Sing of God's Deliverance-- Sing with Hannah

Text: “Song of Hannah” (LSB #926, based on 1 Samuel 2:1-11)

Tonight’s canticle is unique. It’s a song of deliverance, like the others that you’ll hear about and sing through these midweek services. The source is different, though. It’s not the song of a group of people— like the song sung by the Children of Israel after passing through the Red Sea or the song of one of the great, important individuals of history— like the song of Moses as He praises God at the end of his life. Tonight’s canticle is the song of an ordinary woman. She’s the mother of one of the important figures of the Old Testament, to be sure, but an ordinary woman, nonetheless.

We’re talking about a woman named Hannah. She is the mother of Samuel, who was the last of the judges and one of the important prophets of the Old Testament. But, tonight is not about him, it’s about her. Hannah takes center stage tonight as we consider her song, which was recorded for us in 1 Samuel 2. Before we consider her song, though, we need to start at the beginning of her story.

The part of her life recorded for us in 1 Samuel 1 is a story of sadness; it’s a story of frustration; and it’s a story of hopelessness, bordering on despair. Sadly, Hannah was barren. Like so many of the women recorded for us in the Bible, she was unable to have children. Thankfully, her husband did what he could to comfort her and reassure her of his love, but he’s still a man, so he wasn’t always helpful, and there was only so much comfort he could offer.

So she prayed. Day after day she prayed. Year after year, whenever they went to the tabernacle to worship, she prayed. In fact, to say that she prayed might be a bit of an understatement. She prayed so fervently in the tabernacle that the priest thought she was drunk. Even though she was praying silently, her lips were moving and he mistook her for someone who was drunk. That is how intensely she begged God for a child. Like so many people then and now, she even bargained with God, offering to give her son back to God to serve Him.

We don’t know how long it took, but it was years before God gave her what she asked for. And, when He did, she fulfilled her promise and gave her son back to God to serve Him. As she did, one more of her prayers is recorded for us. That prayer is the song of joy— the song of God’s deliverance— that we sing tonight.

And here we need to stop for a moment. We need to take a hard pause.

Like I just said, the purpose of looking at each of these songs from the Old Testament— each of these Old Testament canticles— is to emphasize that you get to join in singing that song. And, at this point, some of you can’t. You can’t join in her song of joy at receiving a child. Because you didn’t.

You prayed just as earnestly as Hannah did. You begged. You bargained. You pleaded. And God said ‘No.’ How do you join in Hannah’s song when she received her child, but you never did?

Before we go on, please allow me to emphasize that her song really is for you, too. If you are still holding on to hope, I can’t promise you that God will bless you in that way. (I wish I could. But I can’t make that promise.) If you’re beyond that hope, then nothing I’m about to say is meant to minimize your pain in any way. What I do promise you— what I pray that you’ll hear tonight— is that Hannah’s song really is for you, too.

The rest of you might feel that you can’t join in Hannah’s song of joy for the opposite reason. You haven’t been in her shoes. You haven’t felt her pain. Let me assure you that Hannah’s song is for you, too. It may not have been because of infertility, but I suspect you’ve been in a very similar place— begging God, bargaining with God, pleading with God.

Each of us must wrestle, at some point, with the barrenness of this life. It takes many different forms. Childless couples are one, particularly painful example, but there are many other forms that it takes.

You spend a tremendous amount of time, money, and energy building a home and a family, making sure it is filled with love and every good thing for your children. But, in time, your children move on and build lives, homes, and families of their own. All you are left with is the memories. Hopefully your grandchildren know you well. But their children won’t. And their children will know you even less. And their children won’t know who the person in the picture in the attic is unless your name is written on the back. And that’s not even getting into relationships that you have broken by your sins that cannot be mended in this life.

