Loving God, you continue to bless your servants in every generation.  Inspire us today by your servants Hannah and Mary, and strengthen us in our faith by the power of your Spirit; through Jesus Christ our Saviour.  Amen.

    From last week, in the middle of the wilderness with the golden calf, we have moved forward in history by quite a few years in order to get to 1 Samuel.  The story takes place after the people of Israel have already entered the promised land and have lived quite a few years under the guidance of the judges.  The story we have heard today tells of the birth of Samuel, who becomes a great prophet in Israel and ends up anointing the first kings of Israel.

    However, the story itself focuses on Hannah, and what we heard today is only part of the story.  The thing is that Elkanah, Hannah’s husband, has more than one wife.  We are told that Elkanah loves Hannah more than his other wife, but his wife Peninnah is the one who has been able to have children.  Because of this, Peninnah provokes Hannah, and irritates her, and never lets her forget that she has children, but Hannah is barren.  (Does any of this story sound familiar?)

    There are similar stories throughout the Old Testament, but in this case, Hannah goes into the temple and prays and weeps in the presence of God, and promises that if God grants her a male child, he will be set apart in service to God all his days.  However, as she prays in the temple, the priest Eli sees her and for some reason assumes that she is drunk.  Talk about adding insult to injury when you are pouring out your heart to God!  However, once Hannah has explained that this is what she is doing, Eli changes his attitude.  He adds his prayer to hers, asking that God would grant her petition, and tells her to go in peace.

    The birth of a child follows, and his name, Samuel, is very similar to the Hebrew word meaning “he who is from God.”  Meanwhile, Elkanah seems to agree with his wife’s promise to set their child apart for life in God’s service.  As soon as Samuel is weaned, which may have been around age 4 or 5, Hannah takes him back to the temple at Shiloh and leaves him with Eli the priest.  Chapter 1 ends with, “she left him there for the Lord” (1 Sam. 1:28).  After that day, Hannah goes to visit him once a year.

    Can you even imagine leaving your only child at the temple like that?... This is truly putting “your whole self in” when it comes to serving God!  And the prayer that follows - which is one of the parts that we did hear today - is not a prayer that laments how she has lost her son, but a prayer that praises God.  If you had trouble imagining yourself leaving your child at the temple, imagine leaving your child there and then saying a prayer (or singing a song) that begins, “My heart exults in the Lord; my strength is exalted in my God” (1 Sam. 2:1).  Hannah is, indeed, a woman of great faith!

    She is able to say these things, it would seem, because Hannah is fully aware of what God has done for her.  It is not just the birth of a child that she is thankful for - although this is a gift in itself!  No, even more than that, the birth of a son has given Hannah financial security, as well as a more solid relationship with her husband.  It has also taken away the disgrace that she would have felt at that time and in that culture.

    The thing is that women were taught that they really didn’t matter unless they had children.  It was only having sons that gave them any financial security into the future, and many a husband was known to lose interest in a wife who was not bearing him any children.  Women who remained childless were viewed as if there was something wrong with them, and other women who did have children tended to look down on them.

    And so, when Hannah goes to the temple and pours out her soul before God, asking for a son, what she really wants is to matter.  Even though her husband Elkanah still loved her, the entire surrounding culture was telling Hannah that without children, she was nothing.

    It strikes me that in many cultures around the world, things really haven’t changed much.  In Cameroon, everybody you meet introduces themselves by telling you how many children they have, and whenever somebody has lots of children, everybody makes a big fuss.  The same is true when groups of women gather, and it is almost like a competition to see who in the group has the most children.  Women there, too, have been taught to value themselves based on how many children they have.

    I have to wonder, though, how many other things we come up with to judge whether people matter or not.  Do men matter when they happen to be looking for work?  Do people with mental illness matter?  Do black lives matter, or aboriginal lives?  Do single people matter?  Do people in personal care homes matter?  Do people who live on social assistance matter?  There are all kinds of things that we tell ourselves and other people about who is deemed to be acceptable and who is not.

    The thing is, though, that to God, every single person matters.  Every single person is loved by God, created by God, and redeemed through Jesus Christ.  In fact, our value comes from God, for every single one of us is told that we are worth the death of God’s Son.

    In Hannah’s case, it turns out that she mattered, as well.  In the end, Hannah mattered to God, and to Eli the priest, and to Elkanah, and to Samuel, and to the story of the Hebrew people.  And in her prayer, it is clear that Hannah was aware of others who mattered as well.  The poor are raised up and the barren has borne seven.  The feeble are strengthened and those who hungered have been filled.  At the same time, God brings low the proud and the arrogant and breaks the weapons of the mighty.  The rich become poor, and those who were full experience hunger.

    The thing is that no matter what your situation is, our God has the power to reverse it.  And in Jesus, what seemed like foolishness and weakness was actually victory over sin and death.  Thanks be to God, who blesses faithful servants like Hannah, and who has redeemed us through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Pentecost 22 (NL 3)                    1 Samuel 1:9-11, 19-20; 2:1-10
October 16, 2016
St. Luke’s Zion Lutheran Church
Pastor Lynne Hutchison

© 2016 Lynne Hutchison  All Rights Reserved