Bible reading: 1 Samuel 3:1-18.

In those days, when the boy Samuel was serving the Lord under the direction of Eli, there were very few messages from the Lord, and visions from him were quite rare.One night Eli, who was now almost blind, was sleeping in his own room; Samuel was sleeping in the sanctuary, where the Ark of the Covenant was kept. Before dawn, while the lamp was still burning, the Lord called Samuel. He answered, “Yes, sir!” and ran to Eli saying, “You called me, and here I am.”But Eli answered, “I didn’t call you; go back to bed.” So Samuel went back to bed.The Lord called Samuel again. The boy did not know that it was the Lord, because the Lord had never spoken to him before. So he got up, went to Eli, and said, “You called me, and here I am.”But Eli answered, “My son, I didn’t call you; go back to bed.”

The Lord called Samuel a third time; he got up, went to Eli, and said, “You called me, and here I am.” Then Eli realized that it was the Lord who was calling the boy. So he said to him, “Go back to bed; and if he calls you again, say, ‘Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went back to bed.The Lord came and stood there, and called as he had before, “Samuel! Samuel!” This time Samuel answered, “Speak; your servant is listening.”The Lord said to him, “I am going to do something to the people of Israel that is so terrible that everyone who hears about it will be stunned. On that day I will carry out all my threats against Eli’s family, from beginning to end. I have already told him that I am going to punish his family forever because his sons have spoken evil things against me. Eli knew they were doing this, but he did not stop them. So I solemnly declare to the family of Eli that no sacrifice or offering will ever be able to remove the consequences of this terrible sin.”Samuel stayed in bed until morning; then he got up and opened the doors of the house of the Lord. He was afraid to tell Eli about the vision. Eli called him, “Samuel, my boy!”“Yes, sir,” answered Samuel.“What did the Lord tell you?” Eli asked. “Don’t keep anything from me. God will punish you severely if you don’t tell me everything he said.”So Samuel told him everything; he did not keep anything back. Eli said, “He is the Lord; he will do whatever seems best to him.”

Message.

Preachers face a dilemma. If they decide to base their sermon on an obscure text from the book of Leviticus or Numbers, from one of the Minor Prophets, or from one of those short letters at the end of the New Testament which no-one ever reads, the congregation may well start scratching their heads and asking, “Why on earth did they choose that?” If, on the other hand, they base their sermon on a well-known story such as Noah and the Flood or David and Goliath, or on one of Jesus’ parables such as the Sower or the Wise and Foolish Men, the listeners are liable to say, “Oh no, not again – we’ve heard it all before”. The preacher must find a radically new approach to these familiar Bible passages if they don’t want their hearers to “switch off”.

Those of us who follow the so-called Lectionary or Table of Readings have an additional problem: the readings come round on a three-year cycle. Now we could just re-use the sermon from three years before and see if anyone notices but, if we have any integrity, we will try to find something fresh to say – guided, we hope, by God’s Spirit. So today, as we look at the story of God calling Samuel, one which you’ve probably known since you were “knee-high to a grasshopper”, I ask you to cut me some slack as I try to look at it from an unusual angle.

Let’s recap. Samuel has been left in the Tabernacle at Shiloh by his mother because of the vow she made after his near-miraculous birth (do you find that as shocking as I do?). Shiloh was supposed to be a place of divine presence, the very centre of Israel’s spiritual life but, as one writer puts it, “it had now become a filthy remnant of its former glory, characterised more by the slip-shod sacrifice of mottled and speckled beasts than by grand holocausts of pure offerings”. We aren’t told how old Samuel was when he heard God calling him, but the Jewish historian Josephus, presumably following a well-known tradition, says that he was 12 years old. That sounds plausible, and oral history can be remarkably accurate; but Josephus was writing in the first century AD, many centuries later; so we can’t really be sure.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

God calls Samuel as he’s in that liminal space between wakefulness and sleep. He thinks it’s his master Eli calling for him, so he goes to see what he wants: “Oh, no”, says Eli, “You must have been dreaming; go back to bed”. God calls Samuel a second time: the same scenario is played out. When the boy rushes to Eli’s bedside a third time, the old man to his credit realises that something significant is happening, indeed the voice that Samuel is hearing might be God’s. Once more Eli sends the boy to his bed, but this time with the strict instruction: “Stay awake! Hopefully God will call you again”. Samuel waits in anticipation – has God become impatient and given up on him? No, he hasn’t; he gives the boy a message for Eli which he’s reluctant to pass on the next morning as it’s one of criticism and condemnation. But the old priest presses him and Samuel tells him everything.

