PRAYER CHANGES PEOPLE (1 SAMUEL 1:1-22)
Kurt Cobain, the founder and leader of the grunge band Nirvana, was the most acclaimed and creative singer of his generation, according to Time Magazine. His parents divorced when he was eight, and two of his father’s uncles had committed suicide. Marriage and the birth of a daughter were supposed to bring calm, stability and perspective to the brooding singer, but three years after the band had achieved fame and at the height of his popularity, Cobain put a shotgun to his own head at the young age of 27 in 1994.
In a suicide note left behind to his family and for his fans, Cobain revealed: “I haven’t felt the excitement for so many years. I feel guilty beyond words about these things...When we are backstage and the lights go out and the manic roar of the crowd begins, it doesn’t affect me...The fact is I can’t fool you, any of you. It simply isn’t fair to you or to me...The worst crime I can think of would be to (trick) people by faking it and pretending as if I were having 100% fun. (I don’t have the passion anymore. so remember,) It’s better to burn out than to fade away. (LAT 4/12/94).
A 2003 study suggested that 13 percent of the American work force loses productivity from headaches, back pain, arthritis and other common painful conditions, and as many as 50 million or so pain patients in the nation suffers pain (“Making pain control an issue of mind over matter,” The Dallas Morning News, September 19, 2006).
Pain can be physical, emotional or mental. Chronic emotional and mental suffering is more dangerous than migraine headaches, lower back pain or rheumatoid arthritis. Times magazine (Fall 1997) describes how pain travels technically in the body: “A pain signal is set off by the stimulation of nerve endings. The signal goes to the spinal cord, where it passes instantaneously to a motor nerve (1) connected to a muscle in the leg. This causes a reflex action that does not include the brain. But the signal also goes up the spinal cord to the thalamus, (2) where pain is received.”
The story of Samuel, the last judge of Israel, begins with the heartbreak suffered by his mother, Hannah. Hannah’s suffering was likened to that of Job, Hagar, and Israel in Egypt. Childlessness reduced her to tears. She felt that she was nothing like others, she had less than others and despised by others. Years and years (v 7) of the same disparaging remarks, brutal treatment and mind games from her rival made her tearful, miserable and despondent.
What can one do in such an uneven fight, with such an obnoxious person or in such an inescapable situation? What resources do we have to overcome the feelings of hurt, despair and rejection?
Master the Art of Looking Away
6 And because the LORD had closed her womb, her rival kept provoking her in order to irritate her. 7 This went on year after year. Whenever Hannah went up to the house of the LORD, her rival provoked her till she wept and would not eat. 8 Elkanah her husband would say to her, “Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don’t you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don’t I mean more to you than ten sons?” (1 Sam 1:6-8)
A Jewish story in A Treasury of Jewish Folklore tells of how tears were given to us, and why they are valuable to us:
“After Adam and Eve had been banished from the Garden of Eden, God saw that they were penitent and took their fall very much to the heart. And as He is a compassionate Father He said to them gently: “I know that you will meet with a lot of tribulation in the world and that it will embitter your lives. For that reason I gave to you of my heavenly treasure this priceless pearl. Look! (They saw a droplet of water). It is a tear! And when grief overtakes you and your heart aches so that you are not able to endure it, and great anguish grips your soul, then there will fall from your eyes this tiny tear. Your burden will grow lighter then.”
Here are some quotations about crying:
“Heavy hearts, like heavy clouds in the sky, are best relieved by the letting of a little water.” (Antoine Rivarol)
“To weep is to make less the depth of grief.” (William Shakespeare, King Henry the Sixth)
“Grief is satisfied and carried off by tears.” (Ovid)
“Tears are the safety valve of the heart when too much pressure is laid on it.” (Albert Smith)
“Tears are Summer showers to the soul.” (Alfred Austin, Savonarola)
“What soap is for the body, tears are for the soul.” (Jewish Proverb)
http://www.quotegarden.com/crying.html
Unfortunately, Hannah did not master the art of looking away, looking elsewhere or at something else. Looking away is not escaping, avoiding, or fleeing your critics, but shutting down, brushing aside and taking lightly opinions that are unfair, undeserving or uninvited. Too often, problems add up, pile on and get worse when we care too much or give too much weight to what people say, do, or think.
The introduction to 1 Samuel is the most heart-wrenching and tear-jerking passage in the Bible. Nine gut-wrenching Hebrew words were chosen to describe in painstaking detail Hannah’s suffering. The Hebrew word “weep” occur three times (vv 7, 8, 10), the words “provoke” (vv 6, 7) and “grief” (vv 6, 16) twice, and the words “irritate” (v 6), “downhearted” (v 8), “bitterness of soul” (v 10), “misery” (v 11), “deeply troubled” (v 15) and “anguish” (v 16) all occur once.
