Hanna's Need

THE IMPORTANCE OF PRAYER in Christian life can never be overestimated. Jesus instructed His followers to pray incessantly. All the faith giants of the Bible were also prayer warriors. There are about 800 of their prayers recorded in the Bible! This includes Abraham’s intercession for Sodom and Gomorrah, Solomon’s magnificent prayer offered at the dedication of the Temple, Jehoshaphat’s model prayer, the canticles of Hanna, Mary and Zachariah, the Psalm of Jonah offered from the fish’s belly, Nehemiah’s numerous prayers recorded in the book that bears his name, and the mother of all prayers offered by Jesus in John 17.  The list is long.

The prayer of a righteous man has great power to prevail (James 5:16). All good prayers originate in God and return to Him. Prayer is not only communication but also communion with God. When we pray we declare our total dependence on God and admit to the poverty of our spirit. Prayer strengthens our faith and lets us fellowship with God. It promotes sanctification and when we pray in sincerity we share in the Lord’s glory. God’s will for us, for church and for society is fulfilled through prayers.

Prayer gives us hope and peace; strengthens us during times of trials and temptation; it brings victory in our spiritual life. Prayer produces humility in us.  Through prayers we have our needs met as long we pray in His will. When we take our needs to God in prayer He listens. But he is not some celestial push over whom we can manipulate and have our things done. That is why Jesus said “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need” (Matthew 6:33). The Bible is replete with stories of people who had their prayers miraculously answered. Prayer is not just an activity but an attitude.

Jeremiah 33:3 Ask me and I will tell you remarkable secrets you do not know about things to come.

Psalms 50:15 then call on me when you are in trouble and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory.

James 1:6-8  But he must ask in faith without any doubting…For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

Hannah’s Need: This lady had an urgent need. She desperately wanted to conceive and give birth to a son. Her barrenness gave her rival—her husband Elkana’s other wife—enough reasons to scoff at Hanna, to look down on her. The Israelites believed that a childless woman was accursed; God was punishing her for some secret sin (1Samuel 1:11). But the righteous Hannah made a vow that if God just looked at her misery and gave her a son, the boy would be dedicated to God’s service for all the days of his life. Elkanah appears to be a kind man, but his polygamous marriage was anything, but peaceful. He loved Hanna very much, but Peninah hated her.

Hanna was a woman of great faith and didn’t lose hope in God. It was one of the family’s worship and sacrifice at Shiloh and Hanna had lost herself in deep prayer. Her prayer was long when she poured out her heart to the Almighty-- pleading, begging and supplicating Him with her request. Her prayer was to a large part wordless, but we know that she vowed to God that “LORD of the Heavenly Armies,  if you just look at the misery of your maidservant, remember me, and don't forget your maidservant and give your maidservant a son, then I'll give him to the LORD for all the days of his life, and a razor is never to touch his head“ (1Sa 1:11).

Tears streaked down her pretty face and only her lips had been moving, and Eli, the high priest who was observing her throughout thought enough was enough. He intervened and asked her if she was drunk! He was a very old man and in his long service at the temple, he had not seen anyone praying this earnestly. When he realized his mistake, he blessed her and assured her that God will grant her heart’s desire. With mounting hope she returned, ate and drank and was sad no more.

We meet many prayer warriors whose prayer God answered for His glory. When Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah was attacked on all sides, he realized he had no chance of winning at all. He ordered a nation-wide prayer, humbled him, declared his helplessness and confessed his total dependence on God. The king’s enemies were crushed before a single arrow could be shot. Joshua was able to switch off the motor of the earth for a time, as his soldiers advanced and heaped conquest over conquest. Gideon went against the marauding Midianites with only a 300-man army and decimated the enemy in the name of God.   God doesn’t have to answer your prayers, but He does that out of his mercy and through Jesus Christ. He did answer Hanna’s prayer, she gave birth to Samuel and true to her commitment she gave up her toddler son up to His service. The boy grew up in the temple to become the greatest prophet/judge/administrator and king-maker in history.

In prophecy and in the kingdom, Samuel first gave Israel education, and then a constitutional monarchy. Samuel was the first founder of schools, and as the great and primary object of his life had been the internal reformation of the Jewish people, and redeeming his countrymen from ignorance. In those long years which he spent in perpetual wanderings up and down the land, he must have constantly found that a chief obstacle to his work was the low mental state of the people. This, to the best of His ability and through God’s constant presence by his side, Samuel improved to a large extent.

It would have broken Hannah’s heart to be separated from her just-weaned son, but she knew a wow was a wow. She had no other option. We have heard of people making rash promises they could not keep. Jephtha’s distressing predicament is a case in point. When Jesus prayed at Gethsemane He prayed in God’s perfect will. The psalmist prayed “The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit. You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God” (Psalms 51:17). Hanna praised God and thanked Him after giving birth to her son. Her canticle found in 1Samuel 2:1-11 has few equals in the Bible.

Obstructions to prayers are not uncommon. As the High Priest, it was Eli’s job to bring people to God. In Hannah’s case, he jumped to the wrong conclusion. When the mothers wanted to bring their children to be blessed by Jesus, His disciples tried to stop them.  These are the men who joined Jesus’ ministry in order to become ‘fishers’ of men! When the blind men outside Jericho called out to Jesus, the bystanders tried to obstruct their way. 

Samuel anointed David as the future king of Israel after God had rejected Saul. He went on to become the greatest king in Israel’s history and Yahweh referred to him as ‘a man after my own heart’.  The Saviour of the world was born in his lineage. All this started with the tear-soaked prayer of one woman, who refused to give up.

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