The Way Back to God, Part Two

It was a long time, twenty years in all, that the ark remained at Kiriath Jearim, and all the people of Israel mourned and sought after the LORD. And Samuel said to the whole house of Israel, “If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the LORD and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.” So the Israelites put away their Baals and Ashtoreths, and served the LORD only.

Then Samuel said, “Assemble all Israel at Mizpah and I will intercede with the LORD for you.” When they had assembled at Mizpah, they drew water and poured it out before the LORD. On that day they fasted and there they confessed, “We have sinned against the LORD.” And Samuel was leader of Israel at Mizpah.

When the Philistines heard that Israel had assembled at Mizpah, the rulers of the Philistines came up to attack them. And when the Israelites heard of it, they were afraid because of the Philistines. They said to Samuel, “Do not stop crying out to the LORD our God for us, that he may rescue us from the hand of the Philistines.” Then Samuel took a suckling lamb and offered it up as a whole burnt offering to the LORD. He cried out to the LORD on Israel’s behalf, and the LORD answered him.

While Samuel was sacrificing the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to engage Israel in battle. But that day the LORD thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites. The men of Israel rushed out of Mizpah and pursued the Philistines, slaughtering them along the way to a point below Beth Car.

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far has the LORD helped us.”

1 Samuel 7:2-12

In this passage we learn about the people of God returning to their God after they had turned away to serving idols. The Bible tells us that God’s people often became idol worshipers-worshipers of Baals and Ashtoreths. Like the Israelites, we also have accepted the idols of the people around us-idols of ideas, idols of metals, idols of human beings. But this is not what God wants us to do. We are not to conform to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of our minds. We are to put on our Lord Jesus Christ and think of heavenly things, where Christ is seated.

If we are honest, we must confess that there may be idols in our lives. They may have come in quietly, as the London fog seeps into homes. My prayer is that, as we study this passage and understand it, God will help us to throw away all idols and turn back to our Lord Jesus Christ, who has been crucified in our place on the cross. I pray that we will glory in Jesus Christ and him crucified. Knowing that we have a God who is gracious to all returning sinners, I pray that we will repent truly of our sins and call upon the name of the Lord that we may be saved, and that God will deliver us from our rebellion and help us to return to him with sincerity of heart, not only in word but also in deed, and be true to the covenant which God has granted us in Jesus Christ.

Our Need for God

Recently about ninety-five rich and powerful Germans boarded a chartered Concorde aircraft, which took off at 4:45 P.M. from Paris to go to New York. These people intended to join a number of others in Miami for a long cruise in the Caribbean. I am sure they thought that, having made their money, it was now time to enjoy the fruit of their labor before they died.

But something happened and these people never arrived in New York. They never joined others in Miami for the cruise. Within sixty seconds of its takeoff, the aircraft caught fire and all aboard perished.

What would Jesus say if he heard such news? We don’t have to speculate too much, for his response to a similar occurrence is recorded in Luke 13:3. Upon being told of some Galileans who had been killed while offering sacrifices, Jesus said, “Unless you repent, you too will all perish,” and I would add, “Perish eternally.”

We must be sure that we are right with God, because we do not know when we will die. That is why we say, “Now is the accepted time,” and “Now is the day of salvation.” That is why we say, “Now is the time to repent and return to God.” We do not know what will happen tomorrow, or even in the next hour.

This passage of 1 Samuel 7 speaks about coming back to God. God still receives returning sinners, and, in fact, the Bible tells us that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved. This is a great promise of God, and we must avail ourselves of it.

When Noah built the ark, it had not rained yet. But unlike the Concorde, the ark is safe. The ark stands for salvation, and everyone who is chosen of the Father from all eternity will be drawn to it, come to it, enter it, and be saved forevermore. That is why we must study the way back to God as revealed in this passage.

Review

It may sound strange to us that the people of God could exchange their glory for an image of Baal and Ashtoreths, but the Bible tells us that during Samuel’s time the people of God became sexually perverted and engaged themselves in the loathsome sexual deviancy of the nations they had conquered. In fact, modern archaeologists have discovered many female nude figures from this part of Israel. We may wonder how these people could forget God and worship demons, and yet they did.