I’m not going to discuss what we might call the “mechanics” of this story. Did Samuel hear an audible voice or did he dream or imagine it? That doesn’t really matter if we’re prepared to accept that what he heard was God. What’s more interesting to me is that God spoke to Samuel and told him to convey his message to Eli when he could have spoken to Eli directly. Yes, the priest’s eyesight was failing, but (as far as we know) he wasn’t going deaf; in any case, I can’t imagine that spiritual communication depends on the condition of our eyes or ears! Perhaps there’s a better clue in the very first verse of this chapter: “In those days there were very few messages from the Lord, and visions from him were rare”. The people, including Eli and his sons, who were supposed to listen out for God and pass his words to the nation, had somehow lost their sense of divine receptivity; they were rather like radios which are useless because their batteries are flat. God clearly needed a new, if inexperienced, person to “tune in” to him and listen to what he was saying. Samuel fitted the bill perfectly and, fortunately, Eli wasn’t too proud or blind to listen to him.     

I wonder how prepared we are to listen to children and young people? Do we take notice of their ideas and suggestions, of their criticisms and anger? Do we take time to listen to them, but then patronisingly dismiss what they’ve said with words such as, “They’re young; they’ll learn that things aren’t so simple in the real world”? Or do we simply shut them out and ignore them believing that it is adults who make decisions and young people have nothing to contribute? According to figures from Unicef, there are around 14 million children and young people under 18 in Britain – that’s about a fifth of the population. Don’t they have a right to be heard? Surely they do. (The proportion of young people in some developing nations is of course higher still).  

Dame Rachel de Souza, on taking the role of Children’s Commissioner for England, declared that her first task was to listen to the nation’s young people. Suiting her actions to her words, she organised a survey which was sent to 367,000 under-18s, and found that just 1 in 5 of them thought that the people who run the country listen to them. And just a couple of weeks ago, as politicians debated children’s use of smartphones (some suggesting that they should be banned), Sir Peter Wanless, the Chief Executive of the National Society for the Protection of Cruelty for Children, said that young people’s voices had been “glaringly absent” from discussions about online safety.

I can continue. The Welsh Youth Parliament, made up of 60 members aged from 11 to 17, meets nationally at the Senedd building and also more locally. Its aims include gathering views from young people across the country, making sure their voices are heard, and working with those with the power to make change.

Cadw, the Welsh heritage organisation, has for some years run a project called “Unloved Heritage”. It has been taking place in some of the country’s most deprived areas and has recruited young volunteers to explore their local and little-known history. So, for instance, young people from the valleys have been exploring our mining heritage at Fernhill Colliery in Blaenrhondda; while skateboarders in Bridgend and Swansea have used photography and film to devise historical routes through their cities to create a register of sites at risk, collect oral histories, run guided tours and curate an exhibition.

I must also tell you that the Children’s Act, which applies to many bodies including local authorities, the Health Service, the Police and Probation Service, requires them to implement “a culture of listening to children and taking account of their wishes and feelings”. That’s not optional, and it’s not new: the Act was passed 20 years ago! And it merely echoes the United Nations Convention of Rights of the Child, dating from 1989: “Every child has the right to say what they think in all matters affecting them, and to have their views taken seriously”.

And schools have pupil Councils: according to one Cardiff primary school, “this gives them the opportunity to express their opinions and work in partnership with Staff and Governors to improve and develop the school for the benefit of all … The Headteacher will work with the Council and staff in order to discuss, promote and hopefully implement these proposals”. This sounds like serious listening to young children!

