A Mother's Surrender

What do you do when life doesn’t go the way you hoped?

In this powerful message from 1 Samuel 1, Pastor Matt walks through the story of Hannah, a woman overwhelmed by pain, unanswered prayers, and deep longing. Yet through her story, we discover a better way to face suffering: not with striving, but with surrender.

Whether you’re walking through disappointment, anxiety, relational pain, infertility, grief, or simply a season of waiting, this sermon is a reminder that God is still at work. Even in the middle of your sorrow.

In this message, you’ll discover:

•  Why God sometimes allows painful seasons 
•  How surrender leads to peace 
•  What it means to trust God before the answer comes 
•  How Hannah found hope in the middle of heartbreak 
•  Why God uses pain to shape us, not destroy us

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Amen. Well, let's take our Bibles. Let's open to 1 Samuel as we come to the Word of God today, the high point in our worship experience. It's that moment where we receive the Word of God and we say in our hearts, yes and amen. We'll be doers of the Word, not just hearers only, deceiving ourselves, but we want to do the Word of God. As you're turning there, I love this uh card someone sent me recently. It basically was a Happy Mother's Day card, and it said at the top, uh, Stuff that you ask mom. And it said things like, What's for dinner? What time is it? How come? Why not? When is it my turn? Can I have more? Where is it? Will you read this to me? Can I watch TV? Can I play with this? Do I have to go to bed? And that's how the card is at the top. And then at the bottom it says, Stuff I asked Dad, and the question is, where's mom? That has the ring of truth in it when I read that. You know what I mean? It's like uh mom is the linchpin of so much that happens in the home, and moms, we do, we celebrate you today. Your your role is is irreplaceable. Uh your role is magnificent, it is glorious. And uh today I hope to encourage your hearts. But, you know, that card reminds me that motherhood can be somewhat overwhelming. Uh there are questions, questions your children have, questions that you will have. Uh all of life is filled with questions, and we tend to get overwhelmed by the questions and the uh the wanderings of life. You know, you think, where's the money gonna come from at various points in your marriage? I read somewhere that that each child in your home uh between the first grade or kindergarten and twelfth grade is like $300,000. Somebody said, Amen. Yeah, I mean it adds up over time, especially if you have four of these critters, right? And um uh you think about it, and it's it's like, uh, where's the money for college gonna come from? Where's the money for food gonna come from? I've got a kid who's my height and he eats his weight every week. And it's just like it's getting expensive. Gas is expensive. Where's the money gonna come from? And then there are medical problems on top of that. One of my kids is right now wearing a cast. She's fine. It was just a little nothing in her arm, but they're like, let's just put it in a cast just for just to keep it stable. And it's like, there's medical problems, there's cancer problems, there's there's relational problems. Uh, every single family at some point experiences a wayward child or a moment of, okay, how are we gonna navigate this relationship? It's hard. It's draining. If any of you have gone through that, you know what that feels like. It's it's dysfunctional, it's painful, it's not easy. There are marriage problems. One of the hardest things that parents will deal with is their adult children getting married, getting married, and then having problems, and maybe there's even disagreement on who they should marry. And we've got that all sorted out at our house. We've just decided we're we're just gonna do arranged marriages, amen. I don't know how our kids feel about that, but we're gonna start interviewing parents and kids, and we're just gonna work this out. If only it were that easy, you know? It's not. Some are overwhelmed in their home life with desire. I realize that even on this Mother's Day, there are many who are desiring to have children, but for whatever reason, God has not opened the door for that desire. You know, I was struck by this. I put this graph up before, but but in America, and in really the whole world, the fertility rate is just plummeting. Now, this was 2024. It's gotten at an all-time low in 2025. It's gotten even lower, but in America, we're not even at the population replacement rate. And there are all these young couples now struggling to have children. And the question is, what do I do with desire? What do I do when I want something, but God hasn't opened that door, and how do I respond in that? It's not easy. The question God's purpose is in our pain. Some of you, and this is men and women, this is fathers and mothers, this is this is the reality of life. We don't know what to do when there's this quiet hopelessness inside of us. We want