But we know that idols never save anyone. In due course, after twenty years, the Israelites themselves realized this. They became extremely disillusioned and miserable, and desired to return to God.

In our previous study on this passage, the first point we spoke about was the Israelites’ need to realize the truth of their miserable condition. This is what we must do also, if we want to return to God. Have you come to realize that worship of creation, rather than Creator, is utter futility? It is full of misery and pain and agony and disappointments. Have you come to realize that only the knowledge of the true and living God brings eternal life and everlasting joy? Happiness, let me assure you, is to know, worship, and serve the Lord exclusively. Are you fed up with idolatry-the idolatry of materialism, philosophy, science, false religions and even loving your loved ones more than the eternal God who created us?

Second, we spoke about returning to God. That means you must change your thinking to have a biblical Weltanschauung or worldview. You must change your thinking and direction totally. You must turn around, as the prodigal son did long ago, and come to the sound thinking of reality. You must agree wholeheartedly with God’s thinking and surrender completely to him.

Anyone who wants to return to God must realize that God is a totalitarian ruler and he will never negotiate with us. If you are a child of God and the word of God is articulated, proclaimed, and preached, you will do what God tells you to do. If you don’t, then you are not a Christian. You are still outside the kingdom of God, and you must cry out to God and say, “God, O God, have mercy upon me, a sinner, that I may do the will of God without negotiation, without argument.”

Third, we spoke about getting rid of all idols. That is the proof of true repentance. If you do not rid yourself of all other gods, you are repenting in word only. So in 1 Samuel 7:3 Samuel told the Israelites, “If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths.” As Jacob of old did when God summoned him to go to Bethel, as Joshua demanded when he renewed the covenant with the people at Shechem, and as Samuel now was demanding as he spoke to the people at Mizpah, you must also rid yourselves of all idols, whether they are idols of ideas, things, or human beings.

Why must we rid ourselves of idols? Because, the Bible tells us, we are running a race. Therefore, we must throw off every weight and every sin-whether secret sin or darling sin-everything that prevents us from singleheartedly running, so that we may finish the race and receive a prize. We must acknowledge that all idols are useless, powerless, and unprofitable-yea, they are demonic.

Fourth, you must recommit yourself to the Lord of the covenant. You must acknowledge that you have strayed away from God, looking for idols and seeking satisfaction elsewhere, even in the creation itself. In verse 3 Samuel exhorted the people, “And commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only,” meaning exclusively.

We cannot serve two masters. That is why you must entrust yourself to God alone, to live for his glory at all costs. Haven’t you heard what Jesus said, “Deny yourselves daily, take up the cross, and follow me”? Haven’t you read Jesus’ words, “If anyone comes to me and doesn’t hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters, yes, his own life, he cannot be my disciple”? Haven’t you read, “Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength”? You must serve the Lord wholeheartedly. The Lord alone is mighty to save.

Fifth, we said that the way back to God includes confession. Don’t defend yourself. Confess your sin, saying, “Have mercy upon me, a sinner.” Confess the truth regarding the person and work of the Lord. Agree with God’s philosophy as revealed in his word. Tell him, “God, you are right and I am all wrong. You are holy and I am all unrighteousness.” Join with David, the prodigal son, and the publican. Do not shift the blame, but own your own sin, honor God, and beg him for pardon. When you do these things, you will find a God who freely pardons us.

Remember the Sacrifice

The sixth point we need to examine in the way back to God is that we must remember the sacrifice, which is at the center of our salvation. In 1 Samuel 7:9 we read, “Then Samuel took a suckling lamb and offered it up as a whole burnt offering to the Lord.”

Have you ever considered that it would be justice if God destroyed every sinner with everlasting destruction? God is just and holy, and we have trampled upon his laws. Sin is transgression of God’s laws, and because God is infinite, any sin against him is also infinite. There is no way on earth for God to forgive our enormous sins unless God himself devises a way. But the good news is that God did devise a way before the creation of the world.

