Here I Raise My Ebenezer

Intro

Lots of people like old hymns, The lyrics are very poetic and seem theological and many people miss that. Thou I would argue there are many modern worship songs that are equally theologically accurate, you just have to be willing to look. These days it seems popular to take an old public domain hymn, add a verse and switch up the music and put it out as a new song. Honestly some of them are pretty good. But what gets me is some of the lyrics, the langauge is lost on todays generation. The thee and thous no longer make sense.

Hymns often use words that are no longer in common usage, like "hark" instead of "listen" or "thou" instead of "you." This can make the lyrics feel unnatural and difficult to understand.

Night With Ebon Pinion

This is a Hymn that I have never heard before. Lyric: “Night, with ebon pinion, brooded o’er the vale…”

Confusion: What is ebon pinion? Explanation: “Ebon” means black, and “pinion” refers to a bird’s wing. The hymn paints a poetic image of dark wings of night over the garden of Gethsemane—but many modern listeners, like me, miss the metaphor entirely.

A bulwark never failing

Lyric: “A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing.”

Confusion: What’s a bulwark? Explanation: A bulwark is a defensive wall, a metaphor for God’s protection. Without that vocabulary, it loses its power and imagery.

"My sin—not in part but the whole"

Confusion: Not everyone understands the phrase structure.

Explanation: It means Jesus took all our sin, not just some of it.

"I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew"

– I Sought the Lord

Confusion: The past-tense structure and older poetic flow can confuse listeners.

"Here I raise mine Ebenezer"

Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing

Original: "Here I raise mine Ebenezer; hither by Thy help I’m come."

Confusion: What is an "Ebenezer"?

Explanation: Refers to 1 Samuel 7:12; it's a memorial stone meaning "The Lord has helped us."

In this passage we are going to learn what Happened to Israel and Samuel that he raised a monument to signify what the Lord had done for them. They would learn that they had to return to the Lord God with their whole heart. To lose anything that had come between them and God , to worship Him alone, and only then would He save them.

To follow the will of God, for the Lord God to save us we must remember like them, that God is not someone that can be amnipulated to serve us and give us what we want but rather we re to return to God with our whole hearts, humble ourselves before Him and tell everyone what God has done in your life.

God had come to the rescue of his people when they humbled themselves before him. They were vulnerable, with their enemies approaching, and they did not deserve God’s rescue, having been chronically unfaithful.

We are prone to wander, and we look to our stone of help, Jesus, who spilled His blood so we may be set free.

Chapter 4 - God is on Our side

But first before we go into the idea of our Ebenezer, we go back a little bit. God values humility, people that seek Him not for what God can do for them but rather how we can serve God. But people had gotten to the point where they thought God was on their side for their own glory and nothing else. Beware the assumption that “God is on my side”. but for the Israelites it started by losing to the Philistines for some unfathomable reason.

1 Samuel 4:2 ESV

2 The Philistines drew up in line against Israel, and when the battle spread, Israel was defeated before the Philistines, who killed about four thousand men on the field of battle.

How could this even happen? after all the Lord was supposed to be on their side? this didnt make sense. Maybe it was because the Lord was not with them because they were not living for God.

Instead of seeking God to see exactly what had gone on, they asked eachother. Even the elders didnt ask God, but sought eachother to see what exactley was going on.

1 Samuel 4:3 ESV

3 And when the people came to the camp, the elders of Israel said, “Why has the Lord defeated us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the covenant of the Lord here from Shiloh, that it may come among us and save us from the power of our enemies.”

The Lord has defeated us so let us bring the Lord with us on our own terms and we will win.

So they went an got the ark of the Lord. You need to understand that the ark of the Lord sat in the temple of the Lord. In the holy of holies where the people where not allowed to go, only the head priest and then only once a year. They where allowed to transport it but there where strict rules as to how they were allowed to transport it. That is because this was God’s dwelling place with His people. Now God dwells with us, with the HS but back then this was God’s seat amongst His people.

With the ark of the covenant in tow, the were now revitilized. The Israelites raised a war cry so loud the ground shook and it scared the Philistine army.

They thought that they were done for, after all it appeared a god came to fight for the Israelites. They had heard the stories of old, how the Egyptians were embarraserd and slaughtered by God, they knew of the Israelites God and it scared them that God would appear for them.

The Israelites were fully convinced that their plan would work.

But again the Philistines gathered their courage and defeated the Israelites.

We end chapter 4 with Eli and His remaining family.

A messenger came to Eli, who was old and fat and blind. The messenger, a Benjaminite casme to Eli and told Him what happened. Upon hearing the terrible tale, Eli fell down, broke his neck and died. Eli’s sons died in the battle, and hsi daughter in law, who was pregnant heard what happened to her husband and it caused her to go into Labour. She died in labour giving birth to a son named Ichabod.

you have to understand that Eli had been warned this was going to happen. He was warned to get his kids in line or their would be a punishment. Even after he warning they still kept going. I am not sure what He could have done differently, but because of their sin, they reaped the consequernces of their actions.

The ark was captured, and we are going to trace what happened to it next but first we must remember something.

Beware the assumption That God is on our side

they treated the Lord God like a totem, like a good luck charm. They were attemtping to use God to get what they wanted without seeking God first. But what they learned, or were going ot learn is that God can not be manipulated to serve our own needs or greeds.

So how do we know we are then following the will of God? seek the Lord. they did not seek God but rather each other and their falsre assumptions. We must seek the Lord and His will.

Are we following the word of the Lord. Not what we think it says but do we actually know what the word of the Lord says and does it line up with what we asre doing and how we are living. If we are seeking the Lord God and His glory, if we are following the will of God then move forward and trust in Him.