something, we're hoping for something, and for whatever reason, God has closed the door, and we don't know what to do with our overwhelming problems. And so today, what I want to do is I want to open to 1 Samuel chapter 1. Today we're going to be looking at the story of Hannah, one of the great mothers of Scripture, and what we're going to see in the story is her surrender. Now, there are several passages in the Bible that show like a pre-birth narrative that that that really there's a large, looming individual, and it talks about the process that led up to their birth. I mean, you think of Jesus, of course, you think of John the Baptist, you think of Moses in the basket, and and and these figures in the Bible that are bigger than life, they get these pre-birth narratives, and really this one is about Samuel, God's faithfulness to the nation of Israel to provide a prophet that would lead them and guide them. And what we see in this passage is the events leading up to Samuel's birth uh with Hannah. And Hannah is one of those individuals where really she's this overwhelmed mother. She's suffering, she's childless, she has a marriage that's not awesome. We'll talk about that. And yet she's just taking hit after hit. Man, she's like Glass Joe. She is just taking it on the chin. And all of a sudden, in her story, she discovers this pathway to surrender, and her answers should become our answers. It's not a self-help book. This is not a manifest your desires. That's not what this is about. What this is about is about surrendering your desires to the Lord and trusting the God who is able. So let's take our Bibles. Let's stand together in honor of God's holy word. 1 Samuel chapter 1, starting in verse 1. It says this. Now, this is just the genealogy, and you just pause here. What do you do when you can't pronounce the names? Just read it confidently like a professional. Amen. Just get through it. Verse 2. He had two wives. And everybody in the room says, Uh-oh. That's not a good beginning. The name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other, Panina. And Panina had children, but Hannah had no children. Now this man used to go up year by year from his city to worship and to sacrifice to the Lord of hosts at Shiloh, where the two sons of Eli, Hophne and Phineas, were priests of the Lord. On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to Panina, his wife, and to all her sons and daughters. But to Hannah he gave a double portion because he loved her, though the Lord had closed her womb. Her rival and her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her, but the Lord had closed her womb. So it went on year by year. And as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she used to provoke her. Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat. And Elk Anna, her husband, said to her, Hannah, why do you weep? And why do you not eat? And why is your heart sad? Am I not more than ten sons? After they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh, Hannah rose. Now Eli, the priest, was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the temple of the Lord. She was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. And she vowed a vow and said, O Lord of hosts, if you would indeed look on the affliction of your servant and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give me your servant a servant will give to your servant a son, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and no razor shall touch his head. And she continued praying before the Lord. Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was speaking in her heart, only her lips moved, and her voice was not heard. Therefore Eli took her to be a drunken woman. And Eli said to her, How long will you go on being drunk? Put away your wine from you. But Hannah answered, No, my Lord, I am a woman troubled in spirit. I haven't I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for all for all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation. Then Eli answered, Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your petition that you've made to him. And he said, Let your servant find favor in your eyes. Then she said, Then the woman went her way and ate, and her face was no longer sad. They rose early in the morning, worshipped before the Lord. Then they went back to their house at Ramah. And Elk Anna knew Hannah, his wife, and the Lord remembered her. And in due time Hannah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Samuel. For she said, I have asked for him from the Lord. Today I want to teach us to confront our sorrows. I want to teach us to confront sorrow with surrender, not with striving. That's really the big idea of this passage. Throughout life, we tend to strive through life. And really, whatever you've come into this room with, whatever sorrow you've come into this room with, I want to challenge you to surrender it to the Lord. We're going to see a pathway to surrender. But really, this passage deals with kind of the problem of pain and theodicy. Really, twice in the text