Study Desk

"Sir, thank you for being so kind to me," Hannah said. Then she left, and after eating something, she felt much better.

Eli's sons were priests, but they were dishonest and refused to obey the Lord . So, while people were boiling the meat from their sacrifices, these priests would send over a servant with a large, three-pronged fork.

If you harm another person, God can help make things right between the two of you. But if you commit a crime against the Lord , no one can help you!" But the Lord had already decided to kill them. So he kept them from listening to their father.

But if anyone is left from your family, he will come to my priest and beg for money or a little bread. He may even say to my priest, "Please let me be a priest, so I will at least have something to eat."

So he said, "Go back and lie down! If someone speaks to you again, answer, ‘I'm listening, Lord . What do you want me to do?'" Once again Samuel went back and lay down.

brought the chest into camp, the army cheered so loudly that the ground shook.

He went into town and told the news about the battle, and everyone started crying. Eli was afraid that something might happen to the sacred chest. So he was sitting on his chair beside the road, just waiting.

Instead she kept thinking about losing her husband and her father-in-law. So she said, "My son will be named Ichabod, because the glory of Israel left our country when the sacred chest was captured."

so they sent the sacred chest to Ekron. But before they could take it through the town gates, the people of Ekron started screaming, "They've brought the sacred chest that belongs to the God of Israel! It will kill us and our families too!"

"Don't send it back without a gift," the priests and fortunetellers answered. "Send along something to Israel's God to make up for taking the chest in the first place. Then you will be healed, and you will find out why the Lord was causing you so much trouble."

So make five gold models of the sores and five gold models of the rats that are wiping out your crops. If you honor the God of Israel with this gift, maybe he will stop causing trouble for you and your gods and your crops.

Watch to see if the chest goes on up the road to the Israelite town of Beth-Shemesh. If it goes back to its own country, you will know that it was the Lord who made us suffer so badly. But if the chest doesn't go back to its own country, then the Lord had nothing to do with the disease that hit us—it was simply bad luck.

The people of Beth-Shemesh were harvesting their wheat in the valley. When they looked up and saw the chest, they were so happy that they stopped working and started celebrating.

The cows left the road and pulled the cart into a field that belonged to Joshua from Beth-Shemesh, and they stopped beside a huge rock. Some men from the tribe of Levi were there. So they took the chest off the cart and placed it on the rock, and then they did the same thing with the bag of gold rats and sores. A few other people chopped up the cart and made a fire. They killed the cows and burned them as sacrifices to the Lord . After that, they offered more sacrifices.

The Philistines were so badly beaten that it was quite a while before they attacked Israel again. After the battle, Samuel set up a monument between Mizpah and the rocky cliffs. He named it "Help Monument" to remind Israel how much the Lord had helped them. For as long as Samuel lived, the Lord helped Israel fight the Philistines.

Samuel was upset to hear the leaders say they wanted a king, so he prayed about it.

Kish owned some donkeys, but they had run off. So he told Saul, "Take one of the servants and go look for the donkeys."

Then you should go to Gilgal. I'll come a little later, so wait for me. It may even take a week for me to get there, but when I come, I'll offer sacrifices and offerings to the Lord . I'll also tell you what to do next.

Later, Saul's uncle asked him, "Where have you been?" Saul answered, "Looking for the donkeys. We couldn't find them, so we went to talk with Samuel."

God has rescued you from your troubles and hard times. But you have rejected your God and have asked for a king. Now each tribe and clan must come near the place of worship so the Lord can choose a king.