Friday Devo
Scripture:
1 Samuel 7: 1-6
So the men of Kiriath-jearim came to get the Ark of the Lord. They took it to the hillside home of Abinadab and ordained Eleazar, his son, to be in charge of it. 2 The Ark remained in Kiriath-jearim for a long time—twenty years in all. During that time all Israel mourned because it seemed the Lord had abandoned them.
Samuel Leads Israel to Victory
3 Then Samuel said to all the people of Israel, “If you want to return to the Lord with all your hearts, get rid of your foreign gods and your images of Ashtoreth. Turn your hearts to the Lord and obey him alone; then he will rescue you from the Philistines.” 4 So the Israelites got rid of their images of Baal and Ashtoreth and worshiped only the Lord.
5 Then Samuel told them, “Gather all of Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray to the Lord for you.” 6 So they gathered at Mizpah and, in a great ceremony, drew water from a well and poured it out before the Lord. They also went without food all day and confessed that they had sinned against the Lord. (It was at Mizpah that Samuel became Israel’s judge.)
So the men of Kiriath-jearim came to get the Ark of the Lord. They took it to the hillside home of Abinadab and ordained Eleazar, his son, to be in charge of it. 2 The Ark remained in Kiriath-jearim for a long time—twenty years in all. During that time all Israel mourned because it seemed the Lord had abandoned them.
Samuel Leads Israel to Victory
3 Then Samuel said to all the people of Israel, “If you want to return to the Lord with all your hearts, get rid of your foreign gods and your images of Ashtoreth. Turn your hearts to the Lord and obey him alone; then he will rescue you from the Philistines.” 4 So the Israelites got rid of their images of Baal and Ashtoreth and worshiped only the Lord.
5 Then Samuel told them, “Gather all of Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray to the Lord for you.” 6 So they gathered at Mizpah and, in a great ceremony, drew water from a well and poured it out before the Lord. They also went without food all day and confessed that they had sinned against the Lord. (It was at Mizpah that Samuel became Israel’s judge.)
Commentary:
5–6. The day of confession and fasting at Mizpah was the culmination of Samuel’s programme of reform. Mizpah (modern Tell en-Nasbeh) was in Benjamite territory, on the main north-south road across the hills, and only five miles (8 km) north of Jerusalem. The first walled city on the site was founded c. 1100 BC, during the Israelite period, and it was one of the places on Samuel’s regular circuit (v. 15). It commanded views through the valleys to the west, had already been a rallying point (Judg. 20:1), and after the fall of Jerusalem even became the capital (2 Kgs 25:23).
They drew water and poured it out before the Lord, evidently as a symbol of the washing away of communal guilt, for which Samuel prayed (cf. Lam. 2:19; Mark 1:4)—the visible sign reinforcing the divine response to the confession of sin.
Samuel judged the people … at Mizpah (cf. v. 15): In this instance his role as judge involved a pastoral concern, with particular reference to the covenant relationship between an apostate people and their holy God. So far as we know, only Gideon among the ‘major’ judges came near to playing such a role (Judg. 6:25–27), though Deborah was both prophetess and judge (Judg. 4:4). In the person of Samuel the role of judge took on prophetic and priestly significance.
Joyce G. Baldwin, 1 and 2 Samuel: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 8, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 84–85.
They drew water and poured it out before the Lord, evidently as a symbol of the washing away of communal guilt, for which Samuel prayed (cf. Lam. 2:19; Mark 1:4)—the visible sign reinforcing the divine response to the confession of sin.
Samuel judged the people … at Mizpah (cf. v. 15): In this instance his role as judge involved a pastoral concern, with particular reference to the covenant relationship between an apostate people and their holy God. So far as we know, only Gideon among the ‘major’ judges came near to playing such a role (Judg. 6:25–27), though Deborah was both prophetess and judge (Judg. 4:4). In the person of Samuel the role of judge took on prophetic and priestly significance.
Joyce G. Baldwin, 1 and 2 Samuel: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 8, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 84–85.
Questions:
We can sometimes think of repentance as something we do when we’ve really messed up; we realize the damage we've caused, feel bad about it, confess it to God, and then try to move on. But repentance was not meant to be a last resort to our short comings. Repentance is part of the regular rhythms of following Jesus.