Hannah cried and cried, cried her eyes out, cried like the world had ended, like someone had died and like she was abandoned. She withdrew and isolated herself, shut the world out and closed herself in, grieved and pained herself to a new high and a personal low. The childless mother was inconsolable. Her husband could not comfort her and she did not answer him anyway. Tears were her breakfast, lunch and dinner. Poor Hannah, she allowed Peninnah to get on her case, to get under her skin and to get into her head.
The word “irritate” (v 6) appears for the first time in the Bible. All the other 12 occurrences of this Hebrew word are associated the thunder of God’s voice (1 Sam 2:10, 7:10, 2 Sam 22:14, Job 37:4, 5, 40:9, Ps 18:13, Ps 29:3) or the roar of the seas (1 Chron 16:32, Ps 96:11, Ps 98:7. Ezek 27:35). Of course, mortal grumbling, nagging and harassing cannot compare with God’s thunderous voice or nature’s mighty roar, but Penninah’s strategy worked. Hannah did not just winced in pain; she burst out, blew up and broke down in pain.
The Hebrew word “weep” (vv 7, 8, 10) was usually preceded by the raising of one’s voice. Hagar raised her voice and wept in the desert when water ran out for little Ishmael (Gen 21:16). Esau lifted up his voice, and wept after Abraham had given his blessing to Jacob (Gen 27:38). The fleeing Jacob lifted up his voice, and wept when he met Rachel (Gen 29:11).
Timid Hannah was not the type to talk back, to exact payback, or to bother others. She sucked in all the dirt, poison, and barbs. Once, I noticed the license plate holder of a slow old driver was inscribed these words: “DON’T LIKE MY DRIVING? YOU SHOULD SEE ME PUTT!”
It’s been said, “No one can govern us without our permission.” People can only do as much as we allow them to or yield to. Dallas Willard said, “You may even be able to destroy the soul of another, but you will never unlock it against their will.” Andy Rooney said, “I’ve learned that I can’t choose how I feel, but I can choose what I do about it.”
Hannah’s “bitterness of soul” (v 10) placed her in elite company though she really did not belong there. This select phrase was selected by Job for his afflictions (Job 7:11, 10:1) and Hezekiah who was sick to the point of death (Isa 38:15, 17), but Hannah’s suffering was merely mental and lightweight in comparison to Job and Hezekiah’s physical torment.
A lifetime of misery is guaranteed for people who look at nothing but themselves, their pain and their unhappiness. Look at something else, think of something else and attend to something else.
Master the Art of Looking Above
9 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. 10 In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much and prayed to the LORD. 11 And she made a vow, saying, “O LORD Almighty if you will only look upon your servant’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.” 12 As she kept on praying to the LORD, Eli observed her mouth. 13 Hannah was praying in her heart, and her lips were moving but her voice was not heard. Eli thought she was drunk 14 and said to her, “How long will you keep on getting drunk? Get rid of your wine.” 15 “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. 16 Do not take your servant for a wicked woman; I have been praying here out of my great anguish and grief.” (1 Sam. 1:9-16)
Anne McCaffrey, an instructor at the Harvard Medical School, through a national telephone survey of 2,055 people, solicited information on how and how many people use prayer to help them feel better. The survey found that about 35 percent of people in the United States asked a higher power for help with their health. Of these 719 people, 75 percent prayed to stay healthy and 22 percent prayed for relief of everything from back pain to cancer, headaches to heart problems. The majority of these people (69 percent) found that doing so was very helpful on a scale of “very helpful” through “somewhat helpful” to “not helpful.”
What is more, some of them gave higher ratings to prayers than to their doctors. Of those who had cancer, 81 percent rated prayer as very helpful while only 78 percent gave the same high mark to their physicians. For those with severe depression, the score was prayer, 68 percent; doctors, 48 percent.
McCaffrey cautions that that the survey did not ask which of the two was more
helpful. “You can’t compare the two,” she says. “Physicians work toward finding the problem and treating it. Prayer goes to intangibles like coping, putting illness in a larger perspective, and quality of life. It’s like apples and oranges.” She found that women pray more that men; those older than 33 years pray more than younger people.
A different survey done by other researchers found that 84 percent of 64- to 85-year-olds used prayer as a form of complementary healing. McCaffrey says, “You can’t prove that God exists so how can you prove that prayer works? People who have faith don’t question the truth of either.” (“One-third of Americans pray for their health” http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2004/05.13/01-prayer.html)
People cannot find answers on earth or in themselves, because they are looking in the wrong place and in the wrong direction. They fail to look up; they only look within and look around. When people are in pain, the last place they look is upward; however, the first and only person to understand is God.
After crying behind closed doors, Hannah’s tears did not stop or dry up; in fact she cried longer and harder (v 10 – wept much), but with a world of difference and in a different world and on a different plateau. She knew where to cry, when to cry and who to cry to now. The Hebrew text says Hannah later “wept and wept” - not before Penninah, Elkanah or Eli, but before the Lord. She prayed and wept, wept and wept till she could weep no more.
