The Rise and The Fall!

Eli was the High Priest over the Tabernacle in time prior to the Prophet and Judge Samuel.  No doubt in his younger years Eli was true to the teachings of God, but as he grew older he began to compromise.  He had two sons, Hophni & Phineas, that he was preparing to take over for him when he passed on (his successors), and these sons were wicked. Eli knew of their wickedness and rebuke them but ignored it. Eli did not openly rebuke them in front of the Tabernacle crowd. Eli did not tell his sons to go on their way because of their open rebellion and sin towards God. Why? I think bcause Eli was comfortable, loved, and accepted – he did not want to rock the boat. After all, he was the respected and venerable “Old Man” that had served faithfully in his younger days and had been in his position for years. 

God grew angry over Eli’s refusal to openly rebuke sin, and he raised up a young boy named Samuel to replace him.  Even though Eli was old and respected, God’s judgement was that he would raise his own successor and it would not be his wicked sons. When Samuel was a little older (in his teens, theologians say 14 or 15 years old) and Eli’s eyes were so weak to the point of blindless, the Lord Himself spoke to Samuel. In the middle of the night, the Lord “came and stood” in Samuel’s room (1 Samuel 3:10) and told the young boy to deliver to Eli the message that it was almost time for the prophesied judgment to fall upon his family (verses 11–14). Eli humbly accepted God’s decree, and Samuel was confirmed as a prophet of the Lord in Shiloh
(1 Samuel 3:19–21).

On the day that the Ark of the Covenant was captured the sons of Eli were killed in the battle, Eli fell over (he was very fat though the word of God states) in his chair and died of a broken neck, and a grandson was born through his son Phineas' wife who died after giving birth but not before she named him “Ichabod”, which means “the glory has departed”. 

**Read the first three chapters of 1 Samuel for the whole story. **

The lesson we learn from this is that it is possible to start out well in any ministry or journey with the Lord and end wrongly. It is possible to allow success and longevity to become a stumbling block to the later years in ministry. It is possible to be true for years, but compromise in the end. 

We must always guard ourselves that we do not become as Eli and grow soft in our later years. We do not want to become a memory of what we were in the beginning. We do not want “Ichabod” to be written over our hearts, over our churches, and over our legacy.  We do not want the glory to depart.