Class Outline:

Sunday March 27, 2022

Hannah had an antagonist who tried over and over to shame her and belittle her, and for a while it worked (1Sa 1).

 

Hannah’s antagonist was her husband’s other wife Peninnah who had children while Hannah did not.

 

1SA 1:6-7

Her rival, however, would provoke her bitterly to irritate her, because the Lord had closed her womb. 7 And it happened year after year, as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she would provoke her, so she wept and would not eat.

 

EPH 6:10-11

Finally, be strong in the Lord, and in the strength of His might. 11 Put on the full armor of God, that you may be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.

 

After her husband Elkanah tried to comfort her, it seems that Hannah had reached a breaking point and she decided on prayer. She went and fell before the door of the Tabernacle and prayed while she wept bitterly, that the Lord would remember her, and if the Lord would give her a son, thus removing her reproach, she would give the son to the Lord as a priest. She depended completely on the Lord, and she fulfilled her word. God subsequently would give Hannah three more sons and two daughters.

 

When the boy Samuel was weaned she brought the toddler to the Tabernacle and placed him, for the rest of his life, under the care of Eli the high priest. When she did, she prayed the marvelous prayer of 1SA 2:1-10. I just want to take a few excerpts from it as it applies to our current subject of being strong in the Lord, putting on the full armor of God in order that we may be able stand firm against the schemes of the devil.

 

ROM 5:1-2

Therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand.

 

1SA 2:1

Then Hannah prayed and said,

 

“My heart exults in the Lord;

My horn is exalted in the Lord,

My mouth speaks boldly against my enemies,

Because I rejoice in Thy salvation.”

 

“horn” represents strength.

 

Hannah applied standing in the grace of God. “My mouth speaks boldly against my enemies, Because I rejoice in Your salvation.” Salvation is not earned. It is a gift to those who will receive it by faith. When our own antagonists seek to provoke us, we stand in the beautiful foundation that is composed of all of God’s grace gifts. In our hearts we say about our foes, “You seek to make me bitter and feel shame, but I have the gift of eternal life; I sit with the Creator of the universe at the right hand of God and He is my husband and my Lord. I will not be shaken and I will not stop rejoicing while feeling the contentment that His presence brings to me.” The schemes of the devil almost always involve deceived people whom he is using, and it is so easy for us to get frustrated and anxious or bitter and angry at the people and completely lose our focus on what the real issue is, which is bigger than them or you. This is why Paul tells us that our conflict is not with people. We have to get control of our emotions that want to focus on the persons we can see or hear or read, and remember that all humanity is under God’s righteous judgment, so we can leave them to Him as we lovingly and courageously appeal to them with the gospel, knowing that our true struggle is with the unseen forces of the devil.

 

All of humanity is under God’s righteous judgment. We can leave them to Him as we witness of Him to them.

 

ISA 2:4

And He will judge between the nations, And will render decisions for many peoples;

 

1SA 2:4

“The bows of the mighty are shattered,

But the feeble gird on strength.”

 

Hannah references a belt of strength.

 

ISA 11:5

Also righteousness will be the belt about His loins,

And faithfulness the belt about His waist.

 

Isa 11 is about the Branch from the root of Jesse (father of David) - Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

 

The verb “gird on” is the same one God uses when He first responds to Job’s accusations by saying “Gird up your loins like a man, and I will ask you, and You instruct Me.”

 

1SA 2:8

“He raises the poor from the dust,

He lifts the needy from the ash heap

To make them sit with nobles,

And inherit a seat of honor;

For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's,

And He set the world on them.”

 

Talk about standing firm - the very pillars that the Lord set the earth upon (the earth’s stable rotation and orbit around the sun that you can literally set your watch by) are His.

 

Not always, but often the godly are not the wealthy. In the devil’s world it is common for those who follow his rules are rewarded with the world’s riches and power and influence. Not always, but often. And they are often unthinking and unwise in the true ways of life because they have sold out themselves for material things that are not alive. Not always, but often. These often persecute the ones who have given themselves to the Lord, for the godly do not sell out to the world and that convicts and insults and sometimes enrages the elite. Again, not always, but often. Hence, we find so often in the Scriptures that God contends for the poor, not all the poor (that would make God more of an economist), but for those who are His. Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God.” Those ones know that they are poor in the world but exceedingly abundantly rich towards God.

 

In this light Hannah continues …

 

1SA 2:9-10

“He keeps the feet of His godly ones,

But the wicked ones are silenced in darkness;

For not by might shall a man prevail.

10 Those who contend with the Lord will be shattered;

Against them He will thunder in the heavens,

The Lord will judge the ends of the earth;

And He will give strength to His king,

And will exalt the horn [symbol of strength] of His anointed.”

 

Every believer in the church-age is anointed by the Lord.

 

1JO 2:20, 27

But you have an anointing from the Holy One … the anointing which you received from Him abides in you

 

In contrast, and God loves to give us contrast, to Hannah and her son Samuel is Eli’s sons Hophi and Phinehas who do not know the Lord or the customs of the priesthood even though they were, by birth, priests. They despised the offering. In Hannah’s prayer in 2:9 they are of the wicked ones who are silenced in darkness. They both die in the battle of Ebenezer, not as warriors, but as priests with the ark of the covenant and the ark was taken by the Philistines. But to show that God is not defeated, or that He stands while His enemies cannot stand before Him, when the Philistines place the ark in the temple of Dagon, the image of Dagon falls to the ground, and when the attending priests of Dagon put the image back up, it falls over again, this time with its head and feet severed, which is then followed immediately by a terrible plague upon the people of that city.

 

Hannah’s faith in her understanding of God gives her the ability to rise above the petty schemes of the devil and the petty people he uses.

 

If we don’t believe that there is a righteous and gracious God, our Creator, who will fight for us, contend for us, and ultimately save us to eternal life through His Son Jesus Christ by His death on the cross for us, then we are on our own and have to survive alone. If anything is obvious for anyone who has eyes to see, is that there is a Creator of this world and He is good, and He has not left His creation alone. It should also be obvious that the Creator has given each of us a choice.