It’s so funny, the things you think as a child. I grew up attending church regularly with my family until I was about 10, and I remember singing one of the songs we sang this morning, “Come Thou Fount”. It’s always been one of my favorite songs, even from childhood. But I remember always thinking that the line, “Here I raise my Ebenezer, hither by Thy help I’m come”, was really weird. I didn’t understand it at all, and I remember thinking, “Why would this church song be talking about old Ebenezer Scrooge from A Christmas Carol?”
It’s funny to me the connections that children’s minds make sometimes. Of course, this song, and that line has nothing to do with Charles Dickens’s Christmas classic, but do you know what an Ebenezer is? Or do you just sing that line in that song like a good church member, singing without understanding?
The idea of raising an Ebenezer is a Biblical idea and it’s one I want to preach about this morning. The word Ebenezer comes from a passage in 1 Samuel, and I’d love you to join me there this morning in your Bibles. 1 Samuel 7:12, “Then Samuel took a stone and placed it between Mizpah and Shen, and named it Ebenezer, saying, “So far the Lord has helped us.” (NASB)
Ebenezer is the combination of two Hebrew words, ‘ĕ’bĕn meaning STONE and hā’ē’zĕr meaning HELP. So combined the word literally means “stone of help” or “help stone”. Samuel was a priest of the Old Testament, dedicated to the Lord before He was born and given over to the Lord’s service in the Temple under the priest Eli. Samuel heard the call of the Lord very early, as a boy, and responded with a life lived in complete and total devotion for the Lord.
The passage we just read from 1 Samuel 7 where Samuel took the stone and placed it between the two towns and named it Ebenezer happened after God had given the Israelites a great victory. See, the Philistines, who seemed to be constantly at war with the Israelites and a real thorn in their side, had years before taken the Ark of the Lord, the Ark of the Covenant, captive. God brought tumors and plagues upon the Philistines wherever the Ark went in their territory. Finally, the Philistines had had enough of the wrath of God and sent the Ark back to the Israelites.
The Israelites recognized that the reason the Ark had been captured in the first place was because of their arrogance and disobedience to the Lord. So when the Ark was returned to them, there was great cause for celebration, but most importantly, humility.
The Israelites humbled themselves before the Lord…and they remembered.
What I hope you see throughout this message about the Ebenezer stone is that ultimately the Ebenezer is a place where God calls His people to remember.
We have short memories, humankind does. Sometimes I come across these videos where an interviewer will be interviewing one or two people with some history questions that to me seem like they should be common knowledge. But, of course, these people, not all of them young people, have no clue what the interviewer is talking about. Things like, “What was Pearl Harbor?” Or “When was the Holocaust?” Or even more recent events, like “When did 9/11 happen?” You know, common knowledge events that are pretty big and well-known that are seared into our collective conscience even if we weren’t alive then? Sometimes I think these people need a help stone to help them remember, instead of living under a rock.
The call to remember though is a theme that we see run throughout the Old Testament. The Ebenezer Samuel placed called God’s people to remember the way God responds to repentance and renewal of faith. The people had been in mourning because they were suffering under the hands of the Philistines, and this is what Samuel called them to, “Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, “If you are returning to the Lord with all your heart, then remove the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you, and direct your hearts to the Lord and serve Him alone; and He will save you from the hand of the Philistines.” 4 So the sons of Israel removed the Baals and the Ashtaroth, and served the Lord alone. 5 Then Samuel said, “Gather all Israel to Mizpah and I will pray to the Lord for you.” 6 So they gathered to Mizpah, and drew water and poured it out before the Lord, and fasted on that day and said there, “We have sinned against the Lord.” And Samuel judged the sons of Israel at Mizpah.” (1 Samuel 7:3-6, NASB)
The people realized their mistake. They realized they had been arrogant and disobedient and here they turn their hearts back to the Lord. Samuel directs them to return, repent, and serve the Lord alone, and they do, from that day faithfully for 20 years under Samuel’s leadership. God responds to their repentance and the renewal of their faith by giving them victory over the Philistines. And what we see time and time again throughout the Old Testament, especially during this period of judges before the first king, and even in through the time of the kings of Israel, that if the leader was leading the people to serve the Lord faithfully, God always responded to their repentance and sincere faith with victory over their enemies.
