Your Servant Is Listening

The childhood of the prophet Samuel is instructive for anyone who is parenting or mentoring a young person. Samuel’s mother, Hannah, had been barren, and after God heard her plea for a child and she gave birth, she dedicated the life of her son to the service of God. Thus Samuel was taken to the temple and entrusted to a priest, Eli. It fell to Eli to help Samuel discern when he was hearing God’s call. He told Samuel, “…if you are called, reply, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.’”

Samuel was blessed in having a mentor who taught him early to identify God’s voice, to listen, and to understand that he was God’s servant. It takes many people a lifetime to learn that. Those who identify their vocation at an early age are particularly effective partners with God in creating a beautiful and just world because they have learned how to be their true selves early in their life span. An example is Martin Luther King, Jr., who found his voice as a preacher and social justice advocate at a young age and had a remarkable effect on the world before his life was cut short.

We hear in 1 Samuel 3: 19, “As Samuel grew up, the Lord was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground” (or, as it says in another translation, “not permitting any word of his to be without effect”). I wonder how many of us are standing in the midst of a pile of God’s words that have fallen to the ground because we either don’t recognize them or aren’t willing to allow them to enter the ear of our heart. Eventually God’s word is able to penetrate us, for as God says in Isaiah 55: 11, “…my word shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.” How much better when we can allow that word to achieve its end now rather than at the end of our life, for the world is in great need of healing and joy that we can provide by recognizing and responding to our vocation, whatever it may be.