First Impressions
Sometimes God is already talking — we just don't recognize it yet.
Picture this: a boy named Samuel, probably eight or ten years old, sleeping on a mat near the ark of God in the tabernacle at Shiloh. His mentor, an old priest named Eli, is asleep nearby, his eyesight nearly gone. In the middle of the night, a voice calls out, 'Samuel.'
Samuel jumps up and runs to Eli. 'Here I am. You called me?' Eli, confused, tells him he didn't call and sends him back to bed. This happens two more times before Eli finally puts it together — this is the Lord calling the boy. So he tells Samuel exactly what to say next time: 'Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.'
Here's what gets me every time I read this. Samuel actually heard God's voice three separate times before he ever recognized whose voice it was. The text even tells us why: 'Samuel did not yet know the Lord, because he had never had a message from the Lord before.' It wasn't that God was being unclear. It's that Samuel had no frame of reference yet for what this was. He'd never had a category for 'that's God' before.
The chapter opens by telling us that in those days, messages from the Lord were rare and visions were uncommon. That might sound like a spiritual dry season — and in a lot of ways it was. But notice, God still showed up. He still spoke. The rareness of the moment didn't make it any less real when it finally came. If anything, it made it worth paying closer attention to.
If you've ever wondered whether you're 'spiritual enough' to hear God, or whether you've been missing him this whole time, take a breath. Even a boy who grew up to be one of the greatest prophets in Israel's history didn't recognize God's voice on the first try — or the second, or the third. And God didn't get frustrated with him. He simply kept calling, patiently, until Samuel learned to answer, 'Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.'
That's really the invitation this week. Not 'figure out how to get God to talk to you,' but 'learn to recognize the voice that's already speaking.' Maybe you've had moments — a thought that wasn't quite your own, a verse that jumped off the page, a check in your spirit right before a decision — and you brushed it off because you weren't sure it was really him. That's okay. That's exactly where Samuel started. This week isn't about pressure or performance. It's about paying attention to what might already be happening.
Sit with this
- 1Think back over the last month — was there a moment where you sensed a nudge toward something, and could that have been God, even if you didn't recognize it at the time?
Journal prompt
Write about a recent moment when you felt a nudge, a strong thought, or a check in your gut before a decision. Describe what happened and what you did with it. Looking back now, does it seem like it could have been God trying to get your attention?