To Encourage You

1 Samuel 2:25 “But they would not listen to the voice of their father, for it was the will of the Lord to put them to death.”

Of the things I’ve come to learn about God, one of the most sobering is that He is nobody’s fool.  You can’t dupe Him or in any way “get one over on Him.”  You can’t go on defying Him with impunity and think there will be no consequences.  It just doesn’t work that way. 

An example of this is given in the verse above. This verse is referring to the sons of Eli. Eli was the high priest in Israel at the time this was written.  He had two sons named Hophni and Phinehas. These men, as sons of the high priest, were also priests.  It was a very high calling.  Yet, they defied the Lord to Whom they were responsible day in and day out.  God had commanded in His Law that the fat of the offerings was never to be eaten by the priests.  It was all to be burned as an offering to Him.  The word “fat” in Hebrew refers to the choicest part.  In other words, the best things were to be given to the Lord.  However, Eli’s sons disregarded this command and took the fat for themselves. They would do this although the people they were leading knew it was a grave violation of the Law and tried to stop them.  In response, Hophni and Phinehas would mock them and say, “’No, you must give it now, and if not, I will take it by force.’ Thus the sin of the young men was very great in the sight of the Lord, for the men treated the offering of the Lord with contempt” (1 Samuel 2:16-17).  Furthermore, we are told that these wicked priests, rather than lead the people in worship as was their duty, would “lay with the women who were serving at the entrance to the tent of meeting.” As Eli learned of these things, he was very alarmed and said do them, “Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil dealings from all these people. No, my sons; it is no good report that I hear the people of the Lord spreading abroad. If someone sins against a man, God will mediate for him, but if someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for Him?” (1 Samuel 2:23-25). It is at this point that the verse above appears, “But they would not listen to the voice of their father, for it was the will of the Lord to put them to death.” 

You see, these men had crossed a line where the mercy of the Lord was no longer granted to them.  Although grace is a wonderful thing, it is not something upon which we should presume.  The fact is that these sons had come to a point in their lives in which they would not listen to their father because they could not for the Lord had made it so. He had given them over to their sin and to the consequences of that sin, which was death. 

We find a very similar account in the story of Pharaoh at the time when Moses was sent to him by God to deliver the nation of Israel from bondage.  Time after time, as Moses told Pharaoh to let the people of Israel go because God had commanded it, the Bible tells us that Pharaoh would “harden his heart” (Exodus 8:15, 8:32, 9:34) and say “No!”  He did this in spite of the fact that God sent miraculous judgments in response to Pharaoh’s refusals, things like turning all the drinking water in Egypt to blood; plaguing the land with innumerable frogs, gnats, and flies; and the death of all the Egyptian’s livestock.  However, as Pharaoh’s rebellion continued, the narrative shifts, and we are told now that “the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart” (Exodus 10:20).  In these sobering words we see that Pharaoh’s fate had been sealed.  He no longer could repent, because God Himself, was preventing it.  Like Eli’s sons, Pharaoh had crossed a line of no return with the God he continually had defied. 

In the New Testament we are given a warning about the same thing.  In Romans 1 we are given an account of how people so often refuse to obey God despite the lengths God has gone to reveal Himself to them. This is how the Bible talks about it: “For his (i.e., God’s) invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things” (Romans 1:20-23). But then this: “For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, god gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips,slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them” (Romans 1:29-32).

It is a very serious matter to presume upon God’s grace. It is a very serious and tragic mistake to take God for a fool.  Though His justice may turn slowly, it turns very fine.  As the apostle Paul warns us “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).

May God keep us from the folly of presuming upon Him. May His wonderful and patient grace toward us not be disdained and thus be in vain (1 Corinthians 15:10).  And may we heed His call, for as He said to Israel, Eli’s sons, and Pharaoh, He says to us, “As I live, declares the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel?” (Ezekiel 33:10-11). It’s one of the most sobering questions that can ever be asked. What is your answer to Him?