A Salvation Prayer

If you have your Bible (and I hope you do) please turn with me to 1 Samuel 2. If you are able and willing, please stand for the reading of God’s Holy Word:

1 Samuel 2:1–11 NIV

1 Then Hannah prayed and said: “My heart rejoices in the Lord; in the Lord my horn is lifted high. My mouth boasts over my enemies, for I delight in your deliverance. 2 “There is no one holy like the Lord; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God. 3 “Do not keep talking so proudly or let your mouth speak such arrogance, for the Lord is a God who knows, and by him deeds are weighed. 4 “The bows of the warriors are broken, but those who stumbled are armed with strength. 5 Those who were full hire themselves out for food, but those who were hungry are hungry no more. She who was barren has borne seven children, but she who has had many sons pines away. 6 “The Lord brings death and makes alive; he brings down to the grave and raises up. 7 The Lord sends poverty and wealth; he humbles and he exalts. 8 He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap; he seats them with princes and has them inherit a throne of honor. “For the foundations of the earth are the Lord’s; on them he has set the world. 9 He will guard the feet of his faithful servants, but the wicked will be silenced in the place of darkness. “It is not by strength that one prevails; 10 those who oppose the Lord will be broken. The Most High will thunder from heaven; the Lord will judge the ends of the earth. “He will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.” 11 Then Elkanah went home to Ramah, but the boy ministered before the Lord under Eli the priest.

May the Lord add His blessing to the reading of His Holy Word!

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This is Hannah’s response to what the Lord has done. This is Hannah’s praise to the Lord; this is worship.

The Lord Yahweh has done great things for her, great things for us. Hannah responds as she should. Hannah responds as all of us should: with praise and recognition and longing to the Lord Yahweh to act.

We should notice the word LORD in our Bible. If you look, it’ll be written (more than likely) in all capital letters throughout this prayer.

That word—LORD—is the covenant name of God: Yahweh. YHWH. The tetragrammaton, the Hebrew name of God transliterated in four letters.

Hannah is rejoicing in the LORD Yahweh, the God of the Bible. He is the One who makes and fulfills promises and keeps His Word. The LORD loves His people with a "Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love."

Hannah’s praise, her first response, her prayer begins with her delighting in the LORD:

1 Samuel 2:1–3 NIV

1 Then Hannah prayed and said: “My heart rejoices in the Lord; in the Lord my horn is lifted high. My mouth boasts over my enemies, for I delight in your deliverance. 2 “There is no one holy like the Lord; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God. 3 “Do not keep talking so proudly or let your mouth speak such arrogance, for the Lord is a God who knows, and by him deeds are weighed.

It’s Personal (vv. 1-3)

Hannah had something to sing about, that’s for sure. The heading says that this is a prayer, but many think it was a song like Mary’s song (the Magnificat) in Luke’s Gospel. David sings/prays in 2 Samuel.

The Lord had answered her prayer directly. The Lord heard Hannah and responded to the deepest longing of her heart.

She was given a son. The Lord knew Hannah deeply and answered her prayer, tiny and insignificant as she was.

She had given her son back to the Lord and “could sing from the fullness of joy that wells-up from costly giving.”

And Hannah had an unshakable assurance that her God controlled the ordering of the world and, because of this, she need not worry.

Hannah had personally experienced the providence of God.

“The unceasing activity of the Creator, whereby, in overflowing bounty and goodwill, He upholds His creatures in ordered existence, guides and governs all events, circumstances and free acts of angels and men, and directs everything to its appointed goal, for His glory.” - J.I. Packer

Hannah’s personal experience is that of at least one micro-salvation, a tiny deliverance, a mini-rescue.

Hannah wasn’t surrounded by a vast number of enemies. She wasn’t in fear for her life. She was childless, which, though it’s not life and death, is no small problem.

And from this, the Lord worked in her life; from this pit, the Lord has saved her. The Lord stepped-in and rescued her from her grief and misery.

It’s salvation on the personal, intimate, details-of-life level. It’s a tiny-deliverance, a mini-rescue.

This teaches Hannah something. This should instruct us regarding how we should consider the “small” things God does for us and what He saves us from:

A train car wreck in 1983.

A massive brain bleed in 2012.

A fall from a bucket truck in 2016.

Job loss.

Cancer.

Addiction.

At the end of verse 1, Hannah says she delights in the Lord’s deliverance (ysu-at). Hannah calls the Lord’s help “salvation, rescue, deliverance.”

It’s a compelling thought. What deliverance/salvation/rescue is the Lord working out in your life?

It might be something fairly small and seemingly insignificant, like finding the money to cover all your expenses. Reconciling with an old friend. An answer to a long-prayed prayer.

Hannah would call it deliverance. Salvation.

Hannah makes a confession of her faith in the Lord. That’s what verse 2 is. She speaks to the otherness of the Lord. He stands alone. There is no one besides you. And this is true!

