1 Samuel Week 8
February 3, 2026
1 Samuel 7:7 NIV
7 “When the Philistines heard that Israel had assembled at Mizpah, the rulers of the Philistines came up to attack them. When the Israelites heard of it, they were afraid because of the Philistines.”
We go back to what Samuel said now, the promise was if they returned back to God the Philistines would be defeated, and here already, while they are repenting and returning to God, they would be protected. The Philistines are ready to attack, and the Israelites heard this was happening, they have fear. It is understandable knowing how the last battle turned out, but they should have trusted God knowing what was spoken through Samuel the prophet and how God would protect them. Honestly, fear is a natural feeling.
1 Samuel 7:8-9 NIV
8 “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.” 9 Then Samuel took a suckling lamb and sacrificed it as a whole burnt offering to the Lord. He cried out to the Lord on Israel’s behalf, and the Lord answered him.”
So, they go to Samuel, the priest and judge and they ask him to intercede for them, not a bad thing to do here, and they ask him to keep crying out to God, and this is obviously for their deliverance. This is a beautiful picture of how we should be; we should run to the Lord during times of trials and battles and do whatever it takes to get the attention of our Lord. When we do that, with a right heart, God is faithful and will handle the business at hand. So, we see Samuel, he cries out and he makes a sacrifice as well, a lamb, and it says the Lord heard him. We see a picture of salvation and deliverance from the Messiah here. Jesus, the sacrificial Lamb sent to us, sacrificed with His innocent blood being poured out, and the result was delivering God’s people from the enemy. Man, what a powerful picture, and even prophecy!
1 Samuel 7:10-11 NIV
10 “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. 11 The men of Israel rushed out of Mizpah and pursued the Philistines, slaughtering them along the way to a point below Beth Kar.”
God is faithful, the Philistines attacked the Israelites, which you would think they would have learned a lesson with the ark and the punishment poured out on them, but it is amazing how times causes you to forget so much. God starts this massive thunder, and it causes so much fear and confusion that the it allowed the Israelites to step up and battle the Philistines and defeat them. I want you to get an idea of this route: while the city of Beth Kar is not known exactly, it is estimated that the distance was anywhere from 10 to 16 miles. Maybe you do not want to but get a visual of people being slaughtered for 10 to 16 miles, not counting all of those killed at the point of attack, there were many killed and yet, there is not a number given. This is what happens when we give our hearts totally to the Lord and He fights for us.
1 Samuel 7:12 NIV
12 “Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
After this great victory over the Philistines, and God fighting for them pretty much, we see they set up a memorial and they name the place.
Ebenezer – Hebrew meaning is “stone of help”.
This was a memorial stating that the Israelites won this victory only with the help of the Lord.
Sometimes we need to set up a memorial in our life but for one purpose, to remember what God did for us to give us the victory. It is never a stone to worship, but a stone, or item, to remind us of who helped carry us through the battle and onto victory.
Honestly, to many times God does something so big for us, and we put it in our bags of then, and we remember it no more, we should be reminded who truly carried us through, it was not us, but the Lord!
1 Samuel 7:13 NIV
13 “So the Philistines were subdued and they stopped invading Israel’s territory. Throughout Samuel’s lifetime, the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines.”
This is a carry over of the promise God gave the Israelites to have them overcome the Philistines as long as they do not have their idols and Ashtoreth’s out, they had to put them away, actually, they were told to get rid of them, but as long as they were not worshipping these articles, they would overcome the Philistines. (1 Samuel 7:3-4).
God kept His part of it and the Philistines lost against the Israelites.
I simply love how we see the faithfulness of God here. God says look, put me first, put away the other gods in your life, lay everything else down, and watch me deliver you as I promised. GOD IS FAITHFUL!!!!
1 Samuel 7:14 NIV
14 “The towns from Ekron to Gath that the Philistines had captured from Israel were restored to Israel, and Israel delivered the neighboring territory from the hands of the Philistines. And there was peace between Israel and the Amorites.”
So, we see the territories that belongs to the Israelites that the Philistines had taken from them because the hand of the Lord had been against them, but now that God was protecting them again, these towns restored back:
· Ashdod
· Ashkelon
· Gath
· Gaza
· Ekron
Now, when you look at these towns, what do you see? These are the towns that had the ark of God and were afflicted with the rats and tumors.
They took the land from the Israelites, and now, after God had afflicted these places, it gave them back to the Israelites, that is the goodness of God!
Amorites – this was a group of people that were spread out throughout the land on both sides of the Jordan River. These people were basically classified as anybody who was not an Israelite. There was a heavy level of these people that lived on the East side of the Jordan, primarily Canaan.
After the Lord allowed the Israelites to defeat the Philistines, the Amorites lived in peace with the Israelites as well, which is kind of miraculous, but shows the reverence these people had for the God of Israel.
