Your investments in people, your investments in your family, your investments in your children, they will reap rewards. You will reap the rewards of your investments for saying yes in obedience to God And as you pray on that assignment to raise those people that you raised, I pray for myself, I pray for you, that God will send us Samuels. In our old age, we won't be alone. In our old age, we will have men and women who will rise up to answer the call to be there for us at the age. He decreed so, and it is so, in Jesus' mighty name. Amen. All right? So, well, thanks, everyone, for tuning in again this evening. Next Sunday, with Jesus Terry's, we're going to have another fresh episode of wisdom, of deep mysteries in God's kingdom. Until then, take care of yourself, be prayed up, be alert, keep your eyes open, and be victorious. Amen.