Who else was listening to Hannah’s prayer? And, even if they were listening, who else could do anything for Hannah? Elkanah couldn’t do anything. Eli the priest wasn’t able to give her what she was asking for. Only the Lord.

He is incomparable; no one compares to Him. There is absolutely no other absolutely-holy being besides the Lord.

He is our “Rock”—a common descriptor of God in the OT. He is the protector and strength of His people. Hannah uses the phrase “our God” to indicate her membership, her belonging to the covenant community.

For your troubles, Christian, there is but One Rock: the Lord Almighty. When Hannah was at her lowest, she turned to Him.

And now, as she sings and prays to the Lord, she confesses her faith in Him alone as the Rock, the One and Only, the Holy One.

Hannah now offers a personal word of advice. This isn’t aimed specifically at Peninnah, though she’s probably included as one who needs to hear what Hannah says.

It’s not reflected in our English translations, but the first two Hebrew verbs are plural, as is the “your”.

This is a general warning to all self-sufficient boasters.

Again, this isn’t about Peninnah alone, but let’s think about her.

She’s been taunting Hannah for years because Hannah had no children and Peninnah had many. Peninnah started to think of herself as special, as better-than. She’s self-sufficient: “I have kids and you don’t! Ha! Take that!” As if she was the author and creator of life!

The arrogance of Peninnah and others who boast in themselves, proud and arrogant.

The Lord Yahweh knows and weighs our deeds. God’s knowledge extends even to the motives behind our actions, the thoughts that lead to our actions.

Be careful little mouth what you say, be careful little mind what you think, be careful little heart what you feel...

For Hannah, the salvation she experiences is personal. This is the Lord’s particular salvation for Hannah. What He has done here for Hannah is for Hannah. It’s the Lord Almighty looking out for Hannah, delivering Hannah, rescuing Hannah.

Salvation for Hannah is personal.

It’s personal, but it’s not just personal:

1 Samuel 2:4–8 NIV

4 “The bows of the warriors are broken, but those who stumbled are armed with strength. 5 Those who were full hire themselves out for food, but those who were hungry are hungry no more. She who was barren has borne seven children, but she who has had many sons pines away. 6 “The Lord brings death and makes alive; he brings down to the grave and raises up. 7 The Lord sends poverty and wealth; he humbles and he exalts. 8 He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap; he seats them with princes and has them inherit a throne of honor. “For the foundations of the earth are the Lord’s; on them he has set the world.

It’s Corporate (vv. 4-8)

Hannah sings/prays, expanding on what she has just prayed. What YHWH has done for Hannah is symbolic of what He does for His people in general.

This is how Yahweh rules the world. The Lord raises up the beaten-down. He humbles the proud and exalts the humble. What the Lord has done for Hannah is simply what the Lord does.

The strong warriors are weakened; the weak are given strength.

The full find themselves hungry; those who were hungry are filled.

Barren Hannah has children; the one who had many still longs for something.

The Lord brings death as well as life, poverty as well as wealth.

Yahweh humbles. Yahweh exalts.

In God’s economy the poor and needy are lifted up.

The Lord does this because He can. The whole world is His.

There’s comfort here in Hannah’s prayer for more than Hannah, you see. Hannah is praising the Lord for being the Lord. Hannah is thanking God for being Himself. Hannah has benefitted from belonging to God, in more ways than she could count.

The salvation and deliverance that Hannah has experienced is not a one-off experience. This is what the Lord does. This isn’t merely personal for Hannah; it’s corporate, it’s for the whole lot of God’s people.

In the 1600s, there was a pastor who lost his wife. He wrote his friend saying: “May the Lord Jesus support me under this heavy affliction, which would certainly have overcome me had not He, who raises up the prostrate, strengthens the weak, and refreshes the weary, stretched forth His hand from heaven to me.”

In essence, what he’s saying is that he would surely have been crushed by his wife’s death, but for the fact that he knew a Lord who raises up the broken, gives strength to the weak, refreshes the weary.

This is what is true for people in general, for the gathered assembly of God’s people. It’s not just personal; it’s corporate. It’s something all God’s people can testify to—in big and small ways, the Lord has delivered and is delivering us. He has saved us, and He saves us in a thousand different mini-deliverances.

This isn’t really surprising. This is just the way the Lord Yahweh is. He will help you, but not just you. He’s got the whole world in His hands. He’s at work for us.

Salvation, personal and corporate, and that’s not all...

1 Samuel 2:9–10 NIV

9 He will guard the feet of his faithful servants, but the wicked will be silenced in the place of darkness. “It is not by strength that one prevails; 10 those who oppose the Lord will be broken. The Most High will thunder from heaven; the Lord will judge the ends of the earth. “He will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.”

It’s Anticipatory (vv. 9-10)

This is the Grand Finale, so to speak, what God will do. In these verses you can pick out all the uses of the future tense (just look for the word “will”).

