We Pray Wednesday: People of Prayer - Samuel

People of Prayer in the Bible: Samuel

We read in the Bible about men who had great prayer relationships and wish that we could have the type of relationship that men in the Bible had with God.  Samuel is one of those men.  As you read the life of Samuel, there are several things to notice about his walk with God.  As we read, we can follow some steps that can allow us to have a better prayer relationship with God.

1.  He had a family that prayed.

Samuel came into this world and was born as a direct answer to prayer.  He was born of a praying mother; whose heart was full of earnest desire for a son.  He came into life under prayer surroundings, and his first months in this world were spent in direct contact with a woman who knew how to pray.  It was a prayer accompanied by a solemn vow that if he should be given, he should be "lent unto the Lord," and true to that vow, this praying mother put him directly in touch with the minister of the sanctuary and under the influence of "the house of prayer."  It was no wonder he developed into a man of prayer.

2.  He was at the house of prayer as a child.

He was in a favorable place to hear God when He spoke to him, and was in an atmosphere where it tended to his heeding the divine call which came to him.  It was the most natural thing in the world when at the third call from heaven, he recognized God's voice and his childish heart responded so promptly, "Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth."  Quickly was there a response from his boyish spirit, of submission, willingness and prayer.  Had he been born of a different sort of mother, had he been placed under different surroundings, had he spent his early days in contact with different influences, does anyone for one moment suppose he could have easily heard the voice of God calling him to His service, and that he would have so readily yielded his young life to the God who brought him into being?  Would a worldly home, with worldly surroundings, separated from the Church of God, with a worldly-minded mother, have produced such a character as Samuel?  It takes such influences and agencies in early life to produce such praying men as Samuel.  Would you have your child called early into divine service and separated from the world unto God?  Would you have him so situated that he will be called in childhood by the Spirit of God?  Put him under prayer influences.  Place him near to and directly under the influence of the Man of God and in close touch with that house which is called "the house of prayer."

3.  He had prayed for his nation and it’s leader.

A crisis came in the history of this nation.  The people were infatuated by the glory of a kingdom with a human king, and were prepared to reject God as their king, as He had always been.  So they came to Samuel with the bold request, "Make us a king to judge us like all the nations."  The thing displeased this man of God, who was jealous for the name, the honor and the pleasure of the Lord God.  How could it be otherwise?  Who would not have been likewise displeased if he were built after the pattern of Samuel?  It grieved him in soul.  The Lord, however, came to him just at that time with the comforting assurance so far as he was personally concerned in the transaction, that "they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them.  Hearken unto the voice of the people, in all that they say unto thee."  Then it was that Samuel followed the bent of his mind, "And Samuel prayed unto the Lord."  It seemed that in every matter concerning this people, with which Samuel was connected, he must pray over it.  How much more now when there was to be an entire revolution in the form of government, and God was to be displaced as the ruler of the people, and a human king was to be set up?  National affairs need to be prayed over. Praying men are demanded to carry to God in prayer the affairs of government.  Lawmakers, law judges, and law executives need leaders in Israel to pray for them.  How much fewer the mistakes if there was more praying done in civil matters?

4.  He prayed all night for a hurting friend.

One more incident in the prayer life of Samuel is worth noticing.  King Saul had been ordered to destroy all the Amalekites, root and branch, and all their stuff, but Saul, contrary to divine instructions, had spared King Agag and the best of the sheep and the cattle, and had justified it because he claimed that the people wanted it done.  God brought this message to Samuel at this time: "It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king; for he is turned back from following me, and hath not performed my commandments." "And it grieved Samuel, and he cried all night unto the Lord." Such a sudden declaration was enough to produce grief of soul in a man like Samuel, who loved his nation, who was true to God, and who above everything else desired the prosperity of Zion. Such grief of soul over the evils of the Church and at the sight of the abominations of the times always drives a man to his knees in prayer. Of course, Samuel carried the case to God. It was a time for prayer. The case was too serious for him not to be deeply moved to pray. So greatly was the inner soul of Samuel disturbed that he prayed all night about it. Too much was at stake for him to shut his eyes to the affair, to treat it indifferently, and to let it pass without taking God into the matter.