18. There was a "stone of help" in the nation of Israel and it served as a reminder that God was faithful to His divine Word. It is true that we should not live in the past. We should not dwell on sin but I am sure we remember the consequences of our sin. The punishment for our sin is chastening unto holiness not redemptive. We hear that we should not live in the past. This is basically good advise, but it is not entirely true for the Christian. If we remember it will help our gratitude, and Christian gratitude will help keep us faithful. The mark of a true Christian is faithfulness. However, because of our remaining corruption we despair and doubt God and His blessed Word. He is faithful in the past, now in the present and soon in the future. There is never a time when He is not faithful. We may be steadfast for the future if we dwell on the past. That is, didn't you first trust Christ in the past? In other words, Paul says about his past in a paraphrase, "I know whom I have believed and I am persuaded that He will keep that which I have committed against the Day of Judgment." We see that Samuel remembered the Lord's work because He acknowledged the Lord's help. We ought always to confess the Lord's work in how He helps us to give Him alone the glory and the honor and the praise.
19. We need God as the font of every blessing in our Christian lives. We need His Spirit to tune our hearts to sing of God's awesome grace. We are sheep going astray and wandering from the fold of God. We are prone to wander and we know it. We are prone to leave the God we love so dear. We fall into sin and rebel, but He is always there ready to forgive us. The Christian loves His Redeemer and Creator. The "Ebenezer" is a reminder to God's utter and very faithfulness in Christ to help the people of Israel. If we remember God's work of faithfulness since we first trusted Christ as Lord and Savior, it will no doubt strengthen our faith before God and we will grow in His Word by edification, knowledge and wisdom. We see that God's love has blessed us and God has brought us to where we are. He will bring us safely home by His all-true and all-dominating grace. We ought to remember God's faithfulness to us. It is always good to count our every blessings in prayer because it enriches our prayer time, life and conversation to God. Have you remembered God's faithfulness to you? Maybe it is good to keep reminders of His blessed faithfulness to you, because we easily forget.
20. We have not been saved from a human enemy like the nation of Israel concerning the Philistines. We have been saved from the Father's wrath. The Father's wrath in eternal hell is far worse than any human enemy. We ought to praise the Father of lights that He sent His only begotten dear Son in whom He was solely well-pleased to die a death of a sacrificial atonement to remit the sins of God's people through Christ alone and pay for divine satisfaction for our sins. We ought to tenderly dwell upon His atoning death through the Lord's Supper. He was lifted up in our behalf. He is with us now in fellowship and communion, but He will also come again. We remember that He is with us now and will come again in the future. In the days of Samuel God was opposed to the Philistines all the days of Samuel. God is opposed to the non-elect and hates them. He hates them and He is angry with them everyday because they do not have the Christ-covering of the divine Savior of the Cross. Israel was restored what the Philistines had taken. God restores to us what was taken from us by our enemies. Its like a person who has been raped. That is, if they come to Christ and He washes them clean from the defilement of the world, they are purer than when they first begun. God also brings peace between enemies when our ways are pleasing to Him. I would like to point out that there was peace between Israel and the Amorites. God is the first cause to bring about peace through His outstretched providential hand. God the Father, the only Holy Father, made peace with Himself through Jesus our Savior and Lord in earning salvation for us in His sinless life in living in our behalf and dying an efficacious propitiatory death in our behalf. Jesus said of Himself that the Son of Man must be lifted up. That is, the Son of Man must be crucified. He called Himself the "Good Shepherd" because He lies down His life for the sheep. It was said by a Catholic theologian on EWTN that none of the people that saw Jesus' death knew that Jesus was offering Himself as sin offering to God to atone for sin of His people because it all appeared outside the walls of Jerusalem, outside the temple and with no priest. I suggest to you that He clearly said He was the Good Shepherd and the Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. The people that treasured His words knew actually what was going on at the Cross of Calvary. That is, surely His mother knew this was the very reason He was born! I have a Savior that needs no additions or subtractions. Why, He is perfect just the way He is for us! Don't you see that Jesus is the perfect Savior? Dwell much on this in these dark days.
Grace and peace!
This blog web site is for the in-depth, sound and basic exegetical study of the Bible in Reformed apologetics; that is, I shall expound upon the inerrant and infallible Word of God, the Holy Scriptures. There shall be biblical studies in world religions and non-Christian cults. I also quote and research reformed writers and I am happy to study from them. May the Lord bless everyone who reads this blog with spiritual riches in Christ which is His imputed merit by faith alone.