The weeping Hannah did in the temple was more intense than previously. Verse 10 records that Hanna wept “much” (or in Hebrew, “Hannah wept wept”), or the double use of the Hebrew word “wept.” The Hebrew text emphasized Hannah’s praying to the Lord before her weeping before Him, unlike the Chinese and English traditional translations that had her “weeping and praying.” Verse 12 also noted that eventually she spent more time praying and less time weeping. The word “kept” is usually translated as “multiplied” and occasionally as “increased” (Gen 7:18, Lev 25:16). The same word was used to describe how the flood waters increased on the earth. Hannah multiplied, increased and intensified her prayers to the Lord. Her prayer kept pace or grew stronger (Job 39:4) by the minute with every heartbreak, headache and teardrop, till she forgot about weeping and focused on praying (v 12).
Instead of pouring out her heart to spouse, friend or priest who could in no way understand her, Hannah poured out her heart and soul to the Lord. The word “poured out” (v 15) is used in Old Testament sacrifice as pouring out the rest of the blood from an animal sacrificed at the altar of burnt offering (Lev 4:7, 4:18, 4:25, 4:30). Hannah shed (Gen 9:6, 37:220, Lev 17:4, Num 35:33, Deut 19:10, 21:7), drained (Lev 17:13) and emptied her tears in God’s presence. She did not hold back, keep inside or bottle up her heartbreak.
Hannah poured out “great anguish and grief” (v 16), complain and grief of biblical proportions to the Lord. Job (Job 9:27, 10:1, 21:4, 23:2) and David (Ps 55:2, 64:1, 142:2) were the only other two biblical characters who declared of their “anguish” (Hebrew for “complain”), but none stated their case and condition as emphatically as Hannah. She poured out not just her “anguish/complain” but also her grief, and she poured out not just “anguish,” but “great anguish/complain.” Good for her, she finally vomited, spit and discharged everything out to the Lord instead of regurgitating everything within and swallowing her grief.
Weeping is painful; weeping and praying is more hopeful, but praying longer than weeping is most helpful.
Master the Art of Looking Ahead
17 Eli answered, “Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of him.” 18 She said, “May your servant find favor in your eyes.” Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast. 19 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. 20 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 Sam 1:17-20)
During field training exercises at Parris Island, South Carolina, a drill instructor threw a pinecone among the recruits and yelled, “Grenade!” The trainees immediately turned away and hit the ground.
“Just as I suspected,” chided the instructor. “Not a hero among you! Didn’t anyone want to jump on that grenade to save the others?”
A little later the instructor threw another pinecone and yelled, “Grenade!” This time, all the recruits but one jumped on the substitute explosive. “Why are you still standing there?” the instructor demanded. “Sir,” the recruit replied, “someone had to live to tell about it.”
Haddon Robinson calculates how change occurs: “Pain + time + insight = change.”
The story of Hannah does not have a conventional happy ending. She did not go home with a son, but just the blessing of a son. Her wish was not granted immediately. She went home with kind words ringing in her ear but a lot had changed for her and, more importantly, with her and in her. Eli did not promise her a baby more than he could guarantee her happiness or understand her problem, but he advised her to go in peace, to rest her burdens and leave them down in the temple, before the altar and at the door.
Hannah took Eli’s advice to heart and the Lord answered her prayer in another way. She had peace of mind, made peace with herself and lived in peace from that time on. After pouring her grief to the Lord, she was able to cheer up, walk out and move on. It was time to face up to her enemy and her problems. She decided to return home, eat something and cheer up. Surprisingly, things did not bother her like they used to before. She no longer feared life with her rival, her kids and their antics.
At the same time, smell, taste and appetite returned. Sense, sensibility and sensations returned to her. Hannah did not get what she wanted and things were the same at home, but she was no longer irritated, inconsolable or inferior. She had the courage to look ahead, brave insults and live wisely. Hannah could put up with the past, cope with the present and look to the future. She could look away, and her new-found strength came from looking above and looking ahead. The cycle of verbal abuse, personal jealousy and outright rivalry was broken at that point. She had the will and courage to live and she knew the way to live and the road to travel.
Conclusion: Samuel Chadwick said: “If successful, don’t crow; if defeated don’t croak.” (J. Oswald Sanders, Spiritual Leadership 193 Chicago/Moody/67) Pain is a constant menace, a frequent companion and a returning guest. Vindictiveness makes a person mean, ugly, and surly. Releasing your pain is more livable than repeating, retaining or rehashing them. Do you turn to God rather than turn on others? Jesus suffered like one of us. He was tempted more than any one of us. As such He is able to aid those who are tempted (Heb 2:18). Are you willing to be a blessing to others and a beacon in the dark? Are you taking things to the Lord or taking the cheesy way out?
Victor Yap
Other sermons in the series and other sermon series:
www.epreaching.blogspot.com
