The Lamp Of God Had Not Yet Gone Out

1 Samuel 3:2-3 – One night Eli, whose eyes were becoming so weak that he could barely see, was lying down in his usual place. The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the house of the Lord, where the ark of God was.

Exodus 25:37,40 – “Then make its seven lamps and set them up on it so that they light the space in front of it…See that you make them according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.

Exodus 27:21 – In the tent of meeting, outside the curtain that shields the ark of the covenant law, Aaron and his sons are to keep the lamps burning before the Lord from evening till morning. This is to be a lasting ordinance among the Israelites for the generations to come.

Application:

• ·         Oil for the lamps was to be supplied by the people; the light from the lamps represented the glory of the Lord reflected in the consecrated lives of the Israelites—Israel’s glory answering to God’s glory in the tabernacle.
• ·         For the lamp to be permitted to go out before morning was a violation of the Pentateuchal regulations.
• ·         The tabernacle; it was not a place where God’s people met for collective worship but one where God Himself met—by appointment, not by accident—with His people.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV