SoulFit: Hannah Praying Through The Pain

We talk through Hannah’s story and the kind of waiting that hurts, especially when it feels like everyone else is getting their prayers answered. We land on a hard but freeing truth: surrender can unlock peace before anything changes on the outside. 
• the difference between a quick prayer and living in a prayer 
• waiting as tension, not just time 
• Hannah’s public pain and the damage comparison can do 
• praying with honesty, emotion, and raw words without cleaning it up 
• why messy prayer can be misunderstood and still be faithful 
• moving from control to surrender through a vow 
• peace arriving internally before the external answer comes 
• the real test of a blessing, keeping promises after we receive it

https://aarondegler.com/

Transcript

Welcome To SoulFit

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome, SoulFit. Thank you for taking the time to join us today. If this is your first time to SoulFit, welcome. Each week we just join in our live call as share some scripture and how do we make that applicable to our everyday life? What does that look like? How do we apply it? And what does that mean for us? So thank you again for being here on SoulFit and let's join our live call. We are going to talk, talk about Hannah. Have you ever, okay, as we continue, we continue to talk about she matters and we talk about different women in the Bible that we find do matter. I think everybody in the Bible matters, but we we picked out five to talk about, and this week is Hannah. And have you ever just said a prayer once and kind of went on? And I think there's different things that we pray for that we just kind of pray for it and then move on. And then I think there's some prayers that we live in. So what does that mean? What does it mean if we live in a prayer? It kind of means that have you ever wanted or waited on something for so long that you just kind of started to hurt? It started to ache. You had that desire that it wasn't happening yet. Or have you ever prayed for something that hasn't changed yet? Maybe, and sometimes I think, well, you know, after a couple of weeks we should see a difference. And then how often are we guilty of this? That it feels like God's answering everybody else's prayers but mine. Maybe I'm doing something wrong because we hear about all these answered prayers, but for some reason he hasn't answered mine. And as we've talked about waiting and prayer and different things, we've talked about how waiting just isn't about the time. It's also about the tension. So in thinking about that, we're gonna talk a little bit about Hannah and how she didn't pray just once, but she prayed through her pain. She had a long time of pain, of thinking things weren't gonna happen. And we're gonna find out as we see there's comparison. And and, you know, other people are living the life that we we want. In other words, we're they're living the life of all the children are great. And and not just, you know, they're living the life that they're actually doing good, they have good relationships, they have they're kind of getting all the things they want. And we're over here thinking, well, why am I not getting some of that blessing? Why am I not feeling that way? And and Hannah was really no different than kind of feeling the way we do. And so the kind of it from Samuel 1 kind of context is this Hannah's married to Elkaniah, and and Hannah can't have any children. And Paniah, that's Elkaniah, Paniah, Elkaniah, but Paniah is Elkaniah's other wife, and she can have children. And what does she do? She provokes her. She says, kind of, you know, I can have kids and you can't. Kind of makes fun. And you can imagine how that goes. And so year after year, Hannah suffers. And really, Sammy One talks about the suffering that she goes through, and and she weeps and she's sad all the time. Can you imagine if in that time, if we take ourselves back to that time, and your husband's other wife is, you know, having kids and he's doting on them, and it's all the great things. It would be definitely a season to weep in. And and she feels forgotten. Who else uh we talked about who else felt forgotten is Sarah when she couldn't have any kids. And I think it's interesting that the theme of being forgotten keeps coming up because it's not by accident, it's not in there just once and glossed over. There's stories and chapters about women who feel forgotten, who, you know, it's not happening fast enough. And that's a re and there's a reason for that. It's because we feel that way. We feel many times that that we're forgotten. And and and you know, Hannah's pain of not being not having a being able to have a child is not it's not just a personal thing. It's not just, oh, we're keeping it between, you know, husband and I, and nobody else knows. It it's really a public thing. Everyone, everyone saw she didn't have any children. When Panaya is having kids and Hannah is not, and so everyone sees that. So it's a very public pain. It's like, you know, let's put everything, your biggest pain. How would you like that? How would that feel? Your biggest pain in your life, and your biggest pain probably a lot of people don't know about. Very, maybe very few close friends. But what if you think about that pain? And what if you were to take that and put that up on one of those digital boards? Flashing billboards, flashing billboards that says your name and that has your pain after. And so everybody you come in contact with knows your pain. How challenging. I mean, I think we would be the same way. Am I forgotten? Am I always crying? And I don't want to be, and that's really suffering, right? Suffering is long-term pain, is really what suffering is. And and really, you know, and and what's Hannah doing? She's also comparing. And really nothing can expose pain like when we compare. Um, when we compare, it's really makes it so much harder. And and we we're human, so that's what we do. We compare. Um, we try