Brandon highlighted that rhythm with three simple words: Repent, Remember, Repeat.
Martin Luther famously wrote that the entire life of a believer is meant to be one of repentance. That doesn’t mean spending our lives beating ourselves up over sin. It means becoming quicker to recognize when we have fallen short, quicker to turn back to Jesus, and quicker to remember the grace that meets us there.
When we hide what we’re struggling with, it becomes easier to excuse it, protect it, and convince ourselves that we’re the only ones who can’t seem to get it together. But God never intended the Christian life to be lived in isolation. We need other believers who know us well enough to ask hard questions, remind us of the gospel, pray for us, and help us take the next step of obedience. Israel gathered TOGETHER at Mizpah, confessed their sin, and turned back to the LORD. They didn’t try to clean themselves up before coming to God, they brought their sin into the light and depended completely on Him. Their repentance was a real turning back to the God they had abandoned.
Repentance is not a way of earning our way back to God. Jesus has already made the way. We repent because we belong to Him. We remember His grace because our hope is not in our ability to get everything right. And then we repeat. Learning, day by day, to turn from sin and turn toward Jesus.
Brandon highlighted that rhythm with three simple words: Repent, Remember, Repeat.
Martin Luther famously wrote that the entire life of a believer is meant to be one of repentance. That doesn’t mean spending our lives beating ourselves up over sin. It means becoming quicker to recognize when we have fallen short, quicker to turn back to Jesus, and quicker to remember the grace that meets us there.
When we hide what we’re struggling with, it becomes easier to excuse it, protect it, and convince ourselves that we’re the only ones who can’t seem to get it together. But God never intended the Christian life to be lived in isolation. We need other believers who know us well enough to ask hard questions, remind us of the gospel, pray for us, and help us take the next step of obedience. Israel gathered TOGETHER at Mizpah, confessed their sin, and turned back to the LORD. They didn’t try to clean themselves up before coming to God, they brought their sin into the light and depended completely on Him. Their repentance was a real turning back to the God they had abandoned.
Repentance is not a way of earning our way back to God. Jesus has already made the way. We repent because we belong to Him. We remember His grace because our hope is not in our ability to get everything right. And then we repeat. Learning, day by day, to turn from sin and turn toward Jesus.
- Israel had spent years “lamenting after the LORD,” but Samuel still told them, “If you are returning to the LORD with all your heart, put away the foreign gods.” Feeling conviction wasn't enough; something had to actually leave their lives. Where have you confused being bothered by your sin with actually repenting of it? What are you still holding onto that repentance would require you to put away?
- Israel's Ebenezer was not placed on a mountaintop where they had gotten everything right. It stood near a place marked by their previous defeat. What failure or painful chapter of your life do you still interpret mainly as evidence of what went wrong? How might remembering God's faithfulness in that same place change the story you tell yourself about what happened?
- Luther's picture of the Christian life as continual repentance can sound exhausting if we think repentance means constantly being disappointed in ourselves. But biblical repentance is not circling around our sin, it is continually turning back toward God. What would change if you stopped measuring spiritual growth by how rarely you fail and started paying closer attention to how quickly you turn back to Jesus when you do?
Prayer Topics:
- Ask God to make you quick to repent. Pray for the humility to recognize sin honestly instead of defending it, minimizing it, or waiting until you feel worthy to come back to Him.
- Ask God to help you remember the gospel when you fail.
- Pray for the right people to walk alongside you, and for the humility to actually let them ask questions, speak truth, and help you follow through.
- Pray that repentance would become less of a crisis and more of a daily rhythm: Repent. Remember. Repeat.
This Week's City 7:
Try to commit to memory!
2. Are there sources outside the Bible that confirm the Biblical account of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead? Many Roman and Jewish historians have confirmed that the apostles died as martyrs for preaching that they saw Jesus risen from the grave. No one dies for something they know to be a lie.
(Luke 1:1-4; Acts 26:26; 1 John 1:1-4, Josephus, Clement, Hegesippus, Tertullian, Origen, Polycarp)
(Luke 1:1-4; Acts 26:26; 1 John 1:1-4, Josephus, Clement, Hegesippus, Tertullian, Origen, Polycarp)
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