it says that the Lord closed her womb. What do you do with that? The Lord had closed her womb. She's acknowledging this is from the Lord. And so this is the pathway that any of you who are experiencing pain, we've got to get on this journey that she took. Three points. Very simply, we need to surrender to the pain that refines you. The pain that has come to you is purposeful. We're going to see that today. Second, we're going to have to surrender to the posture that raises you. She doesn't end this place moping and sorrowful. She rises, she prays, and she puts on this posture of peacemaking with Eli. Very powerful. She's humble. And then lastly, we're going to see the surrender to the peace that relieves you. Her face gets better before her problem is solved. She experiences the peace of God in the worst of trouble. So that's where we're headed today. May God bless his word. And may God bless all of you this happy Mother's Day. You may be seated. Let's make a start of it with this first point. Let's talk about surrendering to the pain that refines you. Surrendering to the pain that refines you. Now, everything in verses 1 to 8 is showing the pain of life. Verses 1 to 8 is filled with pain, filled with trouble. In fact, almost like every little phrase is just ratcheting up the pain in Hannah's life. Notice how it begins. She's got in a situation where she doesn't have just the greatest marriage ever. Can we just agree on that? This guy's got two wives. Everywhere in Scripture that we see this, it's trouble. This is descriptive, not prescriptive. This is not saying God was okay with this. What this is showing is that her marriage situation was not ideal. This is a contrast. And out of that contrast comes one wife has kids, the other one does not. And this is a society where children are really a status, a blessing from the Lord. This is a to not have children would have been a great shame in that community at that time. It's a sign of God's blessing. And so all of a sudden we realize her situation, she is experiencing this feeling of inadequacy, this feeling of God's not happy with me, or this feeling of shame within the culture. That's what we see initially. In verse 3, we notice that it's chronic. You might write that down. This is a chronic pain. Notice that it says year by year, multiple times in this passage, year by year, they went up to the temple. And this is to show that this is the pattern of her existence. Year by year they go up, no more children. Year by year they go up, they worship, still no children. This is a chronic pattern in their life. No kiss, no answers, and it is emotional. In verses four and five, it gets worse. We see there's this acknowledgement twice that the Lord had closed her womb. Stated twice. I think that's really important. That's showing that this is not a biology issue. This is not like plastics in your food or red dye. This isn't like some sort of uh biology issue or chemical issue. This is strangely and confusingly God's will. How does that work? Well, we see throughout the scriptures that that the act of conception, the gift of conception, it's a miracle from God. In fact, right down Genesis 30, verse 22, we see that God remembered Rachel. God is in a covenant relationship with Jacob's Rachel, his wife Rachel, and it was the Lord who opened her womb. It was the Lord who brought about life. Right down Psalm 127, unless the Lord builds the house, we're reminded that those who build it labor in vain. God does this work of giving us children. It's a gift, it's a blessing from the Lord. And this is really keying in on the problem of pain in our life. What do we do with the pain that comes to us? Why do we have pain? And this passage shows us at least part of the answer. There's more pain here in verses six and seven. Notice with me the conflict. Notice how the other wife is described. She is my rival. She's an irritant. Now, the word rival here, it's the word for your enemy. It's the word for an adversary. And there's this irritant in her life, constantly bringing up bad emotions and pain. Verse 8, we, it gets even worse. I mean, it's just every little phrase. This poor lady is struggling. In verse 8, she's, well, she's got a clueless husband to deal with. This is like everybody loves Raymond type of husband. You know what I mean? This is that husband who just he tries to help. In fact, I think he loves her. In fact, it says that he loved her and gave her a double portion. He truly loves her. And yet he doesn't know how to comfort her. He doesn't know how to meet the issue of the heart. He can't fix her. In fact, he'll say things like, Why do you not eat? He's asking questions. Why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons? Can we just agree? That's very confident of him to say, right? Like this guy's looking in the mirror. This guy's like, I'm the man, right? Why would you not be happy with me? Now, I I realized my place on the totem pole when we started having children. You know what I'm talking about? It's like we had Caleb, and all of a sudden