Commentary - 1 Samuel 7:1-2

Bird's-eye view

This short passage marks a significant, though somber, transition in the life of Israel. After the catastrophic loss of the Ark of the Covenant to the Philistines and its subsequent chaotic and judgmental return, the symbol of God's presence is not restored to the tabernacle at Shiloh but is instead quietly taken into a private home. For two decades, the Ark, the very throne of Yahweh on earth, is effectively put in storage. This period represents a long season of covenantal neglect and divine silence. Israel is in a state of spiritual stupor, going through the motions without the central reality of God's presence. The passage concludes with the first stirring of a national awakening, a widespread lamentation after Yahweh. This is not yet full-throated repentance, but it is the necessary precursor to it. It is the beginning of the nation coming to its senses, realizing the emptiness of life without God, and setting the stage for the ministry of Samuel and the revival at Mizpah that follows.

The core of these two verses is the contrast between the quiet sequestration of God's glory and the eventual loud groaning of God's people. It demonstrates that God is willing to wait, to let His people feel the full weight of their sin and His absence. True revival is never a cheap or instantaneous affair. It is often preceded by a long, fallow period where the consequences of disobedience are keenly felt. The twenty years of silence were a severe mercy, creating a hunger for God that could not be satisfied by anything else. This is a picture of how God works with nations and with individuals; He sometimes withdraws the sense of His presence in order to create in us a desperate longing for His return.

Outline

Context In 1 Samuel

These verses follow directly on the heels of the Ark's disastrous tour through Philistia (1 Sam 5) and its terrifying return to Israelite territory at Beth-shemesh (1 Sam 6). The men of Beth-shemesh had looked into the Ark, a profane act of disrespect, and God struck seventy of them dead. Terrified, they asked the crucial question, "Who is able to stand before this holy Yahweh God?" and begged the men of Kiriath-jearim to take it off their hands. So, our text begins with Israel treating the Ark like a radioactive contaminant, not like the glorious throne of their King. This whole narrative arc, from the defeat at Ebenezer to the Ark's residence in Abinadab's house, underscores the spiritual bankruptcy of the priesthood of Eli's house and the nation as a whole. They had treated the Ark as a good-luck charm, and God taught them through judgment that He will not be manipulated. This twenty-year period of the Ark's absence from the center of national worship sets the stage for Samuel's emergence as the prophet-judge who will call the nation back to covenant faithfulness.

Key Issues

The Long Defeat

We often think of defeat in terms of a single, decisive battle. But there is another kind of defeat, a long and grinding one, that settles over a people like a low-grade fever. This is what Israel experienced for these twenty years. The Ark of God was on Israelite soil, but it was not in its proper place. It was not at the center of their worship. It was on a hill, in a house, out of sight and largely out of mind. This was a physical representation of their spiritual state. They were God's people, but God was not at the center of their lives. They were defeated not by Philistine armies, but by their own apathy.

This is a profound danger for any church or any Christian. It is not the dramatic fall that is always the most perilous, but rather the slow drift. It is the danger of getting used to the absence of God's manifest presence. It is the danger of organizing your life, your family, your worship, around a God who is kept at a safe distance, respectfully stored on a hill somewhere. The Philistines couldn't handle the Ark's presence, and neither could the Israelites at Beth-shemesh. The men of Kiriath-jearim handle it by sequestering it. They solve the problem of God's terrifying holiness by domesticating it. But a domesticated God is no God at all, and the result was twenty years of spiritual drought.

Verse by Verse Commentary

1 And the men of Kiriath-jearim came and brought the ark of Yahweh up and brought it into the house of Abinadab on the hill and set apart Eleazar his son as holy in order to keep the ark of Yahweh.

The men of Kiriath-jearim answer the call from the terrified men of Beth-shemesh. They come and they "brought the ark of Yahweh up." This was a reverent action, but notice where they take it. Not to Shiloh, where the tabernacle was. Shiloh had likely been destroyed by the Philistines after the battle of Ebenezer. They take it to a private residence, the house of a man named Abinadab, which was conveniently located "on the hill." This was a practical solution, but it was a theologically deficient one. The throne of the Great King was now being kept in a spare room. Then, they "set apart Eleazar his son." The verb here is the one used for consecrating a priest. But Abinadab and Eleazar were not Levites from the line of Aaron. This was a makeshift, lay-priesthood. They did the best they could under the circumstances, but the circumstances themselves were a testament to the nation's spiritual disarray. They consecrated someone to "keep" the ark, to guard it, which shows they had a sense of its holiness and danger, but not a sense of its purpose as the center of worship and communion with God.

2 Now it happened from the day when the ark remained at Kiriath-jearim, that the time was long; it was twenty years. And all the house of Israel lamented after Yahweh.

The text emphasizes the length of this period. "The time was long; it was twenty years." A full generation grew up with the Ark of God in exile within their own borders. This was a time of divine silence. No prophetic word is recorded, no great deliverance. God let them sit with the consequences of their sin. He let the silence grow. And what was the result? "And all the house of Israel lamented after Yahweh." The word for "lamented" here suggests a groaning, a mourning, a deep sense of loss. It is the sound of a people waking up from a long stupor and realizing that something essential is missing. They had tried to live without God at the center, and they found that life to be hollow and meaningless. This lamentation is not yet repentance. Repentance requires a decisive turn, which Samuel will call for in the next verses. But this lament is the soil in which repentance can grow. It is the godly sorrow that leads to repentance. After twenty years of quiet neglect, the people of God finally began to cry out for God Himself.

Application

This passage is a powerful diagnostic tool for the church today. It is entirely possible for a church, a family, or an individual believer to have the "ark" nearby but not central. We can have our Bibles on the shelf, our theology correct, our church membership intact, but have the actual presence of God sequestered in a back room of our lives. We can honor Him with our lips, and even set up makeshift structures to "keep" Him safe, while our hearts are far from Him. And the result is always the same: a long, dry season. A spiritual listlessness settles in. There is no power, no joy, no sense of God's active presence.

The first step out of such a condition is to lament. We must learn to groan. We must feel the ache of God's absence. We live in a culture that medicates every ache and distracts from every sorrow. But the path to revival runs straight through the valley of lament. We must stop pretending that everything is fine when it is not. We need to look at the state of our families, our churches, and our nation, and learn to lament after the Lord. We need to develop a holy dissatisfaction with the status quo. We need to ask ourselves, "Where is the glory? Where is the fear of the Lord? Where is the power of God that we read about in the Scriptures?" It is only when we feel the emptiness of our own efforts that we will begin to cry out for Him. That cry, that lament, is the sound that God is always waiting to hear. It is the first stirring of life in a graveyard, and it is the necessary prelude to the mighty work of His Spirit.