CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY NOTES—
1 Samuel 7:3. “If ye do return,” etc. “These words prove that a profession of repentance on the part of Israel had preceded them.… The profession, therefore, must be looked for in the preceding words, All the house of Israel lamented,” etc.—(Biblical Commentary).
1 Samuel 7:4. “Baalim and Ashtaroth.” The plurals of Baal and Ashtoreth. “Baal was the supreme male divinity of the Phœnician and Canaanitish nations, as Ashtoreth was their supreme female divinity. Both names have the peculiarity of being used in the plural, and it seems certain that these plurals designate not statues of the divinities, but different modifications of the divinities themselves.… There can be no doubt of the very high antiquity of the worship of Baal.… We need not hesitate to regard the Babylonian Bel (Isaiah 46:1), or Belus (Herod 1:181), as essentially identical with Baal, though perhaps under some modified form.… The great number of adjuncts with which the name is found is a sufficient proof of the diversity of characters in which he was regarded, and there must no doubt have existed a corresponding diversity in the worship.… If we separate the name Baal from idolatry, we seem, according to its meaning, to obtain simply the notion of Lord and Proprietor of all.… The worship of Ashtaroth or Astarte was also very ancient and widely spread. There is no doubt that the Assyrian goddess Ishtar is the Ashtaroth of the Old Testament and the Astarte of the Greeks and Romans … It is certain that the worship of Astarte became identical with that of Venus.… If now we seek to ascertain the character of this goddess, we find ourselves involved in perplexity. There can be no doubt that the general notion symbolised is that of productive power, as Baal symbolises that of generative power, and it would be natural to conclude that as the sun is the great symbol of the latter, and therefore to be identified with Baal, so the moon is the symbol of the former, and must be identified with Astarte” (Smith’s Biblical Dictionary).
“Mizpeh, or Mizpah. The word signifies a watch-tower, and was given to more than one place in the land of Israel. The place here mentioned has been generally identified with the present Neby-Samwil, an elevation near Ramah and Geba (see 1 Kings 15:22; 2 Chronicles 16:6), and 2480 feet above the level of the sea, and five miles from Jerusalem. Dean Stanley and Mr. Grove (Smith’s Bib. Dictionary) consider that Neby-Samwil is too far from Jerusalem to answer to the description given of its position in 1Ma. 3:46, and identify it with the Scopus mentioned by Josephus (B. I. 2, 19, 4), as on the north quarter of the city, seven stadia therefrom, and now generally held to be the “broad ridge which forms the continuation of the Mount of Olives to the north and east, from which the traveller gains his first view of the holy city” (Grove). “I will pray for you.” That deliverance from the hand of the Philistines was not at least immediately the object of the intercession is clear, not only from the phrase “for you,” since otherwise Samuel must have used an expression to include himself, but also from the following words.”—(Erdmann).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— 1 Samuel 7:3-4
REPENTANCE
I. Repentance is the lessening of a moral distance between God and man by a moral turning of man to God. “If ye do return unto the Lord,” etc. When a man turns and walks in an opposite direction he changes his course, and lessens the distance between himself and the point to which his back has been hitherto turned, and from which he has been every moment getting farther away. His face is now directed to an entirely opposite goal, and the distance between him and that goal grows less at every step. Repentance is not a bodily act—it is a turning of the heart. “If ye do return unto the Lord with all your hearts.” Directly the heart turns to God in penitence and trust the moral distance between that heart and God is lessened. That turning is the beginning of a new course of life, which daily decreases the distance between the man and his former way of life, and brings him nearer to God in his sympathies, and in his character. And this goes on until there is entire conformity of the character of God,—until the just man becomes the perfect man, and all the moral distance which once separated him from God is annihilated. Locally, God is as near to the sinner as He is to the saint. He was locally as near to the Israelites in general as He was to Samuel in particular. “God is not far from every one of us,” said Paul to the Athenians (Acts 17:27). Yet God was morally much nearer to Paul than He was to any other man on Mars Hill, because Paul was much more like God in character than they were. And there was also a great gulf of moral difference between Samuel and his hearers, because there was a wide gulf between them and Jehovah in character and disposition. Paul had once been far from the God whom He now served, and the Saviour for whom he was now ready to die, but he had diminished that distance by repentance—by an entire change in his feelings concerning Jesus of Nazareth, and by a corresponding change of life. The people whom Samuel here exhorts were at such a moral distance from God that they had become partakers of the debasing idolatry of the Canaanites, and the worship of Baal had increased the natural badness of the national character. As the road of iniquity is downhill, every step in the road had not only brought them farther from God, but had increased the speed at which they had departed farther and farther from Him. Samuel here teaches that a turning of heart to God would be the beginning of a moral transformation—it would at once begin to lessen the moral distance between them and Jehovah, and begin to make a separation between them and the sinful habits in which they had been living. He tells them in effect, what another prophet afterwards told their descendants, that “The Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save: neither is His ear heavy, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you” (Isaiah 59:1-2).
II. Repentance is born of a sense of need. A local change of place is often brought about by a sense of need. The man feels dissatisfied with what he meets with in the road in which he is travelling, and his dissatisfaction leads him to turn round and take another course. And so it is in a change of souldirection. The prodigal’s sense of need led him to set his face towards his father’s house, and Israel had now begun to feel that they wanted something as a nation which Baal and Ashtaroth could not give them. They “lamented after the Lord.” Such a feeling of want is a sign of a re-awakening conscience—it is like the outcry of the man who was thought to be dead before the surgeon’s knife touched him—it is a sign of returning consciousness. The very fact that he can feel leads to the hope that he may recover. He who feels a sense of spiritual need is not morally dead—his conscience may have been lying dormant for a long time, but its outcry is a sure sign that it is not dead, and is often the first step to a true repentance.
