{"id":201,"date":"2013-12-14T02:05:55","date_gmt":"2013-12-14T02:05:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/?page_id=201"},"modified":"2013-12-14T02:17:34","modified_gmt":"2013-12-14T02:17:34","slug":"samuel-and-his-mum","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/?page_id=201","title":{"rendered":"Samuel and His Mum."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hi, my name is Samuel. I\u2019m not all that old, and I\u2019m living with the old priest in the <\/span><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">temple. It\u2019s a bit lonely here sometimes, but my Mum explained to me how I was a special baby from God, and that she had promised to give me back to God when I was old enough. It\u2019s rather nice to think I can do something for God. I sometimes wonder\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">what it\u2019s like where God lives. Eli (that\u2019s the priest) says it\u2019s too hard to even try to <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">imagine it, so I guess he\u2019s right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He\u2019s quite nice. He tries to make up for me not having my Mum here, but I don&#8217;t <\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">like his sons much. They are rude to him and boss me round. They even take ladies <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">into the side rooms of the temple. I\u2019m sure that\u2019s not right. God\u2019s temple is His house <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">on earth, and there are a lot of rules to make sure we don\u2019t do things wrong. God has <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">given us, His people, special laws to keep. Eli is very fussy about these things. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">Things like the lamp must be kept burning all the time. His sons couldn\u2019t care less. <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">They are so greedy, and take all the best bits of meat out of the sacrifice pot. I\u2019m sure <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">they don&#8217;t love God as they should!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I have special clothes to wear, ones like the priests wear. My Mum brings me a <\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">new set every year when she comes to the temple to worship God. I love my Mum so <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">much, she is so nice! But she explained how much better it is to love God, so I do my <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">best.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A strange thing happened not long ago. I had just got into bed and was nearly <\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">asleep when I heard a voice calling me. I jumped out of bed and ran into Eli.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u201cI\u2019m here, Eli\u201d, I said, \u201cwhat do you want?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">\u201cI didn\u2019t call you, son\u201d, he said, \u201cGo back to bed\u201d. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">So I did.\u00a0\u00a0 The same thing happened again\u2026.I heard the Voice once more,\u00a0\u00a0 just <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">quietly, but clearly. So I ran in to Eli again, and he told me to go back to bed again. <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">When it happened the third time he said, \u201cIf you hear it again, say \u2018Speak Lord, for <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">Your servant is listening\u2019 \u201c.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">It made me shiver to hear that, but sure enough, the Voice came again, and this time <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">I sat up in bed and said, \u201cSpeak Lord, for Your servant is listening!\u201d <\/span><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0I just knew it was God\u2019s voice and that what He was telling me was for Eli. He said\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">that He was going to punish Eli\u2019s sons because they were so evil, and wouldn\u2019t listen <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">to Eli.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\"> I didn\u2019t know how I was going to tell that to Eli the next morning, but after I had <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">got up and opened all the doors, I managed to tell him. It wasn\u2019t a nice message. But <\/span><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Arial;\">all he said was, \u201cIt is God\u2019s message, let him do what is right\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019m determined now to always do what God wants. I know that is the best way to grow up! I told my Mum this the next time she came to see me, and she was so pleased. She said it makes up for us having to live away from each other.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>You can read this story in the Bible in 1 Samuel 2:11-19.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hi, my name is Samuel. I\u2019m not all that old, and I\u2019m living with the old priest in the temple. It\u2019s a bit lonely here sometimes, but my Mum explained to me how I was a special baby from God, and that she had promised to give me back to God when I was &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/?page_id=201\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Samuel and His Mum.<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":49,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-201","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P69z0J-3f","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=201"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":205,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/201\/revisions\/205"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/49"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblestudies4you.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}