1 Samuel 7:15-16 NIV
15 “Samuel continued as Israel’s leader all the days of his life. 16 From year to year he went on a circuit from Bethel to Gilgal to Mizpah, judging Israel in all those places.”
We have to remember as we get into this, Samuel was priest, yes, but he was also a judge, and he will be the last judge as we will start progressing forward towards the time of kings.
We see the servants heart of Samuel here as he traveled and went to different places, teaching the Word of God, settling disputes, and making sure people understood how things should be done in the eyes of our Lord. We know how faithful Samuel has been to the lord since he was dropped off at the temple as a young child.
1 Samuel 7:17 NIV
17 “But he always went back to Ramah where his home was, and there he also held court for Israel. And he built an altar there to the Lord.”
So, we have already seen the faithful leadership of Samuel, first to God and then to the people of God, and we see he had a home, and that is where his heart was even though he went out to other towns.
We see he had an altar there where he lived and that demonstrated his place of daily worship. Man, this poses a question to be asked, what is our altar? What God is built to? And where is and what do we worship on it?
Samuel built an altar for the Lord, we MUST make sure that who our altars are built to, and for, are for the Lord and nothing to please the flesh!
1 Samuel 8:1-3 NIV
1 “When Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as Israel’s leaders. 2 The name of his firstborn was Joel and the name of his second was Abijah, and they served at Beersheba. 3 But his sons did not follow his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice.”
As often was the case with priests, and we saw it with Eli, their sons would be installed to take over the ministry to the people.
We know that Samuel walked upright from all we have seen and read, and even though he walked it out, and taught it to his sons, they strayed. They sound a lot like Eli’s kids and using their position for personal game and taking bribes and what not.
Remember here, the priestly positions these men held were not just as priests, but also as judges and they were often involved in politics as well, this was the influence of religious leaders back then.
So, we have Joel and Abijah and they were very specific in what they did by accepting bribes, dishonest gains, which would refer to stealing and cheating. First from God and then from the people.
Perverting justice of course would be favoring people no matter if they are guilty or not, leaning to making decisions that would benefit them and not uphold the truth, boy, do we see that in our world today.
1 Samuel 8:4-5 NIV
4 “So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. 5 They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have.”
We see the elders of the Israelites see how the sons of Samuel are acting, how they are corrupt and do not stand for what Samuel stood for.
They also understood that Samuel was old and could not do the job he did before, this is obvious as he installed his sons to take over. They understood how corrupt these boys were and they did not want to be under Gods hand of judgment, which would happen if these guys were unfaithful.
They then do something they did not think through, they asked for a king.
Now, it is obvious they had been having these discussions about this, and you wonder how many times Samuel went to his kids to confront their sin, but like Eli’s sons, the boys shunned their warnings. So, they figured look, we are not going to go through what we went through with Eli’s sons, so let’s eliminate these boys power by telling Samuel we want a king.
The other thing to factor here is this, they knew Samuel was a man of God and that if he sought out somebody to be king that he would pray and God would lead Samuel to the right person to be king and uphold justice, remember the reputation Samuel had as a proven man of God.
So, they tell Samuel, “We want a king”.
The other interesting part to this is interesting to me, they are specific in saying that want a king because all the other nations have a king. They had the God that was above all Gods, He led the Israelites to victory over and over, and they never had a king, but now, because they see what the other nations have, they want to copy them, this is not the wisdom of God, this is worldly wisdom.
1 Samuel 8:6-7 NIV
6 “But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord. 7 And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.”
So, we see here that the people ask for a king and there are two perspectives here, but the Lord spells it out for Samuel. Samuel is displeased because they are thinking that the people are rejecting him, but as we talked about, they knew Samuel was older and that the people leading now were corrupt.
What they should have been doing is seeking and asking God what He wanted, but as people do so often, they just went and told Samuel what they wanted, and had decided, on their own.
Samuel seems to think it is a personal attack against him, but then Samuel does what he should do, he prays, and the Lord is clear here, look, I am their king and they are now rejecting me as King.
1 Samuel 8:8-9 NIV
8 “As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. 9 Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”
The Lord then points out what we have read all through the Scriptures in the Old Testament, the Israelites have followed other gods ever since the Lord delivered them out of Egypt.
Remember what happened in Exodus Chapter 32, while Moses was on the mountain getting the law, the Israelites were having Aaron make a calf of gold to worship.
Remember, this is right after God delivered them from 430 years of bondage, He led them by a cloud during the day and by fire by night. Then they got backed up to the waters, God opened the waters, and they walked through on dry ground. God gave them manna to eat and water from a rock. After seeing, and experiencing all of that, they still turned their back on God.
As you go through the Old Testament, you will see the Israelites get into trouble, God deliver them, they make promises, and then they return to the sin they left.
Then Lord then declares that there will be a cost to having a king, there are things the king will do and have and take and there is nothing they will be able to do about it, we will talk about those things next.