Year 4, Day 290: 1 Samuel 4

Theological Commentary: Click Here 

Discipleship Focus: Up

• Up: Up is the word we use for what we worship.  If we are following God’s will, God will occupy the Up position.  Our life, our identity, our mission, our family on mission is all derived from Up.  This is why God needs to be in our Up position.

In my theological commentary from three years ago, I talked about Eli’s successful spiritual perspective at the end of his life.  And I made an interesting assertion over the fact that Eli gets more upset over the loss of the Ark of the Covenant than over the loss of his sons.  I make the assertion that true love for others can only come when our love for God supersedes all other loves in our life.

I really do believe this to be true.  One of the hardest – yet most important – things that I ever heard my father tell me is that as much as he loves me, he loves God more.  What he was telling me was that in order to have enough love for me, he had to have his love replenished by a greater love for God.  Without his love for God in my father’s life, he couldn’t have loved me as he did.  I believe the same is true for Eli as this chapter ends.  Yes, Eli loved his sons – as unrighteous as they were.  But he could love them because of his love for God.

What we’re really talking about here is Up.  Eli has put God in his Up position by the end of his life.  Only when Eli is focused on God above all else is his life oriented in a healthy direction that allows for healthy reactions.

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