So what about churches? Might I suggest that they are often a long way behind in all this? Some churches have a culture which says, “Of course we want to have children and young people – so long as they sit quietly and listen”. Other churches are more open; but do their young people attend, or see any point in attending, decision-making meetings which may be important but aren’t exactly exciting? Do they offer ideas which are immediately squashed because they are too outlandish, or because “we tried that before and it didn’t work”? Do adults make decisions for the children without bothering to find out what they think? Or do they say, “We can’t do that, it’s not in our tradition?” Those things are all too easy to do – and that’s before we’ve even mentioned young people’s pastoral issues; as our own youth leaders know all too well, many of them are worried, confused and hurting, yet we too often assume that they haven’t a care in the world.

The Church of England recently launched an initiative called “Learn to Listen”. This offers “a wide variety of resources, ideas, suggestions and practical advice to help you take the first steps towards listening to the children and young people in your church community and beyond”; it has the ambitious aim of creating “a Church-wide culture where young people are valued as spiritual beings who hear from God, are active agents in the faith, and co-creators of faith traditions and the future of the Church”. “Learn to Listen” is based on the idea that children and young people aren’t just “the Church of tomorrow” but are very much part of “the Church of today”. I might add that, if churches don’t pay attention to their young people and put some of their ideas into practice, there won’t even be a “Church of tomorrow” as they’ll have jumped ship saying, “What’s the point? They never listen to us, they always think they know best, they’ll never change”.

Let’s get back to Samuel and Eli. As I’ve said, the boy had a harsh and difficult message to deliver to his master: that, because Eli’s sons had not only failed to do their job but had acted in disgusting and evil ways, his family and priestly dynasty were to be extinguished. God was handing not just Eli but his successors their redundancy papers: the old man was facing compulsory retirement, his sons were being summarily sacked, their descendants would have to find other work. It wasn’t a pleasant message for Samuel to pass on or for Eli to hear although Eli did not flinch from hearing it; indeed it may not have come as a surprise. Was this the first prophetic message of Samuel’s long and distinguished career? I think it must have been. I suspect, from the experience of other prophets such as Isaiah or Jeremiah, that some of his later ones weren’t so readily received.

In the autumn of 2016 you were trying to decide whether to call me as your minister – Moira and I were, of course, trying to decide whether we wanted to come! One thing that swayed us was what happened at the Church Meeting held after I’d conducted worship. For, there in the Hall, was a table with four young people sitting behind it, ready to fire questions at me before the adults got a look in. Most of the questions were sensible; one or two of them were unanswerable (no, I didn’t like “bopping” as I didn’t know what it was!). Having that panel made a strong statement to us: “This is a church which takes young people seriously”, and it strongly influenced our decision to come when you called us. Incidentally, in an age when so many young people seem to “grow out” of church in their teens, it’s great that three out of those four are still with us – you must have been doing something right!

But we mustn’t be complacent. We must make space for young people to speak, we must also make sure that we listen carefully, Yes, the opinions they express may be immature, their criticism may be harsh, their ideas may be impractical, their enthusiasm may be exhausting. But their words may also be prophetic, stirring us to evaluate, think and change; we must never forget that God’s Church needs prophets, however uncomfortable their message may be.

Today’s story took place in the Tabernacle, the tent of worship. I’d like to close in the Temple, the permanent building which replaced it. For on Palm Sunday, as Jesus entered after his rapturous welcome by the crowd, children were heard shouting, “Praise to David’s Son!”. The chief priests and teachers of the Law, sensing disorder and potential blasphemy, became angry and railed at Jesus: “Don’t you hear them? Tell them to stop!” But he refused, instead quoting from a psalm: “You have trained children and babies to offer perfect praise”. Those children were young and were got caught up in the excitement. Nevertheless Jesus declared that they showed more wisdom and understanding than the grown-ups and deserved to be heard. Eli listened to Samuel, the religious leaders of Jerusalem rejected the words of their city’s young people. Whose example will we follow?