I Samuel – 3
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
When Chickens Come Home
(I Samuel 4:11-18)
As a young man I remember my mother often repeating a familiar phrase of warning: “Chickens always come home to roost.” By it she meant that one’s actions eventually catch up with him. To put it another way, ghosts of the past always come back to haunt us. Paul said, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7).
Faithful readers will recall the curse God pronounced upon Eli. In summary, all of his descendents would die early and his two errant sons, Hophni and Phinehas would die on the same day. As part of the curse, Eli lived with the knowledge that the days of his sons were numbered, and that he would outlive them. It appears that the debacle concerning the ark of God was the final straw.
Not only were the armies of Israel defeated by the Philistines, but the precious ark—the symbol of God’s presence—had been captured. During the course of the battle, Eli’s sons were slain (11). Everything that had meant anything to Eli was, in the familiar phrase, “gone with the wind.”
Apparently Eli harbored some hesitation about the ark’s being used as a good luck charm. The Bible tells us that he sat outside the city, waiting and watching anxiously for the return of the ark (13). His heart “trembled for the ark of God.” His concern, though genuine, had not been enough to restrain his sons in their insistence on taking the ark to battle (4). By allowing the removal of the ark, Eli proved once again that he feared the displeasure of his sons more than the wrath of God.
And so, the “chickens came home to roost.” Eli’s indulgence of his sons led to their predicted end—both of them slain in one day. Eli, too, died that day, broken hearted and perhaps repentant—but too late to make any difference.
