Kristi Burchfiel

The God who Hears, Day 8 We want to be like everyone else. Read 1 Samuel chapter 8. The people want a king. They look around and see all ther other nations with their kings and they want to be just like them. So they ask Samuel for a king. Samuel doesn’t want to give that to them, but they insist and God tells him to go ahead. How often do we want something simply because people around us have it? Looking at what God provides for us, we have to remember and understand that God does everything for us and there is nothing that we can do for ourselves.…

The God who Hears, Day 7 The reminder stone. Read 1 Samuel chapter 7. The Lord had provided tremendous victory for the people of Israel. As a result, Samuel wants to set up a reminder for the people. He puts a stone in place and named it Ebenezer, as a reminder that God has helped them this far. We can trust God and everything that we do, but sometimes we have a terrible memory problem. We get caught up in the circumstances of the day and don’t remember that God helped us in the past. God has been faithful in the past. God moved in the past. As a result,…

The God who Hears, Day 6 History repeating itself. Read 1 Samuel chapter 6. The Philistines found themselves in a difficult situation. They had captured the Ark Of God, however they were experiencing plagues that were killing their people as a result. They realized that the Ark of God was fighting against them. Interestingly, they knew the stories of how the people of Israel had come out of Egypt. They knew that pharaoh had hardened his heart and as a result many people had died. So, they decided to not relive that part of history. They decided to give the Ark back. When we read the Bible and we look…

The God who Hears, Day 5 God is truly Lord over all. Read 1 Samuel chapter 5. This may be one of my favorite chapters in all of scripture. What an amazing display of God’s power and authority over absolutely everything. We may try to put up idols in our life, but nothing can stand in the presence of our holy, awesome God. Knowing that God is holy and treating him as if he is holy are two different things. What do our daily actions look like and how do they demonstrate the holiness of God? Do we try to add God to any other idols that we have set…

The God who Hears, Day 4 “Let’s get God to do what we want.” Read 1 Samuel chapter 4. The Israelites have been fighting against the Philistines and they have been getting beaten. So they have the bright idea that, instead of going to God and asking him for help, they should just take the ark that represents God’s presence to the battlefield and everything will be ok. They didn’t bother to ask God what they should do. They didn’t even understand what the ark of God represented in the first place. They wanted to fight a battle and so they told God that was what they were doing and…

The God who Hears, Day 3 Do we see God moving in others? Read 1 Samuel chapter 3. I have read through this passage numerous times, and I’m always struck by the innocence of the young Samuel hearing the voice of the Lord for the first time. Yet, if it wasn’t for Eli, Samuel might not have recognized what was happening. Eli was the one who directed him on how to listen to the Lord and respond. Eli was the one who recognized what was happening. How many times has God tried to speak to me and I didn’t recognize it? How many times has God had a message for…

The God who Hears, Day 2 God is the provider. Read 1 Samuel chapter 2. As we look and understand this 2nd chapter of a 1 Samuel, we see the joy that Hannah describes as she praises God for the birth of her son Samuel. She understands and shares a very important truth about who God is. God is the one who gives and God is the one who takes away. Everything we have and everything we don’t have is a result of God’s allowing it in our life. We can be frustrated by what we don’t have, but we misunderstand that God is the one who brings us everything…

The God who Hears, Day 1 The God who hears. Read 1 Samuel chapter 1. When you read through the history of the people of Israel, so much of what happens can be boiled down to the phrase, “the God who hears.” You see, as the people are going through situations, they cry out to God and he hears them. He hears them as a nation and he hears them as individuals. This chapter starts off two books of history of the nation of Israel, and it begins with a story of a woman in distress who cried out to God, and he heard her. So many times we turn…