The Servant of the Wicked - 2 December 2009
Eli's sons were wicked men; they had no regard for the LORD. Now it was the practice of the priests with the people that whenever anyone offered a sacrifice and while the meat was being boiled, the servant of the priest would come with a three-pronged fork in his hand. He would plunge it into the pan or kettle or caldron or pot, and the priest would take for himself whatever the fork brought up. This is how they treated all the Israelites who came to Shiloh. But even before the fat was burned, the servant of the priest would come and say to the man who was sacrificing, "Give the priest some meat to roast; he won't accept boiled meat from you, but only raw." If the man said to him, "Let the fat be burned up first, and then take whatever you want," the servant would then answer, "No, hand it over now; if you don't, I'll take it by force." This sin of the young men was very great in the Lord's sight, for they were treating the Lord's offering with contempt.
1 Samuel 2:12-17 [NIV]
This story shows how not to serve effectively. The servants of Eli’s sons were serving the greed and disrespect of their masters. They somehow got pulled into the wickedness of those they served.
The warning for us is ‘Be careful who you serve’
Sadly the sons of Eli came to a sticky end and the shock of their deaths killed their father, nobody knows what happened to the servants, hopefully they found better masters.
Jesus warned us that it is impossible to serve God and riches at the same time, there must also be many other motivations that are incompatible with the ability to serve God and do His will.
In His life on this earth Jesus challenged people to leave behind their core securities and follow him. If we are serving some other god like money or success or enjoyment then we can find ourselves torn when we try to give God the reins of our lives. We feel like we are trying to go in two directions at once. It has been described as trying to manually drive a vehicle which is on autopilot. For a while we can hold it on course but as soon as we relax it will drift back on its original course.
The only way out is to admit and confess these things, turn them over to God and ask Him to turn our lives around. Then when we transfer our trust to Him we find that life goes a lot more smoothly.
And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, 'What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.' "Then he said, 'This is what I'll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I'll say to myself, "You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry." ' "But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?' "This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God." Luke 12:16-21 [NIV] | 