You work hard to build something lasting in this world, then the honest, hardworking business owner loses everything through no fault of his own. Innocent school children or university students suddenly find themselves the victims of senseless violence. Far too many have their lives completely uprooted and upended by war, ending up as refugees who are scraping to try to stay alive. Even for the rest of us, so much of our time and energy is spent on things that seem urgent— and are, in that moment— but really don’t matter, in the end. How much of what you do will need to be done again tomorrow? The clothes always need to be washed; the house always needs to be dusted; the oil always needs to be changed; the snow always needs to be shoveled. If not, just give it a moment and it will.

Even the best things that you build in this world are fragile and fleeting. That’s true for princes, after all. You remember Psalm 146:3— “Trust not in princes....” But why? It’s not just because most are not trustworthy.

He warns not to trust the ones who are trustworthy, either: “When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish” (Ps. 146:4). It’s not a lack of planning or a lack of commitment or a lack of follow through that makes this life fruitless (although those certainly don’t help). It’s death. If death brings the plans of the great and powerful to nothing, what does it do with your plans and mine?

You try to do something meaningful in your life but, each step of the way, the barrenness of this life is nipping at your heels. Eventually, it gets hold of you and you’re left begging, bargaining, and pleading with God.

And that’s the best case. Your plans are not always so well intentioned. The psalms warn against the princes and kings of this world for another reason: “2 [they] set themselves, and …take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed...” (Psalm 2:2). If their best intentioned plans come to nothing, the best possible outcome for these plans is for them to come to nothing.

You can say something similar. It was a bit of an overstatement to say that nothing you do lasts. Sadly, it’s the things you’d rather forget that have a tendency to go on and on and on.... How many people have you hurt years ago— sometimes decades ago— and that pain is still as fresh as ever? For you and me, too, the best case is for our days to be fruitless— to have no lasting impact.

Based on Hannah’s prayer, she saw all of this. Her prayer was not simply about herself and her son. It was about this barren, fruitless world and what she had discovered about who God is.

“4 The bows of the mighty are broken,” she prays, “but the feeble bind on strength. 5Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger.” This song is not just about her. She prays, “The barren has borne seven, but she who has many children is forlorn.” That is clearly not just about one woman and one child. “6 The Lord kills and brings to life; he brings down to Sheol and raises up” (1 Samuel 2:4-6). She intends this prayer to be a confession of a God who chooses to deliver all people from the barrenness of this life.

With her words, she is trying to confess something deep and profound that she has learned about who God is— something that goes beyond one single answered prayer. “7 The Lord makes poor and makes rich; he brings low and he exalts. 8 He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s, and on them he has set the world. 9 “He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness, for not by might shall a man prevail. 10 The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces; against them he will thunder in heaven. The Lord will judge the ends of the earth; he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed”” (1 Samuel 2:7-10).

And the Good News is that Hannah is completely correct in her confession of who God is.

He would not allow you to be born, to live out your days, and to die in this barren, fruitless world. Before you ever felt the burden of this dying world, before you ever thought to cry out to Him, He had made His plan. Not only was He willing to give Hannah her son, the Father planned for the Virgin to conceive and give birth to a Son who would be Immanuel, who would save you from your sins.

The kings of the earth, the rulers of this world, they did—they plotted, they took counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed One (Ps. 2:2). Even while He was just an infant, they tried to kill Him. But, as the psalmist put it so beautifully, “4 He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision. 5 Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, 6 ‘As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill’” (Psalm 2:4-6).

They did their worst— they used their authority to wrongly convict Him and unjustly execute Him. “8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away,” Isaiah wrote, “and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?” (Isaiah 53:8). Even though, to all appearances, His life and ministry appeared fruitless, “10 ...when his soul [made] an offering for guilt, he [would] see his offspring; he [prolonged] his days; the will of the Lord [prospered] in his hand” (Isaiah 53:10).

But, unlike the princes of this world whose plans end on the day when their breath departs from them and they’re laid in the earth (Ps. 146), when Jesus breathed His last and His body was laid into the earth, His plan was established forever. He made the nations His heritage, the ends of the earth His possession (Ps. 2:8). He broke them with a rod of iron, He dashed them in pieces like a potter’s vessel (Ps. 2:9).