We can not manipulate God to get what we want. We will go deeper into this in a moment.

Ch 5-7 - The Journey of the Ark

So what happened when they used God as a good luck charm? the ark of the covenant, the ark of God, was taken away by the Philistines. They tried to manipulate God to their own ends but it failed, they failed. Eli and His sons were now dead. They where without God and without their priest, what were they to do. The narrative follows the ark and how it affected the Philistines.

They saw it as just another God to put amongst their many gods.

We read in Chapter 5 that they took the ark of God and put it before their idol, their god Dagon. An interesting thing happened.

1 Samuel 5:3 ESV

3 And when the people of Ashdod rose early the next day, behold, Dagon had fallen face downward on the ground before the ark of the Lord. So they took Dagon and put him back in his place.

I find this quite humerous. Though they viewed Israel’s God as just another god to add to their mix, their god Dago had fallen down in worship of the one true God.

They put him back up. They had to help their god back up to it’s proper place. And it happened again but this time the head and hands fell off.

This scared them and they wanted to get rid of it. So that is what they did, to another Philistine city. But similar things started to happen. The Lord’s hand was against the city, tumors afflicted the people.

Only 7 months did the keep the ark, they feared the God of Israel to much, more then they feared their own God it would appear.

1 Samuel 6:3 ESV

3 They said, “If you send away the ark of the God of Israel, do not send it empty, but by all means return him a guilt offering. Then you will be healed, and it will be known to you why his hand does not turn away from you.”

Not only did they send the ark back, but they sent it back with an offering of Gold.

1 Samuel 6:5–6 ESV

5 So you must make images of your tumors and images of your mice that ravage the land, and give glory to the God of Israel. Perhaps he will lighten his hand from off you and your gods and your land. 6 Why should you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts? After he had dealt severely with them, did they not send the people away, and they departed?

Even they realized they needed to give glory to God. They began to realize that there was something about htis God of Israel.

They had an interesting test. Though God was specific in how the ark was transpported for the Israelites, I dont think it mattered as much for the Philistines, they were on the right track fearing God. They hooked up 2 Milk Cows that had just calved as a litmus test. If they went right to Israel instead of going to their calves then it was God who was punishing them. They went straight to the arks home.

But the Israelites of Beth Shemesh looked inside the ark, they knew better, they still were not taking God seriously.

The ark moved again and stayed there for 20 years. Samuel rose to the position he had been prepared for. Samuel challenged the way they where doing things. You can no longer use God (the ark of God) as a good luck charm, you can not make God do what you want him to do. but the end is this.

1 Samuel 7:3 ESV

3 And Samuel said to all the house of Israel, “If you are returning to the Lord with all your heart, then put away the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you and direct your heart to the Lord

return to God with all of your hearts. is where it starts, after that we are told a little more.

To serve the Lord with your whole heart it invovles putting away things that have begun to get between you and God. Direct your heart to God rather then your self and your greeds and everything else going on and go to God with everything.

1 Samuel 7:3 ESV

3 and serve him only,

The next thing that we are supposed to do is to serve is serve God only. If we return to God, we will seek to serve Him alone and not ourselves. Only then will

1 Samuel 7:3 ESV

3 serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.”

Only when we begin to do these things wioll the Lord deliver us.

1 Samuel 7:6 ESV

6 So they gathered at Mizpah and drew water and poured it out before the Lord and fasted on that day and said there, “We have sinned against the Lord.” And Samuel judged the people of Israel at Mizpah.

Lastley Samuel warned them that they must confess that they have sinned.

It is a wrong theing to treat God like some sort of spiritual vending machine. As if we can entreat Him to do what we please. Rather we come to God and confess what we have done to disobey Him.

it was after this that the Philistines came against them and they finally did the right thing, cry out to God for us they told Samuel. So that is what Samuel did and the Lord delivered them. Only after they cried out to God first and foremost.

after all this had happened, Samel set up a stone to remember what the Lord has done.

1 Samuel 7:12 ESV

12 Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen and called its name Ebenezer; for he said, “Till now the Lord has helped us.”

Now remember the old Hymn “Come thou Fount” Here I raise my Ebenezer.

Jesus is our Stone of Help

Ebenezer means literally stone of herlp. Next time you sing that song remember what it really means. Samuel was warning the people to remember, not just for a few days like they were used to but for their lives and the next generations. All that Samuel told them leads to this. God had come to the rescue of his people when they humbled themselves before him. They were vulnerable, with their enemies approaching, and they did not deserve God’s rescue, having been chronically unfaithful. And yet in his gracious fidelity to his covenant people, God intervened with thunder to throw Israel’s enemies in confusion and turn their enemies into the vulnerable nation.

When life is failing, when life is good, remember this. The Lord is not a monument to be used for our good luck, He is not their to do our every wish and whim. We are here to serve and to glorify the Lord. Jesus is our stone of Help and we must turn to Him

Prone to wander

The Good thing about Samuels Ebenezer is that it was a constant reminder. We are not out of the woods yet, we like sheep go astray, everyone to His own way. We are prone to wander away from the Lord and become selfish. That is why we need the reminder of our stone of help, our firm foundation.

To follow the will of God, for the Lord God to save us we must remember like them, that God is not someone that can be amnipulated to serve us and give us what we want but rather we re to return to God with our whole hearts, humble ourselves before Him and tell everyone what God has done in your life.

Remember how Jesus spilled His own blood for our sin, when we were still wandering away from Him. He can also save us from what is to come. So then

what is your “stone of Help?”