Ashley and the grandmothers swooped in and said, We'll take that baby. Thank you very much. You've done your job. And uh and I realized it's like, okay, go get your own coffee now. You know? It's one of those things where you realize your placement, and there are some needs, there are some desires that a husband cannot meet because a husband is not God. Hannah teaches us all kinds of lessons and her pains and her longings, and her longings show us that there are desires that are in the human heart that only God can meet, and only God can comfort. Now, here's what I appreciate about Hannah. We've looked at her pain. Now, let's appreciate together how she deals with her pain, how she sees her pain. Notice with me that she goes to the house of the Lord and she's honest with her pain. She's not hiding it. Notice she goes to the house of the Lord, she's weeping, she's not eating, like she acknowledges something is not right. And this is so refreshing to me because I think in our circles, in our society, we can be so fake. It's like we can put on this face and we greet each other with these little trite statements. How are you today? I'm doing great, I'm fine. And it's just not true. You and I tend to put on these empty phrases and these empty looks, and we cover the pain that God has brought into our life. And we struggle with honesty. We do. We just struggle being real with each other. Like, like, how how refreshing and shocking would it be if you asked someone how they're doing and they looked at you and said, terrible. There's something refreshing in that. There's something real in that. There's something that smacks of truth and honesty, and I don't see a lot of that today. Hannah teaches us this raw honesty. I'll never forget this sermon. I've told you about it before. I was watching, this was like 20 years ago, I was watching John Piper, and he was preaching at Bethlehem Church in Minneapolis, and he got up one Sunday morning, and right before he brings the word, he stands behind the pulpit and he says, This morning, my wife and I had one of the biggest fights we've ever had in our marriage. She yelled at me. I yelled at her. We were both ungodly in our activity and our words. And I walked out of the house and I slammed the door. That's where it's at in the Piper household today. Let's get to the text. There's something so attractively real about that honest assessment of the problems of life. And there's something for us to recover here. You know, we're called as believers to share our burdens with each other, to counsel one another. And I always want this to be a place where we can say it's okay to not be okay. And it's okay to share that you're not okay. It's okay to counsel each other in and through the pains that are going on. That's why we have a small group ministry. Our small group ministry offers that closeness and that camaraderie. Hannah teaches us to face our pain with honesty, and that's the question for you and me today. Have we done that? Have we identified our pain? Have we wept in our pain? Have we named the pain? It's okay to say, I'm not, oh, I'm not doing okay. And we've got to create that kind of atmosphere in this place. Elkanah teaches us that human beings are not the solution for the heart's greatest desire. Elkanah teaches us charity and kindness with the hurts of the people around us. Elkana teaches us tenderness because life is very hard. Life is very painful, and we've got to be the kind of people who put on charity and put on mercy. Back when I was first starting ministry, I was very rigid. I was very strong in the sense I would say, Why aren't people showing up to youth group on time? I was a youth pastor and I was looking around. Why don't they show up on time? Now I've had four kids. I've had four kids, and it is a weekly miracle that we get to church anywhere close to time. All the parents said, Amen. Like, and so I look at people now entirely different. Like 20-something years later, I'm looking around and I'm saying, Whoa, you're here, and you're only a few minutes late. That's a I'm witnessing a miracle. It's a blessing from God, and I'm just cheering them on. It's like we've got to put on more charity towards people. We've got to realize that people are bearing very, very difficult burdens in their life. Hannah, this may be the most central point. This may be the heart of the issue in the text today. Twice it says, the Lord closed her womb. And notice what it says here. Hannah sees her pain, I believe, from the Lord. Hannah is looking at the problem, and she actually attributes this, those who are writing this attributes this to the Lord. The Lord closed her womb. And what this is showing us is that you will suffer through life. You will have burdens through life, but none of that is out of the control of God. God is omniscient, he is outside of time, he knows about the things that are coming into your life. And here's the truth: He sends things into your life with great purpose, not to break you, but to shape you. Write that down. He sends these trials into