Night reading · 1 Samuel 3:10
Speak, for thy servant heareth
Samuel in the temple · 1 Samuel 3
Speak; for thy servant heareth.
1 Samuel 3:10 · King James Version
A boy is lying down in the house of God, and the lamp has not yet gone out.
That is how the writer sets the scene, and it is perfect. Ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep.
It is late. The oil is low but still burning. The building is dark and cool and enormous around a small boy on a mat.
And the text says something sad just before it: the word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no open vision. Precious meaning rare. Meaning nobody had heard anything from God in a long time, and people had mostly stopped expecting to.
Then a voice says his name.
Samuel.
He gets up and runs to Eli, the old priest, because who else would be calling him in the night — and Eli says, I did not call you. Go and lie down.
So he goes and lies down.
And it happens again. Samuel. And he runs again, and again Eli sends him back to bed.
Three times. Three times a boy gets up in the dark and goes to the wrong person, because he does not yet know what God's voice sounds like. Samuel did not yet know the LORD, neither was the word of the LORD yet revealed unto him.
There is no rebuke for this anywhere in the chapter. He is not scolded for not recognising it. He is simply young, and this has never happened to him before, and God calls him a third time anyway.
That is worth something if you have been trying to hear God and getting nothing. Three times is not too many. He does not get tired of saying your name.
Eventually the old man works it out, and he tells the boy what to say. And the next time the voice comes, Samuel says the sentence the whole story has been walking toward:
Speak; for thy servant heareth.
Not: tell me what to do about the situation. Not: explain Yourself. Not: here is my list.
Speak. I am listening.
That is a good last sentence for a day. It puts down the arguing and the arranging. It does not require you to have anything sorted out. It is the posture of somebody lying down in the dark with the lamp still burning, who has decided that the next move is God's.
You do not have to hear anything tonight. Samuel did not, for years. He just went to bed in the house of God and left the listening switched on.
The lamp has not gone out.
Lie down.
Speak; for thy servant heareth.