not to. We say, I'm not gonna do that, I'm not gonna, I'm gonna scroll past that, or when I see them around, I'm just gonna look past that. But in our minds, we think we do some comparison. It takes a lot of work to let that go. So we're gonna talk a little bit about what is her prayer, what is Hannah's prayer as we talk about she prayed through the praying, so the pain. So it in 1 Samuel 1:10 and 11, it it shares her prayer. And so her prayer starts out with it in her deep anguish, Hannah prayed to the Lord, weeping bitterly. And she made a vow saying, Lord Almighty, if you will only look on 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. Until we know what happens one day. He gets his hair cut, and that's a whole nother story by a whole nother woman. He gets that hair chopped off and it goes south from there. But in those verses, she doesn't hide it as she prays, she doesn't clean it up because she says, Look on your servant's misery, remember me, and not forget your servant. Don't forget me. Hey, God, remember, I'm still down here. Hey, look at me. And she pours it all out in that simple verse. It kind of, you know, the the number 10 says, kind of how she's gonna she's about to pray, and then 11 says, it's her pouring out, you know, don't forget me, remember me, I'm in misery. She says all those things, and and really her prayer was, and I think it's an example to us that her prayer was honest. It's an honest prayer, it's an emotional prayer, it's a raw prayer, and it's a persistent prayer. And I think sometimes, again, we've talked about it before, but sometimes we feel like we kind of have to sugarcoat our prayer. But isn't it really, I mean, whether we sugarcoat or not, God already knows what we're what we're thinking. So why do we try to sugarcoat it? Why do we not let it all out in all of our fumble words, even even if they don't the words don't come out right, we say them wrong, we don't know how to say, you know, we just say it. Kim and I were praying the other night, and and I was having a really hard time getting words out. I know that's hard to believe, but they it was a little later, it was really coming hard to me. And in the middle of the prayer, I was like, I just can't get it out. And then I tried to just I just had to say what I the words I could, and that was the best I had. It wasn't it wasn't great or anything wonderful at all. But you know, I just had to say, oh, I can't get them out. But it was the real thing. That was, I just, my mind wasn't working. But I think we have to be honest, we have to be emotional, we have to be raw. This is what it is. We have to be vulnerable and we have to be persistent. Because are we gonna are we gonna shock God by our honesty? No, because he knows our thoughts. He already knows that what we're thinking, he already sees the billboard, you know, so it's not like we have to edit the subtitles. He already knows what it is, and it doesn't have to be perfect or or or pretty. And I mean, and Hannah's words are so not pretty and so raw and so honest. Eli, the priest, sees her there and he thinks she's drunk. I mean, he he says, because her prayer doesn't look polished, and she's praying. So she's praying, her lips aren't moving, and no words are coming out. Or, I mean, her lips are moving, but no words are coming out. So he's thinking, she is drunk. He's thinking she is all liquored up and gone crazy. And sometimes that's kind of what messy looks like. That's kind of when somebody is looking at us, they go, wow, what a, you know, what in the world is going on there? And so it can really look messy. And so sometimes we have to ask ourselves, when was the last time we were really honest in a prayer? When was the last time we really kind of poured it out? And and maybe that's maybe that's part of our challenge is is there's that pain that you've been suffering. And suffering is is some time. And you pour it out and and you be honest and open and raw and say, This is this is what it is. I don't like it, I'm not happy, I'm mad, you know. Look, look at my misery. And and we're really honest with that. And and in that prayer, in Hannah's prayer, in Samuel 1.11, that was she makes a vow. She makes a vow. What does she say? She says, Forget your servant, do not forget your servant, but give her a son. Then I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life. So in that, she's praying for a son. And then in turn, she vows to give her son back to the Lord. So, what does that mean for us? She just didn't want the she wanted the blessing, but it she just didn't want it to keep it, but then she was vowing to surrender the blessing. So, what does that mean? Give me a son, and then I'll surrender him to you. And that was what she was vowing to him. And and I don't know how many times maybe we've ever done that. Because if you're playing for a blessing, what do we usually want to do? I want to keep it. You know, I'm praying, I'm suffering, I want to keep it. Give it to me. I want to hold on to it. But she says, give it, give me a son, and I will give that the thing I've been praying for, the thing that has been causing me the most pain, misery, suffering, I will then give that back to you because you have given that to me. And and it reminds us that that true prayer moves from control to surrender. And that is what Hannah's doing through her her prayer. Through she's praying through her pain, but she's surrendering. She is surrendering to that blessing. Because is what she was also saying, is she stopped, she stopped trying to hold on and she's gonna start trusting God with it. I'm gonna give it over to God. And then in 1 Samuel 1 through 1, 18, after she prays, she went on her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast. So we might say she went from a frown. Well, sometimes when you eat, that can happen. Well, that's true. Sometimes you get a little snack and you get a little happier, and that's interesting. It does say, you know, she ate and then her face was