This is how it will be when the Lord Yahweh rules—fully, completely, visibly.

Hannah is able to see something her physical eyes won’t behold. Hannah sees what Abraham had faith to see. Hannah sees what those with spiritual eyes see: the coming of the Lord’s anointed, the coming of His king.

Some people think that Hannah couldn’t have prayed these words. They believe that the verses that speak about a king were inserted sometime later because God’s people aren’t governed by a king at this point.

“How can Hannah know something about a king? She wouldn’t have called the Messiah a King.”

Hannah plays a somewhat prophetic role here. She’s not pulling the idea of a king out of thin air.

The hope of a king was as old as God’s covenant with Abraham—God told Abraham “kings will come from you.”

The felt need for a king was expressed in the time of the judges The people wanted Gideon, and then Gideon’s son, to rule over them. Fools.

Hannah didn’t come up with the idea for a king; she merely discerned that an era of kingship was about to dawn.

When the true KING, the true Anointed One comes He will accomplish:

The deliverance of God’s people—once and for all. The wicked will be silenced. God’s faithful servants will be safe and secure.

The shattering of God’s opponents—those who oppose the Lord will be broken. All those who stand against the Lord and against His anointed One will be shut-up and shut-down.

The judging of the ends of the earth—the Lord will judge the living and the dead. He will assume His role as judge, in His uniqueness, majesty, and dominion.

All of this through the King, the Anointed, the Christ. Hannah’s praise anticipates what Jesus will do. Jesus is centuries from being born to a woman named Mary, and yet Hannah sings/prays to the Lord, looking forward to what God’s anointed will bring, what the Promised One of God will do.

We are on the other side of Jesus’ first appearance. We know that He dealt decisively with the sin of His people. He paid the price our sins wrought. He rose victorious and sits at God’s mighty right hand.

What we anticipate, what we look forward to is just exactly what Hannah looked forward to those many years ago: our deliverance, the defeat of our Enemy, and the judgment of the whole world.

Jesus is coming to do just that. This we believe. To this we look forward.

Hannah’s prayer really is something. From a glance, we might think, “Well, that’s nice…but so what? So she has a son now. Big deal.”

This is no small thing, not for Hannah and not for us. This—this small deliverance for Hannah—is a glimpse of the way the Lord rules in this world, a picture of the way He will bring His kingdom.

It’s a sample of the way the Lord works and how He will work when He bring His kingdom in its fullness.

Dale Ralph Davis calls this a “scale-model demonstration of how God will do it when He does it in grand style.”

Every time God lifts you out of a pit and sets your feet on a rock—that is a sample, a hint, a taste of the coming of God’s kingdom.

What does God for Hannah personally (and for us in our lives) should tip us off as to what God does for others. It should point us to what He does and what He will do.

My wedding ring is a simple and small thing. Nothing flashy. I think it cost somewhere between $300-$400. It’s simple and plain, but it’s a token and a sign of the love Meghann has for me.

It’s only a sign of Meghann’s love. It’s not love itself. The real thing is much greater than the sign or the symbol.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t care at all about my ring.

Before the sand volleyball league retired my jersey and my number, my ring came off in the middle of a game. It was returned to me before I knew I lost it; I would have been sick over losing it.

This ring is not the love it symbolizes but it’s important and significant and special to me. I wouldn’t sell it at a garage sale or give it away.

Because of the deeper reality it signifies, I treasure it, though it is, admittedly relatively insignificant.

Just because what the Lord does in your life might be on the smaller side of the deliverance/salvation scale doesn’t mean you should think less of it. Don’t shrug your shoulders and think: “Eh, it’s not that big of a deal...”

The Lord is working on your behalf. He does things, great and small. And they’re all clues, small evidences of His grace. They are tipping us off to the fact that He is King and He is always at work, bringing sight to the blind, raising up the lame to walk again, lifting the grieving and the needy up and making them to sit with Jesus Christ in the heavenly realms.

Every episode of God’s grace, every moment of His goodness, every ounce of His kindness is personal. It’s how God operates. It’s what He does, and it’s what He will do.

Every little taste and sample of God’s deliverance is meant to drive us to Jesus. We experience small deliverances, micro-salvations every day (if we have eyes to see).

What they are meant to do is remind us of what Jesus has done on our behalf. That He saved us: body broken, blood spilled out that we would be forgiven and made right with our Heavenly Father, the LORD Yahweh.

It’s personal, this salvation. Jesus gave His life FOR YOU! Have you experienced salvation in Him? May today be the day!

It’s corporate, this salvation. God’s people—those who belong to Him through faith in Jesus Christ—know the salvation God has granted through Jesus.

It’s anticipatory, this salvation. Jesus is coming soon. He will set the world at rights. He will vanquish forever our Enemy, all who oppose Him will be broken to pieces.

Hebrews 9:26–28 (NIV)

[Jesus] has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. 27 Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, 28 so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.