Sunday, January 18, 2015: 1 Samuel 3:1-20
I used to think that the end of Samuel’s story was when he learns to listen to God. I wasn’t curious at all about what God has to say.
A couple of years ago, my congregation decided to do lectio divina as part of our midweek Lenten worship. After our opening liturgy and prayer, we entered into this ancient Benedictine practice of scripture reading and expectant listening. Three times we heard a word from God; three times we trained our ears to pick out the voice of God in the silence.
Each week we began our time of lectio divina with words from 1 Samuel 3:9: “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” What more appropriate verse could there be, I thought? Eli teaches Samuel that God is calling him. He teaches him to listen, expecting God to speak. If we use Samuel’s words, we will know that God is speaking to us, too.
Our congregation tried this practice specifically during Lent because we were convinced that one key to revitalizing our congregation was learning again how to listen—to God, to one another, and to our neighbors. When we start believing that God speaks to us—and even more than that, that God is calling us—this is when renewal begins.
