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| "You called me, and I am here!" said Samuel continued on page 37 |
STORIES FROM THE BOOK OF GOD
By April Oursler Armstrong
Illustrated by Clive Uptton
Man of Peace
Samuel had been dedicated to the service of God . . . he fought war with prayer
THE BOY Samuel was all alone in the most holy place of the Temple of the Lord. He was sleeping in the night stillness on the floor before the Ark of God. The sacred lamp burned and its light flickered on the gold and silver of the Ark, where the Ten Commandments lay, and on the precious stones of the altar, and on the brass tent poles, and the pillars leafed with gold.
But Samuel slept peacefully. This secret inner part of the Temple, this Holy of Holies, was his home. He had lived here with the high priest Eli since he was a little boy, just able to walk and talk and take care of himself.
His mother, Anna, had been married many years without having any children. She had wanted a baby more than anything in the world. She had wept and cried and prayed, asking, begging, beseeching the Lord for a son. Finally she made a vow.
" Lord, if You take pity on me, and give me a son, I will give him to You again, and dedicate him to You forever."
The Lord had answered her prayer. Anna had her baby boy, the red-cheeked, merry-eyed child she called Samuel. She loved him with an her heart. She kept him with her while he grew from a babe in arms into a small boy, firm on his feet, clear in his voice, able to wash and dress himself.
It was desperately hard for her to give him up. But when he needed her no more to nurse him, she took him to he Temple at Shilo, and dedicated him to the Lord, and left him to live with the high priest Eli.
Samuel learned to pray, and to know the Lord as closely as any full-grown man. He could not do the most holly things, for he was only a boy. But he helped prepare the things needed for the altar. He learned how to clean and fold the vestments the priests wore.
And, when he was still a boy, he began to realize a terrible thing-the priests who served the Lord, who were so close to Him, were not good men, but wicked!
Eli, the high priest, was very old. His two sons, Ophni and Phinees, were serving as priests most of the time. And Ophni and Phinees had no respect for the Lord.
One night as Samuel slept in the Holy of Holies, he heard his name called.
" Samuel!"
He sat up, rubbing his eyes. "Here I am!" he said, and got to his feet and ran to Eli's room. "Here I am-for you called me."
Eli had been fast asleep. Grunting and grumbling, the old man turned over. "I didn't call you, Samuel. Go back to sleep."
Samuel shrugged and yawned and went back and slept. In a little while he heard his name again.
"Samuel! "
He got up and hurried back to Eli. H Here I am!"
" I did not call you my son," said Eli. "Go back to bed and sleep!"
This time Samuel could not sleep. He lay in the golden light of the lamp, wondering and listening while his heart beat fast. And soon he heard again the call; "Samuel!"
He ran to Eli, his heels thudding. His voice quivered as he said again, "You called me, and I am here!"
Ell did not sleep. He had been thinking. For many years the Lord had been silent. He had chosen no one as His prophet to speak for Him, as once He had chosen Moses and Joshua.
Eli's eyes were not so good, age had made him hard of hearing, but his mind was clear.
" Samuel," he said, "go back to sleep. But, if you hear your name called again, you must answer and say, 'Speak, Lord, for Your servant listens.' "
Samuel went back to his bed. He lay watching the golden Ark of the Covenant, with the cherubim gleaming on top. Then the Voice came again, and it was the Voice of the Lord.
"Samuel. Samuel!"
"Speak, Lord, for Your servant listens," whispered Samuel.
And the Lord said, "Behold, I am going to do a thing in Israel, and whoever hears of it, his ears shall tingle! I will put an end to the family of Eli. I will punish his house forever, because of the wickedness of his sons, and because Eli knew of it and did not punish them."
When the Voice ended, Samuel fell back, eyes staring at the ceiling. How could he tell Eli such news?
In the morning old Eli called him.
" What did the Lord say to you? I beg you to tell me."
Stumbling and embarrassed, the boy told him.
"It is the Lord," groaned Eli. . " His will be done!"
Yet, for a long while, nothing happened. Phinees and Ophni went on their wicked, lying ways, and no punishment fell. Samuel grew, and the Lord was with him, and made him a prophet.
Then, in the middle of those years, trumpets sounded the alarm.
"War! The army of the Philistines is coming against us!"
The battle was like a fight between a giant and a pigmy. The Philistines killed four thousand men of Israel, and those who lived ran for their lives.
So they took the Ark out of the Temple and carried it like a good-luck charm down to the battlefield.
They did not pray. They did not ask God to forgive them. They expected the Ark itself to work miracles. And the two sons of Eli strutted along beside the Ark, their robes sparkling and tinkling in the sunlight.
When the Philistines heard the noise they were frightened. They sent scouts to see what had happened.
The Philistines had their own gods, strange idols with staring eyes, They did not believe in the Lord, the only true God, but they were afraid of Him.