no longer downcast. But I'm thinking that maybe through her food and through her prayer, that her her she turned from a frown upside down. So maybe she now has a more of a smile on her face. So what changed? Did anything change externally? Nothing changed externally whatsoever at all, but something shifted in her internally, and that is where the change begins to happen. It's not, we're not waiting for the external change. The change begins when we have an internal change. So peace doesn't come from the answer, but sometimes it comes from a surrender because she had the peace, but she still didn't have a son. She just still wasn't pregnant, she still none of that. She didn't have that yet. But her peace then came her her she was no longer downcast, her face was no longer, it turned into surrender. And when we surrender, we can have that peace that only he can bring to us. He's the only one that can bring us that type of peace. We haven't received it, but we have the peace because we have surrendered. It is now up to him. And so what does Hannah do? In 1 Samuel 27 through 28, the first chapter says, She says, I prayed for this child, and guess what? And the Lord has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the Lord. For his whole life he will be given over to the Lord, and he worshiped the Lord there. She took him back after he was weaned, or we would say, you know, after you could eat solid foods. He was then taken back to the church, and she gives him back to God. God gave her Samuel and she gave him back. And isn't that wow, that's pretty, that's pretty amazing. She prayed and said, if you give me the blessing, I will give it back. And when the time was, it was time, what did she do? She kept her promise. God kept his promise to her, and she kept her promise to God. She brings them back to the temple, she gives them back to God. How many times do we maybe sometimes go, man, I've been praying for this, and then we get kind of nervous and we go, well, what if I lose it? What if what if I don't get what if I don't get this again? What what am I supposed to do? And you know, don't we sometimes well what what do we tell our kids sometimes when we make promises? If you'll do this, I'll do that. And then they do whatever, and you go, oh, well, we'll do that later. Well we'll do that later. And later sometimes never comes. So the greatest test of a blessing is what we do when we finally receive it. What do we do with it? She surrendered it. She gave it back to God. How amazing is that? I mean, we might say, God, if you if you just get I'm in misery, if you just give me a million dollars, I'll give it all back to you. We get a million dollars. Man, it'd be nice to take care of this and take care of that. Are we running to the mission field? Are we running to the local church? Are we running to give it away as fast as we can? It's a challenge. And, you know, that's kind of where she was at. Could you imagine praying for a child? Praying and praying and praying, suffering, so much hurt, so much pain. And then when you get it, say, I'm returning the promise that I made, and I'm giving it back to God. That'd be tough. But again, it's it's an example to us. We pray through our pain, we keep being persistent with the prayer, and that we will get it back. That that, you know, we have to be, he fulfills a promise. We also too have to fulfill our promise. Maybe there's a prayer that has become very painful. And and maybe again, how we've talked about it, maybe it's because we're trying to control it. Maybe there's some control. Let me try to control this. And what if that prayer turns into a true surrender? I surrender it. We release it. As we talked about, if we release, open up our hand, we've released our control. And when a hand open, we surrender. What do people do when they, if you see them at held at gunpoint, they come out with their hands up? I give up. That means I surrender. That is the, I mean, everybody knows hands up means I surrender. And that is the same that we do maybe when we're praying. Maybe if there's a some pain that you have, you can say a prayer. Maybe you've just been sitting and praying. Maybe you take your physical body, you hold your hands up and say, I surrender, and you and you say that prayer. And be ready to surrender at all to again, because like Hannah, that peace didn't come externally. That peace came internally because she didn't receive her blessing. She changed internally because she surrendered. She said, I surrender. And an honest prayer is one of the most powerful prayers. Again, because God already knows what we're thinking, we we can't hide it in our prayer. And our surrender will unlock our peace before the answer ever arrives. And that is really what we're seeking in that prayer and that pain is we're seeking that peace that we're looking for. And so Hannah mattered because Hannah didn't just get an answer, she became a woman of surrender. And she matters because how many, how great would it be to be thought of as a woman of surrender? I surrender it all, I give it all, and I'm ready to receive my blessing. And when I do, I will fulfill my promises that I made. My peace comes before the the blessing ever does. Um so let's finish it up in prayer and then everybody can get on with their good, fabulous Friday. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for bringing us all together, Lord. We just pray that that if there's anyone going through pain, that we would just surrender that hurt, that suffering to you in an honest, open manner, that we could surrender it, we could stop taking control of it and surrender it all to you and allow that peace into our heart before the blessing ever ever arrives. So, Lord, give us that strength, give us that uh peace, give us that power to surrender it all to you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you, everybody, and thank you to B to you for joining us on SoulFit. I look forward to seeing you right here next time on Soul Fit.