Hannah's Tale

Hannah's Tale :: 1 samuel 1:1-2:10

There was a certain man from Ramathaim, a Zuphite from the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Elkanah, an Ephraimite. He had two wives; one was called Hannah and the other Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah had none.

Year after year this man went up from his town to worship and sacrifice to the LORD Almighty at Shiloh. Whenever the day came for Elkanah to sacrifice, he would give portions of the meat to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters. But to Hannah he gave a double portion because he loved her, and the LORD had closed her womb.

And because the LORD had closed her womb, her rival kept provoking her in order to irritate her. This went on year after year. Whenever Hannah went up to the house of the LORD , her rival provoked her till she wept and would not eat.

Once when they had finished eating and drinking in Shiloh, Hannah stood up. Now Eli the priest was sitting on a chair by the doorpost of the LORD's temple. In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much and prayed to the LORD. And she made a vow, saying, "O LORD Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the LORD for all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head."

Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast.

So in the course of time Hannah conceived and gave birth to a son. She named him Samuel, saying, "Because I asked the LORD for him."

Then Hannah prayed and said: "My heart rejoices in the LORD ; in the LORD my horn is lifted high..."

Like Hannah, all of us – whose hearts are attuned to God, would desire greatly that we may be fruitful in all our endeavours and to multiply the seeds that we have sown. The comfort in knowing that none of our hard labour was in vain, and the earnest desire to please God and to be a vessel that can carry the purposes of God, to know that we have a womb that is strong enough not just to hold the hopes of a new life, but to carry the burdens and bring life itself to the foetus that has just begin to form and is being conformed to the likeness of Christ.

We can be sure that there will the likes of the Peninnah’s that shall taunt our weaknesses, remind us of the shame and embarrassments that we try so hard to forget, and provoke the most vulnerable parts of us, but perhaps that is God’s way of training us to slay the giants.

For wasn’t that the way for David and Goliath?

The Grace that we hold in our sling is more than sufficient to overcome the taunting of our Enemy. It is precisely when we are weak that we realise how strong God really is, that we too may be strengthened by God if only we realised that we are weak.

Hannah turned her bitterness and anguish heavenward – for she must have understood better than anyone else that man’s striving alone can do little without God’s help. Only the God who created the heavens and the earth could intervene the laws of nature. Indeed we may plant and we may water, but it is the Lord who gives the increase. The preparations of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the heart comes from God. It is He who makes all things possible – from the seemingly plausible, to the absurdly impossible; God is more than able, not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of God at work in our lives and in our world.

Cast your cares upon the Lord and be anxious about nothing, but by prayer and petition present your requests to God and let His peace which surpasses all understanding guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. Perhaps that is how Hannah left the temple in peace, went her way and ate – her face no longer sad.

I don’t suppose for once that the greatest miracle was just that God remembered Hannah and granted her a son. It had been for years that Hannah had been childless, and imaginably suffering the provocations of Hannah all this while. The greater miracles rather, was the transformation that took place in Hannah that day – in the way she had learnt to respond to her circumstances and in the way she found joy and peace in the knowledge that it was a faithful and almighty God that she worshipped.

And so we behold the words that departed from Hannah’s lips in her prayer of praise and thanksgiving. It was only after the arduous journey that she could have looked back in retrospect to discover to her surprise that all things truly work together for good to those who love Him.

It is out of the abundance of our hearts that the mouth speaks, and it is out of our prayers that we may catch a glimpse of who we are, where we have come from, and where we are headed on this journey. From a heart that refused to be consoled, that accused God for neglecting her (1 Sam 1:10-11), to the powerful prayer of thanksgiving and praise, how Hannah had grown from faith to faith, strength to strength, and glory to glory!

She displayed a deeper understanding of the character and nature of God as she found Grace through her own flesh and blood experiences and discovered God in moments, whether for better or for worse she was being most honest, most human, and most herself.