1 Samuel 2:12

"Now the sons of Eli were sons of Belial." 1 Samuel 2:12 .

This is one of the unaccountable circumstances in life. We should have said there is a law of cause and effect, and that because Eli was a good man his sons would partake of his spiritual quality. Eli was a priest, and if a weak man he was undoubtedly a good man; and yet his sons served the devil, not knowing the very Lord in whose name they ministered, but going through all their duties as part of a mechanical routine. It does not say they were imperfect men, subject to divers temptations, eccentric, occasionally doing wrong; but they were corrupted in their very souls; they had changed their fatherhood, so they who were sons of God, and sons of God's priest, were adopted into the family of Belial, and bore the image and superscription of their new father. This reminds us of many contradictions in character. A son of civilisation may be a child of barbarism. A man who has received a high education may prostitute his talents to all manner of evil. A child brought up in the sanctuary may sing the hymns of the Church for the amusement of its enemies. They who have been brought up in the school of refinement may betake themselves to the veriest vulgarity, in criticism, in prejudice, in haughtiness. We hold nothing as it were permanently; we are always upon our good behaviour; we have to watch every moment, and pray that our hands and feet and head and lips, yea, our whole manhood in every faculty and power, may be kept under the restraining and sanctifying influences of God. A double damnation is theirs who had high advantages to begin with. How deep the hell into which they plunge who fall out of a good man's house fall from within the very shadow of the sacred altar! When Jesus Christ denounced those who heard him and who rejected him, he denounced those most severely who had had the greatest privileges conferred upon them. If we are to be judged by our privileges, how appalling is the position of men who nave been brought up in Christian countries, and yet have rejected every opportunity of becoming religiously wise and good!