The Bible says that “the soul who sins is the one who will die” (Ezekiel 18:4). We have all sinned and we must die. But there is a ram caught in the thicket for us. We didn’t expect it, but God provided a substitute-a perfect substitute, a heaven-sent substitute, a heaven-accepted substitute. God became man in Jesus Christ, very God and very man, and died in our place to make atonement for our sins. That is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Do you say you have a Ph.D. and you don’t like this idea of the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ? That’s too bad. You say you have a million dollars? That’s too bad. I wish you had nothing, so that in God’s mercy you can turn to God. It is better to have less education and less money and a lot of troubles and be stripped of all our arrogance and strength rather than to despise the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ on our behalf.

Paul spoke about this several times. In 1 Corinthians 2:2 he said, “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” In Galatians 6:14 he said, “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. . . .” In Galatians 3:13 he said, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.'” In Romans 3:25 he said, “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished. . . .” God is just, and he must punish our sins. He did punish our sin, all of it, in Jesus Christ, the heaven-sent perfect substitute.

Our sins are punished in Jesus Christ, not in us. Paul gives us an exposition of the crucifixion of Christ in 1 Corinthians 15:3: “Christ died for our sins.” And in Ephesians 1:7 he tells us, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins.”

We must remember the sacrifice of Jesus Christ! It alone is the basis for the forgiveness of our sins. In 2 Corinthians 5:21 Paul wrote, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” This is called double imputation. Our sins were imputed to Christ, and his righteousness was imputed to our account. In Jesus Christ we are the righteousness of God. We have been qualified to serve him, worship him, and come before him in confidence. “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities,” Isaiah said in the eighth century B.C, “the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5).

That is why it is important to pay attention to what Samuel did. The suckling lamb he offered as a whole burnt offering was a type of Jesus Christ. Samuel’s sacrifice pointed to Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world and by whom alone our salvation is accomplished. In 1 Peter 1 we read that we are redeemed not with perishable things but “with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:19). The sure basis for our salvation, for our acceptance with God, is our faith in the cross of Christ. Jesus Christ, the perfect priest, sacrificed himself, the perfect victim, once for all and achieved for us perfect acceptance with God. This is the only basis on which we can return to our holy God.

Intercession

The seventh point in the way back to God is intercession. In 1 Samuel 7:5 we read, “Then Samuel said, ‘Assemble all Israel at Mizpah and I will intercede with the Lord for you.'” First, we must note that Samuel told the people to come to Mizpah. (PGM) All those who are interested in serving God, whether far or near, must come to God’s appointed place at God’s appointed time. Let me ask you something: Do you know where your children are? Are they working on Sunday? Are they engaging in sports activity during the time for worship? If that is true, you are wicked. If a person is saved and baptized, he or she will come to Mizpah when the prophet says to come.

In Hebrews 10:25 we read, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing. . . .” Shame upon us when we don’t assemble at Mizpah! God himself has told us to come. And in verse 5 Samuel also made a promise: “Assemble all Israel at Mizpah and I will intercede with the Lord for you.” This was the desire of the people themselves. In verse 8 we read, “They said to Samuel, ‘Do not stop crying out to the Lord our God for us, that he may rescue us from the hand of the Philistines.'” In other words, “Please intercede for us. Please pray for us, Samuel.” Samuel listened to the people’s request and in verse 9 we read, “He cried out to the Lord on Israel’s behalf, and the Lord answered him.”

We have an intercessor who is greater than Samuel, yea, who is greater than Moses and Daniel. He is the perfect intercessor, the God/man Christ Jesus, and his intercession is always effectual. In Hebrews 7:25 the writer to the Hebrews tells us, “Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.”

What about you? Do you have an intercessor? Praise God, if you are a believer in Christ, God has given you a mediator, an intercessor, a representative who represents you before God, who prays to God on your behalf on the basis of what he did on the cross. His prayer is always heard in our behalf, and we are delivered from all our troubles.

