Consider what great things He hath done for you

Scripture: 1 Samuel 12:24

Sermon notes 

Consider how great things He hath done for you                 1 Samuel 12:24

This text is a summary of the sermon that Samuel has delivered on this occasion. There has been a great national gathering in the wake of war against the Ammonites that had ended in God giving victory to King Saul and the people. Cp 11:6, 7. There is a rededication of Saul as King at Gilgal, 11:14. It is a significant event in a significant place.

Samuel’s message has a double emphasis that at first may seem strange. He speaks to highlight the sins they are currently guilty of and the displeasure of God upon those sins. Cp 12:17-18. And yet he also exhorts them to turn from those sins and determine to obey God from here on.

Stopping to consider the great things God has done for His people is always important in dealing with sin and going on in the path of obedience.

I  THE GREAT THINGS GOD HAS DONE FOR HIS PEOPLE.

Samuel especially has certain things in mind as he impresses this truth upon his hearers.

1. God had worked to make them His people. Cp v22, 6, 8. It was Pentecost, v17—50 days after the Passover and its annual reminder of the exodus. There is a covenant bond between God and His people sealed by the blood of the Lamb of God. This relationship by redemption is specially underlined. In the light of NT fulfillment, the Pentecost witness of the Holy Spirit’s presence intensifies the focus on this relationship to God in redemption. Cp Rom 8:15-16.
2. The Lord had patiently borne with their sin, v9-11. Samuel rehearses some of the events of the period of the Judges now rapidly reaching a conclusion. That sin had continued until the present, v12, 17, 19. Cyclical forgetting and forsaking God for idols was the sad pattern of the past. The visible display of God’s current displeasure with their rebellion against His order was frightening, undeniable and convincing. Cp v17-19. Yet He still bore long with them and had not forsaken them. Such must be the testimony of every saint!
3. There was mercy and pardon. Samuel is able to say Fear not, v20. There was still opportunity to serve God. The reason for this is given in the background, 11:15. On the basis of an atoning sacrifice, though there is an obvious highlighting of sin and its just sentence, there is pardon and peace with God.
4. God had preserved the means of grace for their use. Samuel’s ministry as a prophet/priest continued, v23. The Lord had not withdrawn from them these spiritual privileges.

II  THESE THINGS ARE TO BE CAREFULLY CONSIDERED.

1. Consider, v24. The word is the simple verb ‘to see’. Here is something to be looked at. It is to register upon the senses of the soul. God’s people must take time to contemplate what God has done. So often we are blind to it, don’t see it or contemplate it. Cp Is 5:11-12.
2. A consideration of God’s work is to be the aim of the preacher. This is Samuel’s great goal, the climax of his sermon. Preaching is to direct our minds and hearts to see what God has done.
3. A specific perspective. Samuel’s obvious instruction here is that what God has done for His people is to be considered as great things. This is specially the perspective in the light of having just seen the frightening display of the storm of His displeasure with sin. A right view of our sin will magnify the continuing mercy of God to us and we can see it as great things.

III   THE DEVOTION THAT SUCH A SIGHT LEADS TO.

There is a duty set down here that is animated by this sight/consideration. This is the good and right way, v23 that Samuel is bent on directing them into.

1. Only/surely fear the Lord. There is an exclusive regard for God alone to be cultivated. He is to reverenced. There is a certainty/conviction to Samuel’s exhortation here. God is certainly to be feared. There could be no doubt of this in the minds of these people.
2. Serve Him in truth. Again the emphasis is upon sincerity and according to the truth of His word. Cp Jn 4:24. Hypocrisy can have no part in serving God. To serve truly is to serve consistently, steadily. Serve is the same root word that described what they were in Egypt as the slaves of Pharaoh. Their duty is to be the servants of God, body and soul. Cp 1 Cor 6:19-20. We do not serve under the tyranny of Pharaoh but the Lord is to have full and complete control.
3. With all the heart. Full-bodied commitment to the will of God is exhorted here and will be the outcome of considering the great things God has done. Having done so much for us, how can we refuse Him anything He requires of us.