Heroes? Eli

1 Samuel 1:12-18

I have grown up in an achievement-oriented society. We are known by what we accomplish. We want to be known as competent and strong. 

Last week we looked at the story of Hannah, and we met Eli, the high priest of Israel, who loved to sit in his chair at the entrance to the Tabernacle in Shiloh. We saw Eli in direct contrast to Hannah — she was a nobody, yet she knelt in the presence of Yahweh. Eli was the high priest, yet he had no real relationship with Yahweh! Eli would have been the competent and strong man; he was the high priest. 

But the contrast does not end here. Hannah dedicated her child to God, quite literally; he was raised in the Tabernacle. But look at Eli’s own sons — 1 Samuel 2:12 describes them this way: Now the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord. Worthless. Can you imagine? In 1 Samuel 1:16, Hannah pleads, “please don’t think I’m a worthless woman.” We remember that it was she who was in position before Yahweh, it was she who had great faith. It was she who left a legacy. But these sons of the priest… the term “worthless” here is connected with destruction. So the sons of Eli were utterly destructive. When I was in college, I lived across the hall from a guy we knew as the ultimate consumer. He consumed and never gave anything back to society. He took. He ate. He consumed. And this was the role of Eli’s sons.

And they had no idea about God. They even took the meat that was given in sacrifice to God. And therefore 1 Samuel 2:17 tells us this: 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. 

While we recognize that each child will do what he or she will; as parents it is our job to bring them up right, to bring them up to know and love the Lord. Train up a child in the way that he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6. How is it that Eli, the high priest, has sons who do not know the Lord? In the same way he neglected his duties as high priest, he has neglected his duty as their father. In fact, their contempt for the Lord’s offering was not their worst sin. 

1 Samuel 2:22 Now Eli was very old, and he kept hearing all that his sons were doing to all Israel, and how they lay with the women who were serving at the entrance to the tent of meeting. 23 And he said to them, “Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil dealings from all these people. 24 No, my sons; it is no good report that I hear the people of the Lord spreading abroad. 25 If someone sins against a man, God will mediate for him, but if someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?” 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 have to realize how awful these sons of Eli were. These women serving at the entrance to the tent of meeting — these were most likely godly women who had come to clean or cook. They were indeed powerless, and this was their service to God, yet the evil sons of the priest were taking advantage of them. So Eli confronts his sons. Sort of. I can hear him whining. “why do you do such things?” 

But here, not only do we see Eli’s poor parenting, but we also can see his poor character. In 1 Samuel 2:25, he recognizes first that if someone sins against a fellow man, God can mediate. But the second part of that verse is where we find a problem. “If someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?”

The problem here is that all sin is primarily against God, whether it is against our fellow man or not. Eli’s question, “who can intercede for him?” suggests that there is indeed no intercession. Is there any hope for a sinner? Eli seems to think “no, there’s no hope.” Here is the high priest, the one who is offering sacrifices on behalf of the people. And he is saying “there is no hope. There is no intercession.” 

Some of us have felt the weight of that hopelessness. We’ve said things, we’ve done things we should not have done, and we’ve left undone things we should have done. And Satan reminds us daily that we are unworthy of forgiveness or intercession. “If someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?” 

But we know, from 1 Timothy 2:5 that “There is one God and one mediator between God and people, the man Jesus Christ.” I hear so often people will say something like, “I’ve been so bad; I don’t think God could ever forgive me.” I personally struggle with feeling the need to do something to overcome my own sins and shortcomings. But the reality is, none of us can do anything to make God love us more, and none of us will ever do anything to make God love us less. So, to answer Eli’s question, “If someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?” Jesus is the answer. Jesus can, and will, and has! interceded for us!

So God spoke to Samuel and prophesied to him. In 1 Samuel 3:11-14, we read the following: Then the Lord said to Samuel, “Behold, I am about to do a thing in Israel at which the two ears of everyone who hears it will tingle. On that day I will fulfill against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end. And I declare to him that I am about to punish his house forever, for the iniquity that he knew, because his sons were blaspheming God, and he did not restrain them. Therefore I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever.” 

And Samuel, who we will look at in more depth next week, grew up and prophesied in Yahweh’s name. But as for Eli, and as for Israel… Israel went to war with the Philistines, and the Philistines routed them, killing thousands. So Israel decided that the problem was they needed to bring the Ark of the Covenant to war with them — they saw it as a magic talisman, guaranteeing their victory. But the Philistines defeated them and stole the Ark of the Covenant as spoils of war and killed Eli’s sons. 

We take up the story in 1 Samuel 4:14-18 When Eli heard the sound of the outcry, he said, “What is this uproar?” Then the man hurried and came and told Eli. Now Eli was ninety-eight years old and his eyes were set so that he could not see. And the man said to Eli, “I am he who has come from the battle; I fled from the battle today.” And he said, “How did it go, my son?” He who brought the news answered and said, “Israel has fled before the Philistines, and there has also been a great defeat among the people. Your two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God has been captured.” As soon as he mentioned the ark of God, Eli fell over backward from his seat by the side of the gate, and his neck was broken and he died, for the man was old and heavy. He had judged Israel forty years. 

What can we learn from Eli’s life? The big lesson I took from this is that to outsiders, Eli would have looked like he had it all. He was the Big Man. He was famous and rich. He had power and authority.

But looks are deceiving. In reality, he was morally bankrupt and was an impotent leader and father. Though he was the high priest, he did not even know Yahweh. Hannah was the hero of this story, a nobody. Our human nature says we have to be strong and powerful. But listen to what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 12:10: For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 

God continually does what we do not expect. In 1 Corinthians 1:27, Paul tells the church in Corinth that God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.We come to church and show how strong we are, how we have everything under control. But the reality is that God can and will use our weakness to glorify Himself, if only we will let Him!

Most of us want to be the Big Man. But Jesus shows us clearly that His Kingdom is different. In Mark 9:35, He says, “If anyone would be first be must be last of all and servant of all.” So, will you be like Eli? Big Man, sitting in his Big Man Chair? Or will you be like Jesus, who stepped down from Heaven to become a man, and he became the servant of all, serving even through death on a cross. This is the path God has given us to Christlikeness. Each of us can serve someone. Find someone to serve this week, and serve with gladness, as if you are serving the Lord!