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 servants'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." As she kept on praying to the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was praying in her heart, and her lips were moving but her voice was not heard. Eli thought she was drunk and said to her, "How long will you keep on getting drunk? Get rid of your wine." "Not so, my Lord," Hannah replied. "I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer; I was pouring out my soul to the Lord. Do not take your servant for a wicked woman; I have been praying here out of my great anguish and grief." Eli answered, "Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of Him." She said, "May your servant find favour in your eyes." Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast. Early the next morning they arose and worshiped before the Lord and then went back to their home at Ramah. Elkanah lay with Hannah his wife, and the Lord remembered her. 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." (1 Samuel 1:9-20)
This passage is not really about Hannah praying for a son! That was one of the first things that occurred to me when I started to take a close look at this passage. I had it in my mind that this was the point of the passage, and I originally chose this passage for Mother's Day, because – well – Hannah prayed to be a mother and I thought there would be all sorts of heartwarming content and reflections about motherhood in the passage. And then I read it again – and believe me, I wasn't reading it for the first time. I thought I was pretty familiar with this passage. I've read it a lot. We chose this name (“Hannah”) for our daughter – connecting us forever with this woman, because she's the only Hannah in the Bible. As long ago as November 13, 1994 I preached on this passage at the United Churches in South Brook, Hampden and Sop's Arm, Newfoundland. I re-read that sermon a few days ago and, sure enough, although the subject matter was about something else, the sermon seems to presume that the passage is all about Hannah being desperate to have a child. And this past week I discovered that I was wrong. Hannah's prayer in this passage wasn't really for a son. Yes, she asked God to “not forget Your servant but give her a son,” but that isn't really what she's praying for. That's the surface issue. That's the presenting condition, you might say. But to get to the real issue, you have to start to peel back some layers in Hannah's life and when you do that you discover that there's more going on here than simply a woman who wants to have a child. So the first lesson I learned this past week is that even after more than 2000 years and even when you think you've read and studied and preached on a passage long enough to now what it's about, Scripture can still surprise you when you take the time to really work with it! This is a living word that's always at work revealing fresh insights for modern people, not a dead word that just records the events and reflections of the ancients. So, if, in spite of her words, Hannah's not really praying for a son, then what is Hannah praying for and what does her prayer teach us? I've often felt that you learn a lot about people by hearing them pray. You learn their hopes and their dreams; you learn their fears and their disappointments. When we stand before God we can't hide. Things come out. Our souls are bared.
To peel back the layers of Hannah's life and get to the root cause of her anguish and then take a fresh look at her prayer we need to know a little more about this woman named Hannah and what her life was like. Hannah was one of two wives of a man named Elkanah. The other wife was Penninah. Penninah had children and Hannah didn't, but interestingly enough the story seems to suggest that it was Penninah who was jealous of Hannah. You see, Penninah may have had the children, but Hannah was the one who really held Elkanah's heart; she was the one he loved more. And because Penninah was jealous, she held the one thing over Hannah that she had - Penninah was cruel to Hannah because (in a society in which having children was seen as the ultimate sign of God's blessing) she had children and Hannah didn't, and so she spent her time rubbing Hannah's nose in that fact, so to speak. The way the story is written (and you have to read the verses right before what we read this morning to see this) I don't get the sense that Hannah was jealous of Penninah. She was simply tormented by her rival. The constant putdowns (in spite of Elkanah's efforts to make Hannah aware of how much he loved her) caused her to question her own worth and her own value. Her life started to seem meaningless. More than that, her life beame a torture because of the hell Penninah was putting her through. It's similar to a child being bullied. No matter how much your parents tell you that they love you, the constant putdowns hurt and eventually they kill the spirit. Finally, in her pain, Hannah turns to God. Here's where the learning begins for those of us who read the story many centuries after the fact.
