1Sa 7:2 | KingComments | STEP | Fear of the ark is not necessary if one does not look into the ark. The truth of the Lord Jesus is not to analyze, but to worship. Although the people are not ready to ask for the ark, the ark can go to some who appreciate it. Why didn’t Samuel pick up the ark? He sees how the people are doing. He understands that he lives in a transitional period. He knows that God in His time will bring the ark to the place He has chosen. Samuel is waiting for God’s time, for David. David is, forty years later, the first one to look for and find the ark ( ). God Himself has delivered the ark from the power and land of the Philistines. He can only deliver His people from the power of the Philistines when they have taken their right place before Him. Before that time, twenty years elapse. After twenty years the people go to the LORD, not to complain, but to confess their condition. The absence of God often makes one feel the value of Him Whose presence one has not appreciated. All this time Samuel also waited. He has waited for the time when the Spirit of God can work among the people. The first thing the Spirit does is to discover the people to themselves. Waiting time is not lost time. This work of God’s Spirit will be the result of Samuel’s constant intercession. Samuel remains in the shadow in the years of his life which, seen from his age, are for others, even today, the most ambitious. The people do not ask for the ark as a symbol, but for the LORD Himself. With this they are far ahead the mass of modern professing Christianity with their longing for and trust in images of saints and other follies.

‏ 1 Samuel 7:2

The Ark at Kiriath-jearim

Fear of the ark is not necessary if one does not look into the ark. The truth of the Lord Jesus is not to analyze, but to worship. Although the people are not ready to ask for the ark, the ark can go to some who appreciate it.

Why didn’t Samuel pick up the ark? He sees how the people are doing. He understands that he lives in a transitional period. He knows that God in His time will bring the ark to the place He has chosen. Samuel is waiting for God’s time, for David. David is, forty years later, the first one to look for and find the ark (Psa 132:6).

God Himself has delivered the ark from the power and land of the Philistines. He can only deliver His people from the power of the Philistines when they have taken their right place before Him. Before that time, twenty years elapse. After twenty years the people go to the LORD, not to complain, but to confess their condition. The absence of God often makes one feel the value of Him Whose presence one has not appreciated. All this time Samuel also waited. He has waited for the time when the Spirit of God can work among the people.

The first thing the Spirit does is to discover the people to themselves. Waiting time is not lost time. This work of God’s Spirit will be the result of Samuel’s constant intercession. Samuel remains in the shadow in the years of his life which, seen from his age, are for others, even today, the most ambitious.

The people do not ask for the ark as a symbol, but for the LORD Himself. With this they are far ahead the mass of modern professing Christianity with their longing for and trust in images of saints and other follies.