Samuel didn’t want them to forget what God had done, so he set up the stone, so that every time they looked at it, they would know and remember what God had done.
Samuel raising an Ebenezer was also him calling the people to remember the ways God HELPS us. The Israelites were constantly being oppressed by the Philistines, and God was quick to help them when their hearts were humble before Him.
But this was not the only time God stepped in to help His people. We see throughout the Old Testament He has a long history of helping us. He helps His people in big ways, like the Exodus clearly shows, and He helps His people in little ways, like when He comforted Hagar in the desert when she was outcast and alone.
Joshua 4 has the account of God helping the Israelites cross the Jordan river, which was a rushing torrent of water that God stopped completely for them to cross. This is what is written about this account, “This shall be a sign among you; when your children ask later, saying, ‘What do these stones mean to you?’ 7 then you shall say to them, ‘That the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord; when it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.’ So these stones shall become a memorial to the sons of Israel forever.” 8 So the sons of Israel did exactly as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, just as the Lord spoke to Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Israel; and they carried them over with them to the encampment and put them down there. 9 Then Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan at the place where the feet of the priests who carried the ark of the covenant were standing, and they are there to this day.” (Joshua 4:6-9, NASB)
Twelve stones, set up as a memorial. What do memorials do? They help us remember. Ebenezers, memorial stones, help stones, help us remember the ways the Lord has helped us.
They also help us remember the way He spoke and revealed Himself to us. In Genesis 28, Jacob has an encounter with God. Before that encounter, he didn’t have a relationship with God. He knew of God, no doubt, from Abraham’s stories and Isaac’s stories about how God had revealed Himself and spoken to them and helped them, but He was not Jacob’s God, not until the Lord spoke to Jacob in a dream. “Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “The Lord is certainly in this place, and I did not know it!” 17 And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!” 18 So Jacob got up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had placed as a support for his head, and set it up as a memorial stone, and poured oil on its top.” (Genesis 28:16-18)
Jacob set up a memorial stone to remember the way God had spoken to him and revealed Himself to Jacob, and from that moment on, the Lord became Jacob’s Lord.
Ebenezers help us remember the way God CHANGED us as well. God appeared to Jacob a second time, and affirmed for Jacob that the covenant God had given to Abraham and Isaac would continue through Jacob’s line. God says He is Jacob’s God, and He changes Jacob’s name, “God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; You shall no longer be called Jacob, But Israel shall be your name.” (Genesis 35:10, NASB)
This is not the only time in the Bible that God changes someone’s name to reflect their new identity. A few years ago, we felt nudged to change our own name, to reflect our desire for who we would be, what our identity would be as a church, that we would be a church built on the foundation of Christ, being built up into a holy temple for the Lord.
Look at what Jacob, Israel, did in response to the way God changed him, “So Jacob set up a memorial stone in the place where He had spoken with him, a memorial of stone, and he poured out a drink offering on it; he also poured oil on it.” (Genesis 35:14, NASB)
A memorial stone. An Ebenezer, to help remember how God had changed him.
We also see Ebenezers show up to help God’s people remember the way God witnesses His covenant lived through His people. Let’s look at some examples.
In Genesis 31 we have a dispute between Jacob and Laban. Laban was not a fair man, and he had not treated Jacob fairly in many ways. First, he gave Jacob Leah as a wife when Jacob had worked for Rachel. Then we’re told in Genesis 31:7 we’re told that Laban had cheated Jacob and changed his wages ten times. God gave Jacob a dream for how to deal with Laban, including very detailed directions concerning speckled and striped sheep. Jacob does this and flees Laban, and Laban goes after him because it turns out it’s really not very nice to be cheated out of something. Finally, they seem to come to an agreement and come up with a covenant for how they can go their separate ways and be at peace as family who both say they serve the Lord.