Although He had no wife or physical children, “12 to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12-13). By His death and resurrection, He became the firstborn of many brothers (Rom. 8:29).

That is not just a promise for a vague, far-off future. To this day, the Virgin Bride of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, continues to conceive and give birth to children of God at her font.

She feeds them with the pure milk of the Word that is preached from her pulpit. In time, she strengthens them with the solid food of His Body and Blood from her altar (giving them, in the process, a foretaste of the wedding feast that Christ is preparing).

In the strength of that promise, her children— you-- “[are] like [trees] planted by streams of flowing water that [yield their] fruits in its season,” (Psalm 1:3), while, “the wicked… are like chaff that the wind drives away” (Psalm 1:4). The grace that flows from this font, this pulpit, this altar, that grace is the stream that constantly refreshes you in this barren world to ensure that you yield fruit in every season— in times of joy, times of trial, times of deepest anguish. Through the grace that He pours out for you here,

“Whatever is placed on the young root [of your life] is changed in the clusters of grapes into the sweetest juice of the vine. [He causes your] souls to change the ridicule, persecution, praise, and whatever else befalls [you] in this world into the wine of faith, hope, and love and into the fruit of patience and humility” (Gerhard, Johann. “Prayer for the Preservation of the Word and the Increase of the Church,” Meditations on Divine Mercy. Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis.)

It is in that confidence that the voice declares in Revelation 14:3, “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from henceforth… for their deeds follow them.” What an underrated promise that is. In this barren, dying world, what an underrated promise that is: Your deeds follow you. And not in the way that you fear— that those whom you have hurt through the years will still carry their grudges and their pain, will still be there to make sure that those deeds follow you. No, Christ has taken all of those sins from you. You will find that they have been washed clean by the blood of Christ and they will be remembered no more.

Not only that, but He will look at the fruit of your life— the fruit of the long days you spent doing the same things again and again and again; the fruit of all the moments when your best plans utterly failed; the fruit of the (imperfect, faltering) acts of love that you’ve done for whomever God has led into your life— He will look at that fruit and He will say to you, “Well done.” Those are the deeds will follow you.

I can’t explain why God chose not to give you a child— or why He allowed you to be tormented by any of the other ways that this barren world forces itself on you. But I can tell you with certainty that the eternal Son of God was not ashamed to be called your brother, even though it meant sharing in your flesh and blood, partaking of the same pain, the same barrenness of this world (Hebrews 2:11-15). It will be with perfect and complete joy that He leads you, one day, in triumphal procession back to the right hand of God—to the place He has prepared for you in the very presence of His Father and your Father, of His God and your God (John 20:17).

He saw your anguish; He heard your prayers; He heard your pleas and, even though you did not receive the answer you hoped for, your prayers mattered so much to Him— you mattered so much to Him— that He was willing to suffer and die to redeem you out of this barren world and gather you into His kingdom, which will have no end, where the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. There, you will be invited to eat from the tree of life as it yields its fruit each month and the leaves of the tree will be for the healing of the nations. You will worship Him there; you will see His face; His name will be on your forehead. And you will reign with Him forever (Rev. 22).

“1 Hannah prayed and said, “My heart exults in the Lord; my horn is exalted in the Lord. My mouth derides my enemies, because I rejoice in your salvation. 2 “There is none holy like the Lord: for there is none besides you; there is no rock like our God. 3Talk no more so very proudly, let not arrogance come from your mouth; for the Lord is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. 4 The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength. 5Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger. The barren has borne seven, but she who has many children is forlorn. 6 The Lord kills and brings to life; he brings down to Sheol and raises up. 7 The Lord makes poor and makes rich; he brings low and he exalts. 8 He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor” (1 Samuel 2:1-8).

Tonight all of you are invited to sing of God’s deliverance. You are invited to Sing with Hannah.