Title: Hannah's Prayer/1 Samuel 1:1-18
Contents <1 Samuel 1:1-18> "Hannah's prayer"
As Augustine said, 'The prayers of tears do not perish,' this is a testament to the fact that many Christians use this saying closer to the truth than the Bible. That is why they are all fervent in prayer. Also, the Korean church pulpit emphasizes the need to pray without ceasing, saying, 'Prayer is the breath of the soul'. Just as the body dies when breathing stops, so it is the logic that the soul dies when the soul stops breathing. He also emphasizes the importance of prayer, saying, 'A hymn is a prayer with a melody'. At the same time, it is common to drive people to think that if they pray while citing the person of prayer in the Bible, they will receive answers like this. Among them, the representative figure is Hannah in today's text.
Is that what Hannah's prayer is trying to show? It is an issue that cannot but be considered. One thing to always keep in mind when dealing with the Bible is that if there is a person God has chosen, there must be an enemy. There are many times when we pass by the enemy shown in the Bible, and there are many times when we conclude that even if we found the enemy, we would not be on his side. But the Bible reveals that I am that enemy.
God promised Abraham, "I will bless you greatly, and I will make your offspring great, and I will make you like the stars in the sky and like the sand on the seashore, and your offspring will inherit the gates of their enemies" (Genesis 22:17, 24:60). Therefore, Abraham's seed and his adversary (enemies) are appearing. The adversary here can be said to refer to the relationship between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent in Genesis 3:15. This means the future war between Jesus Christ and the devil, and the struggle will continue in this structure until Christ, the descendant of the woman, comes.
In today's text, the relationship between Hannah and Peninnah is expressed as 'enemies', including Eli the priest, Hophni and Phinehas as well as Elkanah and all of Israel. Elkanah had two wives; Hannah had no children and Peninnah had children. Given the circumstances at the time, it was a time when childlessness was considered a curse. Therefore, Hannah had been subjected to such humiliation and contempt from Peninnah. So he said that he stirred up Hannah and made her troubled. Hannah's face was always full of sorrow and she had to spend time with tears. Elkanah, her poor husband, tries to comfort Hannah by giving her a portion of wealth twice as much as Peninnah and all her children, and asks if I am better than ten sons to you.
Then why couldn't even this comfort from her husband be a real comfort for Hannah? What was the reason that neither wealth nor the love of her husband could comfort him?
Eventually, he went to God and complained of his suffering, and his prayers were answered according to his wishes. With this, let's imitate Hannah's prayer in the Korean church! Or, like Hannah, we cry out that if we persist, we can receive answers. It is said that the reason Hannah's prayer was answered was that, first, she prayed with tears while weeping. Second, it is said that he made a vow and prayed that he would dedicate himself to the Lord if he would give him a son, and he put it into practice. Third, it is said that they received answers because they prayed for a long time. Therefore, like Hannah, we are convincing the church members that we can receive answers if we persist until we receive answers to our prayers through tears. Does the Bible really record Hannah's prayer in this dimension? Let's talk in ten thousand.
The central content of today's text is 'Let's pray like Hannah!' Therefore, it is not a matter of how we pray like this, but what Hannah actually prayed for is the key. Hannah's prayer was not to save a son as a way to avoid being ignored as a woman because she had no son. What's more, it wasn't like Jacob's wives who sought their son to monopolize their husband's love. Even though she had no children, she was loved by her husband more than Peninnah. It wasn't to get rid of the stigma of being a woman who couldn't give birth to a son, and it wasn't that she saved a son for retirement. It also had nothing to do with passing the family line. Rather, it can be said that Hannah had many sons at the time, but she prayed that she gave up her son in order not to have such a son.
Then, why did Hannah so ask God with tears for a son? Why did Hannah suffer so much?
To understand it, you would have to know the situation in Israel at the time. The circumstances of Israel at the time of Samuel's birth were set at the end of the period of the Judges. ?쏧n those days there was no king in Israel, so every man did what was right in his own eyes??(Judges 21:25). . In other words, because it was a time of ignoring God's Word, he had no compassion for the pain of others. Truly, it was a situation of the times when even the priests, who were supposed to proclaim the word of God correctly and point out the sins of the people, ignored the word more than anyone else.
Therefore, the son of prayer that Hannah actually sought was not a son to restore her self-esteem, but a son who was truly pleasing to God. He had saved such a son. It was never that Hannah had saved her son to satisfy her own greed. From Hannah's point of view, Israel at that time could not find anyone who could convey God's will even if they looked all over the east, west, north and south. Therefore, the son Hannah saved was looking for a son who was only interested in the word of God, that is, a Nazarite.
"Nazarite" means a person who is devoted to God. Gendered person. Therefore, he is a child who has nothing to do with family happiness, whether his parents benefit from this son, restore his self-esteem, or restore his honor. The child being born is a child far from being happy with himself. He was a son who had to give up his glory for God's glory because he was completely dedicated to God. In this way, the son Hannah saved did not suffer because he did not have a son, as people thought. The husband knew only that his wife was suffering because he did not have a son, but he never suffered because he did not have a son. They were suffering because there was no one in Israel who could properly convey the word of God even after washing their eyes, and they were suffering because there was no word of God.
Therefore, this child who will be born now is a child who will live for the Word of God regardless of his or her happiness. Even if he cannot eat, he is a child who will live by the word of God. He is a son who will stand on God's side even if he is shed blood, rejected, and hated because of this word. So, it is the child who will serve as his food to preach God's will. Truly, regardless of his own destiny, he is a child who will stand on God's side and suffer with God. Because he lives by the Word, he is a child who will be cast away and killed while proudly accusing himself of the sins of the world according to the Word. Isn't this kind of Son Jesus Christ, who is to come? This was the son Hannah saved. In other words, he became a son who became a shadow that showed Jesus Christ.
When Jesus went into the city of Sue and was talking with a Samaritan woman, the disciples asked Jesus to eat, Jesus said that I had food that you did not know. Who then brought the disciples to eat? And there is something you said when you were puzzled. ?쏪esus said, ?쏮y food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to complete his work??(John 4:34).
It seems that the prayers of humans today are trying to avoid believing in God, no matter what. The Lord says that if you want to follow me, you must deny yourself and take up your cross and follow. Even as we pray like this, brazenly, we cry out to pray like Hannah. Wouldn't it be amazing if Hannah heard it?
The son Hannah saved was not saving a child who would take care of my happiness and pride, but a son who was truly like Jesus, a son who would live the same fate as Jesus. A son like this has nothing to look forward to in the world and is a poor son. He is a son who will die young without ever opening a prayer. Therefore, Samuel, who will be born in this way, is the son who will suffer for the rest of his life along with the Word on God's side, and then he will have a mission to judge Eli, and will judge those who pursue only their own happiness like Eli. Who would dare to save such a son? Even if you look at the prayers of the prophets of the Old Testament, they are always praying for the judgment of Israel. 'Who will come and overthrow the temple of Israel?' That is what you are looking for. May our prayers today also destroy all human beings like Eli! In other words, isn't a person like Eli not like anyone else but myself? Let this man die quickly! You will have to ask for it every day.