your life not to break you, but to shape you. And we've got to start looking at our next disaster in that light. How many of you have been watching this guy? He's a former senator of the United States. His name is Ben Sass. How many of you have seen the story, the Ben Sass story? Have you been watching this? This man is dying of cancer before the whole world. He was given stage four diagnosis, pancreatic cancer. You're only going to live a few more months, and this guy is dying. Before the whole world. This is one of the interviews, and his face is kind of red, but the most recent interviews that he's having on camera are kind of like the image has had to be a little blurred here because it looks like someone's almost taken a blowtorch to his face. It's just the cancer treatments are just eating him alive. And he realizes, I'm going to die. And he's asked by the interviewer, How are you processing this? How are you thinking through all of this? And he says, Do I love it? No, I hate it. But I see this as from the Lord, and there is a severe mercy in this, and that most people don't know the day of their death. I know mine is impending. And it's made me cherish things like dinner with my family and not traveling and not staying in hotels seven to nine times a month and being with my kids. And I've just cherished these things. And then he quotes R. C. Sproull and he says, There are no maverick molecules. He sees this great trial that's come into his life as from the Lord and for the good of him and for the good of his family. How are you and your wife processing this? The interview asks. And he says, you know, we're both Christians. And we know there's going to be a period of separation, but it's a short separation. I'll see you there and I'll catch up with you there. I watched that interview and I was like, whoa. That's amazing that someone would have that perspective on pain. But that's the perspective all of us have to have. Do you see your closed door, your closed relationship, your closed opportunity as from the Lord? The job that you didn't get, the marriage that wasn't what you thought it would be, the broken relationships in your life? Can you say with James in James chapter 1, count it all joy, my brothers, when you face trials of various kinds, for you know, for we know, that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness, it produces endurance and steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect that you might be perfect and complete and lacking in nothing. Can you see the produce, the production of pain? Can you see the purpose of it in your life? In Romans 8, we know Romans 8:28, it's one of the most blessed verses that God works all things together for good, but we fail to read verse 29. What's the good? What's the good? Sometimes we view the good as this far out thing that we don't see yet. No, the good is defined in verse 29. It's that we might be conformed to the image of Christ right now in your pain, in your trial. God is making you and shaping you to look like Jesus Christ, which is your greatest good. No, friends, we've got to accept, we've got to surrender to this refining pain and even learn to thank God for the pain. That's the first path to surrender. Number two, if you're taking notes. Number two, second, we need to surrender to the posture that raises you. Notice there is a physical and a spiritual raising that's happening in Hannah's life. Notice it with me. In verse 9, it says Hannah rose. Now, she doesn't rise in self-pity, she doesn't rise in attack, she gets better, not bitter. She doesn't get bitter, she gets better. She rises in worship. Notice all the things. First, she's going to rise in prayer. Write that one down. First, she's praying, and notice the three elements of her prayer. She's trusting in God's power. Notice the just opener of her prayer. Oh Lord of hosts. What is that? Somebody asked me what that phrase was like a week or two ago, right over here. They said, I read my Bible and I see this phrase, O Lord of hosts. What does that mean? And I said, Well, it's really the Lord of armies. It's an acknowledgement of the power of God. It's used 260 times in the Old Testament. So our God is all-powerful. Our God is able to deliver. Our God has the ability to change circumstances, to control heavenly and earthly forces, angel armies. And so God is over your boss, He's over your health, He's over your cancer, He's over your failed relationships, He's all powerful. She prays, acknowledging that. She also prays believing in covenant love. Write that one down. She prays believing in the relational covenant love of God. Notice those two phrases. She says, Remember me. And then she calls herself twice, your servant. She's kind of burrowing into the relationship. She has a relationship with God, and she's saying, God, based on the covenant that we have, based on the relationship, I'm gonna burrow into that and I'm gonna trust that you are working relationally good things for me. It's massive. She calls herself the servant. It's a posture of