Sermon – Silence. Listening. God Speaking.

(I preached this sermon on Sunday, October 12, 2025 at Christ Lutheran Church, Harrisburg, PA. It is based on 1 Samuel 3:1-21).

This past week, a pastor right here in Dauphin County made headlines for all the wrong reasons. During his sermon, he lifted an AR-style rifle, pointed it toward his congregation, and said it was a symbol of faith. According to the news story about the incident, the pastor used the firearm as a prop to encourage followers of Christ to use “spiritual violence against unbelief.” 

Let that phrase sink in. Spiritual violence against unbelief.

That wasn’t God speaking.
That was fear masquerading as faith.
That was a desperate attempt to fill silence with noise.

Why does bad theology always have to be so loud?
Why does it always demand attention?

Imagine Jesus doing this. You can’t. Jesus never held a weapon and said, “This is how you prove your faith.” He never told his followers to wage violence on unbelief.

Because doubt isn’t the enemy of faith — certainty is.

Certainty makes us arrogant.
Certainty blinds us to the humanity of others.
Certainty convinces us that God is on our side and no one else’s.
Certainty makes us worship the false god of being right.
And when we worship that god, we live by a different creed — the creed that the ends justify the means.

That’s what we saw this week — people so desperate to hear God’s voice that they substituted their own anger for God’s word. They confused attention for anointing.

And that’s nothing new.

1 Samuel begins with a haunting sentence:

“The word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.”

The silence of God.
That’s how the story of Samuel begins.

Israel was in chaos. The temple — the very place meant to keep people close to God — had become corrupt. Eli’s sons used their priestly power to take advantage of others, and Eli looked the other way.
People had lost trust in religious leaders.
They were hungry for something true.

Sound familiar?

When the word of the Lord was rare, when the temple had lost its way, God called a child — someone without power, without privilege, without the noise of self-importance — and spoke again.

“The word of the Lord was rare in those days.” Sometimes it feels that way in Allison Hill too.

This neighborhood is one of the most diverse, resilient, and beautiful places in all of Harrisburg. But too often, it’s treated like a problem to be solved rather than a community to be cherished.

Politicians drive through Allison Hill looking for votes and photo ops — promising change, listening for a few minutes — and then forget about the neighborhood when it’s time to distribute resources.

Businesses pull out. Schools are underfunded. Healthcare is out of reach. People struggle with housing, mental health, and survival.

And sometimes, it feels like the silence of God.

But friends, Allison Hill is not God-forsaken.
Allison Hill is God’s classroom.
It’s a place where the word of the Lord still breaks through the noise — in whispers, in kindness, in resilience, in acts of healing and hope that the world doesn’t notice.

But let’s be honest: it’s hard to hear God these days — not because God isn’t speaking, but because our world is so noisy.

We live surrounded by constant sound — news cycles, social media, outrage, endless talking. Everyone’s got something to say. Everyone’s got a platform.

And when everyone’s shouting at once, it’s easy to mistake volume for truth.
Just like that Dauphin County pastor — people twist the voice of God to fit their own needs. They use faith as a weapon, as if God’s word were meant to harm instead of heal.

There are entire movements that do this.
Christian Nationalism does this — wrapping the cross in a flag and calling it holy.
It claims God’s blessing for cruelty and domination.
It teaches people to fear, to control, to divide.
And it always comes with certainty — “God told us we’re right.”

But the God of Scripture doesn’t sound like that.
The God of Scripture speaks not through power but through vulnerability.
Not through domination but through love.
Not through violence but through mercy.
Not through certainty but through grace.

That’s the difference between Eli’s temple and Samuel’s calling.
Eli’s sons made God’s word serve their desires. Samuel simply said, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

The truth is, God never stopped speaking.

From the very beginning, God’s word has broken through silence.

In Genesis, when the world was formless and void — God spoke, and creation burst forth.
In Egypt, after 400 years of bondage — God spoke, and freedom came.
In Babylonian exile — God spoke through prophets, calling people home.
Under Rome’s oppression — God spoke again, and the Word became flesh and lived among us.

Every time the world was darkest, God broke the silence with a new word of life, justice, and peace.

And here’s the most important point: God’s word almost never comes from the center of power. It comes from the margins.

Samuel was a boy, overlooked and underestimated.
Allison Hill is a neighborhood overlooked and underestimated.
God speaks from the margins — from those who are ignored, those with little voice, those whom the world refuses to see.

I know this because I’ve heard that word before.
And it didn’t come from a pulpit or a bishop or a committee meeting.
It came from a man named Michael.

Michael was living under the pavilion behind St. Stephen Lutheran Church in New Kingstown — the congregation I served before coming here. That’s how the church was helping him — giving him a safe place to sleep.

One day, Michael told me about people he knew who were living in their cars at a nearby truck stop. They stayed there because there were showers, laundry machines, food, and a warm place to sit inside during the winter.

I told a few church members about this, and they said, “We should go.”

So we went — just to see.

And then we went again.
And again.

We started doing laundry with people.
We made sure they had what they needed to get a shower.
We shared a meal that eventually became Dinner Church.

All of that started because an unhoused man heard something from God — a call to connect, to serve, to love. And he told us.

God’s word came through someone the world ignores.
And when we finally listened, we saw Jesus.

Our world is filled with noise — 24-hour news cycles, social media outrage, politicians shouting, pastors brandishing rifles, people peddling certainty and fear.

But God doesn’t compete with the noise. God waits for people who are ready to listen.

That’s what happened with Samuel. The Lord called his name three times before he finally said, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

That’s what’s happening here, in Allison Hill, right now. God is calling your name — not from the loudest voices, not from the people trying to control or frighten, but from the margins, from the overlooked, from those who persist in hope.

And we hear God in the ways this congregation has chosen to respond.

We hear God in the Nurse-Run Medical Outreach Clinic, where people come for care and leave with dignity and love.

We hear God in the Dental Clinic, where smiles are restored and the anxious are comforted.

We hear God in Healthy on the Hill, where nutrition, exercise, and education meet community support — showing that care for the body is also care for the soul.

We hear God in our partnership with Power to the Hill, which amplifies voices that too often go unheard, reminding us that faith is not just private, but public, and calls us to justice.

We hear God in worship — in the traditional liturgy, connecting us to centuries of faith; in the unplugged service, where musical gifts of all kinds rise from our congregation and neighborhood; in Brunch Church, quarterly, where the table becomes altar, and food, conversation, and laughter become prayer.

Each of these ministries, each act of listening, each gathering is a way of saying, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”
And in each of these moments, God’s Word is breaking into the silence, reminding us that even when the world seems deaf, God’s voice is still alive, still present, still calling us into mercy, justice, and love.

So, Christ Lutheran Church — a beacon on the hill — hear the call.

When the word of the Lord feels rare,
when corruption and cruelty fill the air,
when loud voices twist faith into violence and certainty,
that’s when God is preparing new ears to listen and new voices to speak.

God is speaking again — through you.

Say it with Samuel:
“Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

Go and live as if God’s Word has already been spoken —
because it has.
Right here.
Right now.
In Allison Hill.