Starting in verse 44 we read, “So now come, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and it shall be a witness between you and me.” 45 Then Jacob took a stone and set it up as a memorial stone. 46 Jacob said to his relatives, “Gather stones.” So they took stones and made a heap, and they ate there by the heap. 47 Now Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed. 48 Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me this day.” Therefore it was named Galeed, 49 and Mizpah, for he said, “May the Lord keep watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other. 50 If you mistreat my daughters, or if you take wives besides my daughters, although no one is with us, see, God is witness between you and me.” 51 Laban also said to Jacob, “Behold this heap and behold the memorial stone which I have set between you and me. 52 This heap is a witness, and the memorial stone is a witness, that I will not pass by this heap to you for harm, and you will not pass by this heap and this memorial stone to me, for harm.” (Genesis 31:44-52, NASB)
A memorial stone, for us to remember the covenants we make with one another, as family, to remember the love we ought to have between us in the name of the Lord, that He stands witness to.
There’s another incident similar to this in Joshua 24, when Joshua is at the end of his ministry and he speaks to God’s people and again calls them to remember all that God has done for them, and to commit to serving the Lord because of all that God had done. “So Joshua said to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen for yourselves the Lord, to serve Him.” And they said, “We are witnesses.” 23 “Now then, do away with the foreign gods which are in your midst, and incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.” 24 And the people said to Joshua, “We will serve the Lord our God and obey His voice.” 25 So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and made for them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem. 26 And Joshua wrote these words in the Book of the Law of God; and he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak that was by the sanctuary of the Lord. 27 Then Joshua said to all the people, “Behold, this stone shall be a witness against us, because it has heard all the words of the Lord which He spoke to us; so it shall be a witness against you, so that you do not deny your God.” (Joshua 24:22-27, NASB)
Ebenezers are memorial stones. They help us to remember. We are not in the practice normally of collecting stones or setting up stones to remember what God has done, but I thought it might be a good way to have a visual cue for each of us to take with us. Pastor Allison is going to hand out Ebenezer stones to each of you, and as she does this, I want you to think through these questions as you look at the simple word written on your stone.
How has God responded to your repentance and renewal of faith? Did He forgive you, or hold your sins against you?
How has God helped you? Does He give you what you want or what He knows you need?
How has God spoken to you and revealed Himself to you? What are some of the things He has said to you?
How has God changed you? Though you might not have a new name, you are a new person in Christ. What are the signs of that new life in you?
How has God witnessed His covenant promises lived through you? How has His love flowed through you to others? How has His freedom been proclaimed by you?
The final thing we see in these passages is that each time that the person set up a stone to remember what God had done, it fueled their PRAISE. When I remember that God has always responded to my repentance with forgiveness and has forgiven things I thought were beyond forgiveness; and when I remember the way He helped me, just last week when I was struggling with feelings of loneliness; and when I remember how He spoke to me in that struggle and revealed His near presence to me; and when I remember the way that He has changed my nature from one that is judgmental and arrogant to one that seeks to let love flow out in everything I say and do; and when I remember the way He has moved through me to share Him with the least of these around me I am brought to my knees.
How can such an amazing God do so much for me? How can I thank Him? His fount of every blessing has poured out on me and over me and through me. How do I respond? I ask Him to tune my heart, to make me sing of His grace. His streams of mercy flowing over me have never stopped and how do I respond? Songs of loudest praise. Not just songs sung by human tongues, but songs sung in the depths of my soul as I say to Him, “Lord, you have all of my heart, all of my mind, all of my body, and all of my strength. I am yours. Bind my heart to You. Here’s my heart Lord, take and seal it.”
I want to end our service today, having these Ebenezers in our hands, by letting our remembrance of what He has done for each of us fuel our praise.