humility. I trust you. Notice also she's pledging, third way she prays, she's pledging her faithfulness, and she gives this sort of this Nazarite vow for Samuel. She devotes him to the Lord. She realizes that what God wants in the midst of her trial is not her happiness, but her holiness. Write that down. What God wants in the midst of your trial is not necessarily your happiness, it's your holiness. And she's committing her family to a holy walk with God. She says, I'm not going to let a razor touch his head, and she's going to devote him to be a priest all the days of his life. I will lead my family well. I will take steps towards you. What God wants in your life, and this is how you ought to pray, is your holiness, not your happiness. That's a hard shift to make. But if you can see that, what happens is you will experience satisfaction. Notice she not only rises in prayer, she also rises in humility. Of course, we see that phrase, she's a servant multiple times, but also we see this event in verse 9 where Eli, this priest, misjudges her. Now, Eli is, let's just say he's not a great priest. In fact, it brings up that his sons are serving as priests, Hoffney and Phineas. And we learn later that Hophani and Phineas are actually having relationships with the women in the court around the tabernacle. And so these are not great guys. These are not great priests. Something has gone wrong in Eli's family. In fact, everything in the text is showing us he's not awesome. From the very first introduction to him, what we see is that he's sitting down. He's on the seat. He's sitting on the seat beside the doorport post of the temple. Now, the tabernacle wasn't supposed to have any seats. Wasn't supposed to have any other furniture than what God called for it, and there's a purpose for that. The priest isn't, his job is never done. He's always sacrificing, he's always doing the work, right? And so there's always something to do. You're never to sit down. And that's why, by the way, it's so significant that Jesus, the great high priest, he sits at the right hand of majesty. Why? It's done. Mission accomplished, the sacrifice has been made, the job is done. For Eli, the job's not done. He wasn't supposed to be sitting. And so he's not exactly the picture of a great priest that you and I would want to follow. In fact, here he's not discerning well. In fact, he's making a false accusation. And I want you to see this here. He's misjudging her. Have you ever been misjudged? You ever had somebody judge your motive? You ever had someone lie to you or lie about you to slander you? Has that ever happened? You ever had a misunderstanding? I remember last year we we took our big trip. We're taking one this week. We're headed to the Reformation tour. Last year we took one to Greece, and and this was this was funny, but not funny. I look down at my phone at some point on the trip, and it's my son Caleb texting this massive group. And he's like, Why am I getting these messages? But he uses a bad word. And I'm like, man, it's true what they say about pastors' kids. And it wasn't Caleb, he got a new phone, and so some random number out there is like receiving the text message from the group, and they're like, who's texting me? What is all this about? And so the previous week he just got a new phone number. Right? And so I'm like, oh, I got some explaining to do. There's a misunderstanding that all these people think Caleb is sending out this message with profanity. And so it was one of those moments where I had to, like, okay, it wasn't Caleb. It wasn't Caleb. And misunderstandings are hard because we can immediately just run in a direction with assumptions. And that's what's happening here with Eli. Notice Eli here. Um, he's sitting down there and he's misjudging her. Only her lips moved. And he pipes up and he says, You're a drunken woman. How long will you go on being drunk? Put your wine away from you. Eli reminds us that we need to be very slow to assign motives. We need to be very slow to judge people. You do not see the whole picture. You do not know what they're going through. And you do not know the truth. But notice Hannah, precious Hannah. Sweet peacemaking Hannah. She is clarifying. She doesn't attack back. She's respectful. Notice that her rise includes peacemaking. Says that she calls him my Lord. No, my Lord. She's respectful. She says, I'm troubled in spirit. Let me explain myself. I've got to give explanation of this. I was pouring out my spirit. And in verse 16, do not regard me, your servant, as a worthless woman. For all along I've been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation. She's respectful. She's clarifying. She's gracious. And all this works. I mean, in verse 17, Eli answered, Then go in peace. May the God of Israel grant your petition. She brings peace. So easy in our pain to become bitter rather than better. It's so easy in our pain to avoid our calling of being a peacemaker. She's gracious and she's even secure through misunderstanding. My favorite memory of this story was when this