1 Samuel 3:1-10, Psalm 139:1-6 and 13-18, 1 Corinthians 3:12-20, and John 1:43-51
I Samuel 3:1 opens at a time when YHVH rarely speaks except through the sacred texts and mouths of his prophets. This is demonstrated through the story of a servant named Samuel whose priestly training is under, the dimming eyes of, the high priest Eli. Samuel is not acquainted with the God he serves. Then one day as the menorah is also dimming God beckons to Samuel and he speaks. His message in verse 13 is that the sons of Eli have “blasphemed God” and their father’s response has been insufficient.
Psalm 139:3 provides us with a metaphor for what is happening in 1 Samuel 3:10. David writes, “You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways”. The Hebrew word for ‘search’ means “to scatter, compass”[1]. When the text says, “'the Lord came and stood, calling as at other times”, it paints an intimate picture of God compassing Samuel as he is preparing to scatter Eli and his sons (1 Samuel 3:10a). David wants God to compass him too; his path, his lying down, and his ways as a reminder that God already knows all things and that he cares.
I Corinthians 6 is a turn in the conversation. Rather than asking God to know him, Paul writes that righteousness is not only helpful but also a precondition for inheriting the kingdom of God. For all baptized believers in the gospel of Christ Jesus, the good news is in verse 11. “But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God”. This means that believers have already attained righteousness. The main thrust, then, of Paul’s argument is threefold.
The body is… [meant] for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. …your bodies are members of Christ? …your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? (1 Corinthians 6:13b, 15a, and 19a)
This idea, that we are members of Christ and a temple of the Holy Spirit clarifies a statement that David made in his Psalm, “[that] I am fearfully and wonderfully made… [and] my soul knows it very well” (Psalm 139:14). Souls know well that sexual immorality is dominating, a misuse, and unhelpful in a body. This can be seen in the actions of the sons of Eli in 1 Samuel 2:22, when they laid with the women serving at the temple, and in the judgement that followed. God compassed them but did not know them.
The final passage tells of the introduction of Jesus of Nazareth and Nathanael by Philip who was from Bethesda but was in Galilee at the time. In John 1:45 Philip tells Nathanael that he has found the one who Moses prophesied about in Deuteronomy 18:15-19. That one is Jesus. As Nathanael is on his way to see him, Jesus demonstrates that he has already searched Nathanael by prophesying the truthful inward parts of his character. “Nathanael said to him, “How do you know me?” Jesus answered him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you”” (John 1:48).
These passages of scripture show that God sees all, including the plight of all who are victims of sexual immorality and that he cares. As his body, we are called to behave morally and to care for and to respond as intercessors on behalf of victims of immorality. I pray that God strengthen you to do that in the time you find yourselves in.
[1] “Bible Hub: Strong’s, Psalm 139:3,” Online Parallel Bible Project, accessed February 3, 2021, https://biblehub.com/strongs/psalms/139-3.htm.
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