Raising Your Ebenezer - Pt 1

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen and called its name Ebenezer; for he said, “Till now the Lord has helped us.” So the Philistines were subdued and did not again enter the territory of Israel. And the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel. (1 Samuel 7:12-13 ESV).

Today we will begin a short look at an event in the life of Samuel from the Old Testament. Our reading is the brief description of Samuel erecting a memorial of the nation’s victory over the Philistines. The verse says he set up an Eben-ezer, which means “the stone of help.” If ever the people should forget the providence and protection of God, it was intended to not only remind them, but encourage them to thankfulness for God’s great mercy and deliverance. The place where this memorial was set up was the same where, twenty years before, the Israelites were beaten by the Philistines (cf. 1 Samuel 4:1). Samuel himself took care to set up this monument. He had been instrumental by prayer to obtain the mercy, and therefore he felt obligated to make this grateful acknowledgement of it. 3. The reason he gives for the name is how God had proven himself so many times in the past. It is a reminder for us that the beginnings of mercy and deliverance are to be acknowledged with thankfulness and hope. The meaning of the Hebrew word Ebenezer may be the least known among all our most cherished English hymns. Baptist minister Robert Robinson (1735–1790) wrote “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing” at age 22, not long after his conversion, which was influenced in part by the preaching of evangelist George Whitefield. The meaning of Ebenezer originates more than a thousand years before Christ, in this memorial of the prophet Samuel, who played a pivotal role at a key juncture in the history of God’s people. Long has he been remembered as one of Israel’s greatest figures, alongside names like Moses (cf. Psalm 99:6; Jeremiah 15:1) and David (cf. Hebrews 11:32). God raised up Samuel as the first prophet (cf. Acts 3:24) after the tragic period of the judges (cf. Acts 13:20) to serve as God’s instrument to establish the kingship in Israel. And yet, apart from the extraordinary stories of his birth and calling (cf. 1 Samuel 1–3), his extensive involvement with anointing (and rebuking) Israel’s first king, Saul, and anointing the second king, who was just a mere boy named David, we know fairly little about Samuel. What we do know is his unwavering understanding of the power and purpose of God as well as the tendency of the people of God to wander from this foundation of hope. Samuel wanted the people to remember, not just for a few days, but for years, for decades, for generations, how God had come to the rescue of his people when they humbled themselves before him. They were vulnerable, with their enemies approaching, and they did not deserve God’s rescue, having been chronically unfaithful. Yet, God delivered them. It is the story of all the ages. God has delivered us through Jesus when we were yet “in our sin” (cf. Romans 5:1-12). To this we “raise our own Ebenezer!” It is a cross and an empty tomb!