Afterward, Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the LORD has helped us.”
Evil often springs from good: the Philistines saw Israel's prayer gathering and thought it war, so they struck. But mark this: when sinners repent, Satan musters all his force to oppose and discourage them. Yet God turns their malice to His praise, and the threat comes precisely when Israel can meet it, fresh from making peace with God.
AI summary
Commenting on 1 Samuel 7:7-12
And Samuel took a stone, and set it,.... Not for worship, but as a monument of the victory obtained by the help of God: and this he placed between Mizpeh and Shen; which latter signifies a tooth, and designs the precipice of a rock which juts out, and hangs over in the form of one: and called the name of it Ebenezer; which signifies "the...
Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen--on an open spot between the town and "the crag" (some well-known rock in the neighborhood). A huge stone pillar was erected as a monument of their victory (Lev 26:1). The name--Eben-ezer--is thought to have been written on the face of it. Next: 1 Samuel Chapter 8