Divine Deliverance

The eighth point we need to consider is divine deliverance. The devil hates it when people return to God, and so we notice that when the Israelites assembled at Mizpah, the Philistines became extremely unhappy and came to attack the Israelites.

That is always the case when we return to God. When we repent, when we trust in God, when we fast and pray and throw off all our idols, all of a sudden the devil begins to actively oppose us. But praise be to God, we have a God who defeated the devil, death, hell, and the world for us. That is the wonderful news.

God’s enemies are troubled whenever God’s people repent, confess, throw off idols, trust in God, look at the all-sufficient sacrifice, and rely on Christ’s intercession for them. So the Philistines joined forces to attack and destroy God’s people who had gathered at Mizpah. But God’s people have a champion who is greater than David. He is David’s Son and David’s Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He is God and man. By his death on the cross he defeated all enemies, even death itself. So in 1 Samuel 7:10 we read, “While Samuel was sacrificing the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to engage Israel in battle. But that day the Lord thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites.”

We find this idea of divine intervention several other places in the Bible. In 1 Samuel 2:9-10 Samuel’s mother Hannah said, “It is not by strength that one prevails; those who oppose the Lord will be shattered. He will thunder against them from heaven; the Lord will judge the ends of the earth.”

In Joshua 10:10-11 we read, “The Lord threw them into confusion before Israel, who defeated them in a great victory at Gibeon. . . . As they fled before Israel on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, the Lord hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones than were killed by the swords of the Israelites.” It is God, not Baal, who controls the weather. When he thunders, his enemies are defeated.

In Psalm 18 David says in verse 6, “In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help.” In verses 7-9 we read, “The earth trembled and quaked . . . . Smoke rose from his nostrils; consuming fire came from his mouth, burning coals blazed out of it. He parted the heavens and came down; dark clouds were under his feet. He mounted the cherubim and flew; he soared on the wings of the wind.” In verses 12-13 we read, “Out of the brightness of his presence clouds advanced, with hailstones and bolts of lightning. The Lord thundered from heaven; the voice of the Most High resounded.”

When was the most significant time our Lord thundered? When he was on the cross. By his death he destroyed death, hell and the devil for us and gave us total victory in Jesus Christ. Aren’t you glad that you have a champion whose thunder puts all his enemies to flight?

Thanksgiving

The final point in the way back to God is thanksgiving. Oh, there was great victory based on sacrifice, and in 1 Samuel 7:12 we read, “But Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, ‘Thus far has the Lord helped us.'” But, oh, what a greater victory it is to destroy death, to destroy hell, to destroy the devil and destroy the world, all in behalf of us! This is the great salvation our champion, the Lord Jesus Christ, has accomplished by his death on the cross.

In Psalm 116 the psalmist asks, “How can I repay the Lord for all his goodness to me?” What is the answer? “I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord” (Psalm 116:12-13). Salvation is by grace alone through faith alone. We cannot work for it or pay for it, for it is too costly. So we can only thank God, and that is what we must do.

Our free redemption in Christ, Paul tells us in Ephesians 1, is to the praise of his glorious grace. That is why we can sing now and forever, “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” (Revelation 5:12) That is all we can do.

Erecting Ebenezers

When Samuel put up his Ebenezer stone, he did something that was totally different from what Saul, and later Absalom, did. They built monuments also, but only for themselves. They congratulated and praised themselves, as we read in 1 Samuel 15 and 2 Samuel 18. That is what the pagans do and backslidden Christians do. When anything good happens, they take credit, and when anything terrible happens, they blame God. But here we see Samuel doing something different. He took a stone, set it up between Mizpah and Shen, and named it Ebenezer, which means stone of help. By this Samuel was declaring to the Israelites, “Up to this place, or up to this hour, the Lord has helped us.”

When I look back upon my own life, I can see multitudes of stones-Ebenezers-which, by God’s grace, I have been able to erect. The Lord has helped me even before I was born and he has helped me every day of my life. The Lord has helped me in the past, he has helped me to this hour, and I am confident he will help me in the future.