III. Human exhortation is often helpful to repentance. If a man is awakening to a sense of the moral separation which sin has made between him and God, the words of a godly man will often deepen the feeling and determine him to turn to God. The words of Peter on the day of Pentecost helped his hearers to repentance. His words first pricked their hearts and then helped them to accept Him whom they had crucified. Samuel’s words of exhortation meeting the feeling of need in the hearts of Israel, encouraged and stimulated their desire to return to God.
IV. Repentance is the result of a preparation of heart, and shows its reality in the life. Samuel here speaks of two things as necessary to a turning unto God. “Prepare your hearts,” and “put away Balaam and Ashtaroth.” No thoughtful man makes any great change in his life without first making it the subject of consideration, without counting the cost of what he is about to do. He who thinks about leaving his native land, never to return, does not set out upon his journey without well weighing the consequences of such a step. Changes in our modes and habits of life, if made without thought, are not likely to be either satisfactory or beneficial. And when a man begins to think of returning to God by repentance it is especially necessary that he should ponder deeply what repentance is—what is involved in forsaking sin and becoming a servant of God—in turning his back upon his old life, and beginning an entirely opposite course. It was when the prodigal “came to himself” that he said, “I will arise and go to my father.” That expression implies that there had been much thinking on his part about his past, his present, and his future. Such thinking deepens and strengthens moral resolution, and leads to prayer, and no change of feeling is likely to end in that lasting change of heart and life in which true repentance consists, unless it has its birth in such a preparation. Samuel here insists on such a thoughtfulness and prayerfulness on the part of Israel as indispensable to a true and lasting return to God. And repentance of heart must be proved by a change of life. Israel could not return to God and continue to worship the gods of the Philistines. “No man can serve two masters” (Matthew 6:24), and he who professes to desire the favour of God must show the reality of his profession by putting off the service of Satan and the “works of darkness” (Romans 13:12), by putting away everything in his life that is contrary to the mind and will of God.
V. After repentance comes liberty. “If ye do return,” etc., … “the Lord will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.” Every unrepentant man is a slave to sin. “Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin” (John 8:34)—he is tied and bound by evil habits and passions. But the formation of new and holy desires and habits frees him from the dominion of the old ones, as the formation of the new leaf-buds on the tree pushes off the old and withering leaves. In proportion as the former increase in size and strength, the latter lose their hold; and in proportion as new habits, springing from a new soul-relation, gain strength, the old habits lose their power, and give the man true liberty. The political freedom which Israel gained by turning from Baal to God is a type of the moral freedom which comes to every man who truly repents.
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
Samuel doth not presently cheer them up, but presseth them to a thorough reformation: and giveth them to know that their sorrow must bear some proportion to their sin. See the like done by Peter in Acts 2:37-38.—Trapp.
Revivals of religion have been the blessed experience of the Church in every era of its living history. Whether we trace its course in the Old or New Testament, or in subsequent times, evidences of occasional awakenings, with all their happy results, abound.… At Bochim, in the early days of the Judges, a great revival took place. In the days of Samuel the Church of God was gladdened by another. Hezekiah’s reign was greatly signalised by the general revival of religion; so was Josiah’s. The nation of Judah was preserved from idolatry by means of these great awakenings. In the time of the building of the second Temple there was a revival of religion, which wrought most influentially. Pentecost stands prominent in the history of revivals, and throughout the last eighteen centuries revivals have been occasional, and form the most interesting portions of the Church’s history.… Two features have generally marked these periods of spiritual awakening,—the power of prayer, and the power of preaching.… The revival under Samuel was brought about by prayer and preaching. To this man it is instrumentally to be traced. He wrestled in secret and exhorted in public.…
I. Samuel preached repentance. This has ever been the theme in times of attempted revival. It was the theme of Noah’s alarm-cry to the gigantic sinners of the old world. It was the burden of Elijah’s prophetic message. It was the voice in the wilderness from the lips of John the Baptist. It was the summons which the apostles served in the name of Christ upon a godless world. It rang through Germany by Luther’s lips of music, and echoed among the Alpine valleys from Luther’s patriotic soul. It was the subject of Latimer’s blunt home-thrusts at the practical heart of England, and it thundered throughout Scotland from the stern and fearless Knox. The doctrine of repentance is the appendix to every re-publication of the ten commandments, and the preface to every offer of the Gospel. So when Samuel taught, this was his awakening theme.…
II. Samuel sought fruits for repentance. He did not rest satisfied with the expressed emotion. He demanded instant reproof of expressed sincerity. To give up evil ways is one of the earliest signs of a penitent soul.… This is the trial of conviction. You may profess anxiety to be saved, and mourn over your sins; but so long as you do not give up what comes between your soul and God, you have not sincerely repented.…
III. Samuel urged a believing return to the Lord.… Repentance does not constitute reformation. It is only the outer court. By faith we enter into the holy place.… Faith is the reunion of the soul to the Lord. So when the Israelites gave up the false, they returned to the true God. They forsook the many and returned to the One.… The heart must have an object. No person is without a god, to whom all his efforts are devoted, and on whom his affections are placed. It may be the world, or the creature, or self, or some superstition, or else the true God.… But the awakened conscience finds no satisfaction in anything less than the Lord.—Steel.