Fear roared in their hearts, fear rode with them, and drove them to fight with greater fierceness than ever. Screaming and yelling, slashing and pounding, they burst down on the army of Israel and the Ark.
In Shilo blind old Eli sat by the road waiting and waiting for news.
A soldier, dusty and wounded, fell panting at his side.
"What has happened at the battle?" Eli whispered.
" The battle is over," the soldier said.
"And. . . ?"
"Israel has run away from the Philistines, and they have won a terrible victory. Thirty thousand of our men, lie dead on the field, Eli- your sons with them. And, Eli, listen--"
THE old man raised his pale, sightless face. " Eli-the Ark of the Lord is captured! The Philistines have taken it away!"
Eli's lips opened in a great sob, With a gasp of horror he fell backward off his stool. and broke his neck, and died.
" The Ark of the Covenant is gone! "
The awful words hung heavy on the air. Worse than the death of soldiers, worse than defeat itself, was the loss of the Ark.
In the golden, angel-guarded box which the Philistines held prisoner was the presence of the Lord, and the sign of His covenant with His people, the stones of the Ten Commandments.
"The Lord has forsaken Israel!"
"What, shall we do ? "
"We shall pray," said Samuel, and he led the people to the empty altar, and they prayed. For seven desolate months Samuel burned the incense of sacrifice; praying to the Lord. Seven months of nights he lay wakeful, listening for the Voice.
He could not guess that among the Philistines his prayers were already being answered.
The Philistines had carried the Ark home, to the city of Azotus. In Azotus was the temple of their favourite god, the cruel and wicked idol called Dagon.
The Philistines carried the Ark into Dagon's temple and put it at Dagon's feet.
The next morning the city woke up to a shout of fear.
" The god Dagon has fallen!"
The idol lay on its face on the ground before the Ark. It had toppled from its pedestal, knocked down by an unseen force.
All day they struggled with the great, brazen weight of the statue, raising it back on its giant haunches. At night they had it in place. Exhausted and sweating they went home to their beds.
" Again he has fallen! Look-our god Dagon is smashed to bits!That same day two plagues fell on the gay city of Azotus. Mice came as if from nowhere, swarming over the public squares, into the houses and beds, even into the shoes and clothes of the people. And strange sores like boils rose painfully on the people, hideous purple swelling on their skins.
They took the Ark out of Dagon's temple and carried it from city to city all through the Philistine land. But everywhere the Ark went the plagues went also, the mice, and the sores.
Finally, the Philistine rulers called their, wizards and their sorcerers and the priests of their false gods together.
"What shall we do with the Ark of the Lord God of Israel?"
"Send it back to Israel, with a golden offering that He may forgive you!"
The Philistines made five little golden statues of mice, one for each of their big cities, and five little pieces shaped like the sores on their bodies. They put the gold in a little casket, and put the Ark and the casket on a wagon, pulled by two fine cows..
"Turn them loose, and see where they will go! If they go to Israel, we will know it is the Lord Who has done all this,"
The cows walked straight down the road, straight on to Israel, without stopping, or turning, lowing as they went. When the road ended they , crossed the empty fields, travelling straight for the land where Samuel prayed.
The Ark of the Covenant was home again!
Jubilantly the people clustered round the Temple, laughing and shouting. Samuel stood before them and his face was stem.
"If you welcome the Lord, turn to Him with all your heart! Put away the strange gods-for many of you have bowed before the wicked idols of Baal and Astarte. If you will do penance, and serve the Lord and the Lord only, He will save you from the Philistines! "
Nothing was more important than making peace with God. The people left their ploughs and their shops and their pots and pans and went to the place called Mizpah in crowds growing larger day by day.
There Samuel prayed for them, and judged them, and begged the Lord to forgive Israel.
The Philistines watching, saw the hordes of people gathering, thought surely Israel was preparing for another war.
"These are soldiers praying for victory," they said. "They will destroy us unless we march first!"
The people of Israel were still praying when the armies of the Philistines appeared. Enemy armour flashed in the sun. The red cloaks, the green and purple banners of the Philistines rushed towards them.
"Save us! Save us! Samuel, cry to the Lord our God!" Samuel prayed. The smoke of holocaust wisped toward the heavens as the clatter and clamour of war drew nearer.
HIS prayer was heard. The heavens rescued the people of Israel. Hasty black clouds swarmed across the sky. Lightning cracked, striking the spears of the Philistines and burning their horses under them.
The troops of horsemen stampeded. The enemy soldiers broke in confusion and fled helter-skelter across the plains through the torrents of rain. Behind them charged the Israelites, flailing them with any weapon they could seize, until the last Philistine had fled.
Then Samuel gathered his people again for prayer, so that all men would remember that the Lord God of Israel had delivered His suppliants from evil.
And Samuel, the boy who spoke with the Lord, became a man of peace. While he lived and judged and taught, war never again troubled the land.
NEXT WEEK- THE REBEL KING
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