The Power of God in History - 1 Samuel 6-10

1 Samuel 6:6-7 (ESV)

Why should you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts? After he had dealt severely with them, did they not send the people away, and they departed? Now then, take and prepare a new cart and two milk cows on which there has never come a yoke, and yoke the cows to the cart, but take their calves home, away from them.

To set the scene for the above passage we have to go back to the previous chapters.   Israel had decided to attack the Philistines, their arch enemy.   To embolden their troops they sent the Ark of the Covenant into the battle, lead by Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas.  Not only was Israel defeated and the two boys died, but the Ark was taken by the Philistines.  It was placed into a temple for their god, Dagon, in the city of Ashdod.  The morning after it was placed there the Philistines found this statue of Dagon, on the ground, prostrate before the Ark.  They set Dagon back up and the next morning the false god was on the ground again and his hands and head were cut off.  

The Philistines didn’t know what to do.  On top of all this the longer they had the Ark the worse it got.  God moved among them and He afflicted their people with tumors.  

This is when the leadership called for their own priest and their own diviners to find out what they should do.   Here is one of the marvelous things out of this text.  The priest and diviners point to a significant historical moment to give their leaders counsel.  They point to how God destroyed Egypt many, many years prior.  This is not some Jewish religious leader pointing them to the power of Yahweh, this is the foreign religious leaders.  They point to a historical, known event of God’s intervention in the affairs of mankind, for His people.  

Today’s scholars fail to recognize these historical events in Scripture.   But these false teachers knew something should be done.  They give counsel and it rescues the Philistines from this peril.  But the counsel is not based upon their beliefs. It is based upon the power of the living God.

Psalms 67:3-4 (ESV)

Let the peoples praise you, O God;

let all the peoples praise you!

Let the nations be glad and sing for joy,

for you judge the peoples with equity

and guide the nations upon earth. Selah