The Bible says Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and he will never leave us nor forsake us. Therefore, let us never forget to give thanks to the Lord. Let us never forget to erect Ebenezers daily for God’s glory. And when we do that, we can point them out to our children and say, “This is what God did when I was ten,” “This is what God did when I was twelve,” “This is what God did when I was fifteen,” and “This is what God did when I was seventy-five.” We can tell them, “God has done it all because salvation is of God.”

Erecting Ebenezers is the will of God and should be our way of life. Remember how the Lord commanded Joshua to take twelve stones from the midst of the Jordan and set them up as a memorial to God’s amazing salvation, as we read in Joshua 4? Why did God tell Joshua to do that? Because to God alone belongs eternal praise.

Have You Returned to God?

We spoke about ninety-five people who perished in the crash of the Concorde aircraft. They were rich, famous, powerful people, but in sixty seconds they were gone. We have heard of such things happening before and I am sure we will hear of them again. It is too late for these people to return to the Lord.

But I have good news for you: You are still living, and the Lord Jesus Christ receives all returning sinners. You may think there is no need for for you to return to God, but the Holy Spirit says there is great need for it. I pray that each of us will see our plight in the light of God’s revelation and begin the way back to God.

How do we return to God? The first thing we must do is to realize our misery apart from him. The disillusionment, the confusion, the misery, the pain, the agony, the frustration-may we get to a place of being fed up with all of these things, as the people of Israel finally were.

Second, we must change our thinking and direction, totally and completely. Do not even try to negotiate with this totalitarian God. He demands and we must do what he demands. As Psalm 2 tells us, “Kiss the Son, lest he be angry” (v. 12). And if our repentance is true, we will be ready and very willing to throw out all idols of creation, whether of ideas or metals or people. We will realize they are useless, impotent, and demonic. We will take steps to truly recommit and entrust ourselves to God to serve him alone with all our mind and might. Instead of blameshifting, we will join with the publican and the prodigal son and confess our sins, saying, “I have sinned. Have mercy on me, a sinner.” As Jesus said, the publican went home justified, and the prodigal son was received by his father with great celebration.

Third, we will always keep in mind the basis of it all is the lamb who was sacrificed in our behalf. He who was very God and very man, the Lord Jesus Christ, who knew no sin, became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God. That is the basis for our salvation, not anything in us or in our country or in our parents. We must believe in the pervasiveness of sin and be always thankful to the great Intercessor God has given us in the person of his Son, Jesus Christ. He always lives to intercede for us, and his intercession is effectual. If the prayer of Samuel was effectual, the prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ will be even more effectual for us. There will be deliverance because our Lord Jesus Christ will thunder as he did for his people at Mizpah.

Oh, the devil will not like you to return to God, and he will attack you at the point of your repentance. But the Lord is our champion. He will thunder and there shall be great deliverance. And when that happens, what should we do? Erect Ebenezers in gratitude for the great, costly salvation of our God. There is nothing else we can do.

How can we repay God for his mercy to us? We should take up the cup of salvation and praise our God. We should take stones and erect them, one after another, throughout our life, that we can look at them and point others to them. And then, when we see how God has been good to us in the past, we can make the logical deduction that he will be good for us in the future. We can take great comfort in knowing that nothing in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. We are more than conquerors through Jesus Christ our Lord.

May God help us even this day to call upon the name of the Lord. May we come to him with sincerity of heart, not to negotiate anything, not to argue with God, but to agree with him. May this be our prayer: “O God, I am a sinner, but I still breathe and I still think, so I praise you for this brief period of grace. Thank you for your Son Jesus Christ, our great champion, our great warrior, the one who destroyed death, the one who defeated the devil, the one who defeated every enemy, the one who is my Savior. I repent of all my sins and trust in Jesus Christ alone. I throw off all my idols and recommit my life to Christ. Have mercy on me, O God, and thunder aloud. Defeat all my enemies! Set me free! Deliver me! Save me! Heal me! I surrender my whole life to you. May I serve you only this day forward. For I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.