When in trouble or distress, turn to God. In fact when we're really in trouble and really in distress, where else is it that we can turn but to God if we want to have real hope of moving on. I think here of Jesus, who many years later said to His disciples, “Come to Me all you who are tired and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest.” It's only God – revealed to us by Jesus – who can take the loads or lighten our burdens or at least strengthen us enough that we'll be able to carry them ourselves. No one else can do that. Nothing else can do that. Only God. Hannah seemed to understand that. She was tormented and in grief, but rather than turning away from God, as so many are tempted to do in dark times she turned toward God. She didn't give up on God. She had faith – she turned to God in spite of the temptation to believe that God had let her down and didn't care.
Faith she may have had, but the story suggests that this was no pious prayer. “In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much and prayed to the Lord.” She prayed from deep within her soul. Strangely enough and wonderfully enough, the passage once again surprised me. I may be quite familiar with this passage but for the first time as I read it I was reminded of the story of Pentecost. The Book of Acts tells us that on Pentecost the people thought the disciples of Jesus were drunk because they were speaking in tongues, and in this passage Eli the priest thinks that Hannah is drunk because he can't understand what she's saying. I wonder: when we come to God “in bitterness of soul” or in great anguish or – at the opposite extreme – in heights of joy and immeasurable bliss (when our prayers are passionate and from the heart rather than mere dutiful words directed heavenward) - is there something so wonderful about being "in the spirit" in that way (being so totally focused on prayer and on one's relationship with God) that others simply can't understand it or make sense of it and so they immediately dismiss it as unreal? But what we see here is that Hannah's words weren't important - in fact, the text suggests that she may not even have been speaking. So prayer is not about pious outward religious observance; prayer is about quietly but passionately opening ourselves to God and letting God fill us. And she wasn't embarrassed to be praying this way and she wasn't going to apologize for it. “Eli thought she was drunk and said to her, 'How long will you keep on getting drunk? Get rid of your wine.' 'Not so, my Lord,' Hannah replied. 'I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer; I was pouring out my soul to the Lord. Do not take your servant for a wicked woman; I have been praying here out of my great anguish and grief.'” She defended herself, just as the apostles in Acts insisted to the poeple “we are not drunk as you suppose.” She was talking to God – and no one and nothing was going to get in the way!
And the result was that her burden was lifted from her. “Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast. Early the next morning they arose and worshiped before the Lord ...” She was no longer downcast and no longer feeling tormented. - she could stand before God no longer in anguish, but to worship; to offer praise and thanksgiving. Her prayers were no longer mere petitions; they had become expressions of joy and gratitude – not because her prayer had been answered (because Samuel hadn't been born yet) but because her burden had been lifted. God saw the problem far more clearly than she did – and far more clearly than I have for many years. Hannah's problem wasn't that she didn't have a son; Hannah's problem was that she had been put down so much because she didn't have a son that she felt worthless. Hannah needed that burden lifted from her. That's the answer to her prayer. Yes, she eventually had a son, but that came later. What mattered was that she realized that in all her torment God was still with her and had always been with her. It was several hundred years before Jesus would be born, but Hannah would have understood His words - “Come to Me all you who are tired and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest,” because she had experienced their power. She came to God tired and heavy burdened and she went away rested and refreshed.
All this happened before Hannah even had a son! Her prayers were answered - but not in the way she expected, because neither she nor we saw through to the real issue – at least not right away. Hannah didn't need a son. The birth of Samuel is almost secondary to the story (it's important only because of who Samuel became.) Samuel was a blessing. Let's not mistake that. Not everyone is called to parenthood, but for all those who are called to parenthood, a child is a blessing. We know that. But what Hannah needed wasn't a child, she needed peace in her troubled soul. The real meat of the story is that prayer allowed her to give up her burden and it strengthened her to go back to her home to deal once again with Penninah. She had no promise of a son; she had simply - through prayer - experienced the empowering presence of God - enough to see her through. Everything else was a bonus! Sometimes we find ourselves like Hannah – troubled and burdened and in torment. Hopefully, when those times come, we'll follow Hannah's example and we won't turn away from God; instead, we'll turn toward God in prayer. Hopefully, from time to time, our prayers will burst forth in praise and thanksgiving and gratitude. Hopefully, ultimately, our times of prayer will leave us grateful for what we have rather than grasping for what we're lacking. Hopefully.
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