would have been 2009, 16 plus years ago, when Ashley and I went to Shiloh. That's where this happened. It happened in Shiloh. This is what Shiloh looks like today. There's this tell of a hill, and the temple, the tabernacle was set up here on top of the hill that hadn't made it to Jerusalem yet. And so this is where the people of God came to sacrifice and to worship. And Ashley and I were a young couple. My son is 16 years old. We had no children at that time. And what this passage is calling us to is this kind of surrender, that surrender that Hannah experienced. And when we heard this story there on location, Ashley and I just had some time to just get away, just the two of us, and pray. And we climbed up to this observatory at the top of the hill, looking out, seeing what they must have seen back then. And we prayed together. And we just said, Lord, we we have these desires and we're going to hold them like this. We would love to start a family. We would love to have children. And we prayed and we wept before the Lord. And I kid you not, like a couple weeks later, we found out we were pregnant with Caleb. It was like the Lord immediately answered. He didn't have to do that. But isn't it the kindness of God that sometimes he'll wait on your surrender? He'll wait on this moment of surrender before he gives the answer. I've seen that pattern so many times. It's like for Hannah, she has to go through this rugged, gritty process of surrendering her desires and say, Lord, not my will. And sometimes you've got to release your grip before he'll release a gift. Sometimes that's just how it goes. And the question that Hannah reminds us is, what's your posture? What is the posture of your life? Have you fallen before the Lord in your desires? Have you done it in humility? Have you done it year by year? Have you become sweeter in the midst of your bitterness? Have you fallen in humble prayer? This is the pattern for us, and there's a final pattern. After point one and point two of surrender, we need to surrender our pain. We need to surrender to the posture. Lastly, we need to surrender to the peace that relieves you. I want you to notice this in verse 18. She ate and was no longer sad. Hannah's face changes before her circumstance changes. Do you see that? Like she's not pregnant yet. She doesn't have a baby yet. The Lord has not answered her prayer yet, but her face changes before the circumstance changed. That's amazing. Why is she why is she so changed? Is she trusting in Eli's words and the blessing that Eli pronounces? Probably not. Eli's not the greatest priest. I don't know that I would trust that. Is she trusting in her husband that he's better than ten sons? Probably not. He's over in the corner looking at himself in a mirror. You know what I mean? And so probably not. She's trusting in the covenant-keeping God. Write down the word Hesed. Hesed is a word that's used throughout the Old Testament. It is the loyal, loving, covenant-keeping nature of who God is. That's what she's trusting in. It's a relationship. And don't miss this. She experiences that peace in waiting. Verse 20. In due time. When did she get there? When did she experience peace? When did the prayer get answered? In due time. Is that months? Is that years? I don't know. It's in due time. But she learned to trust the Lord through the pain. I was listening to Jim Cimbala up at Brooklyn Tabernacle years ago, and he shared the story of a lady who came in 11 years. She was estranged from her daughter. Her daughter was kind of out of control, living a wild life. 11 years estranged. And she would come to prayer night every single Wednesday, and she would pray, pray, pray for 11 years.

unknown 37:26

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

Year by year. And on that 11th year, her daughter finally got right with the Lord. Her daughter finally became born again. But Jim Cymbala said this. He said, the greatest transformation was not the night that her daughter came to saving faith. Her face changed far before circumstances changed. It was when she realized that the Lord is able and the Lord is sovereign and the Lord is trustworthy over my life. And so her face changed before her circumstances changed. And that's what we have to live. Now, what do we apply from this sermon? I think for all of us, this sermon teaches us that we need to know that God's working in and through our pain. We need to know that God is working in ways that you can't always see. In your exhaustion, in your childlessness, in your disaster, in your job loss, in your cancer. You can't have a situation big enough to where God's not working in it. And you need to know that. Some of you are working through issues of addiction. Some of you are working through issues of relational trauma. And you need to know that God has a plan to work in the midst of that. Maybe you even have enemies that are attacking you. So did she. And it's painful. But even those enemies are using us, being used as providential power to shape you. Almost like a grain of sand in a clam, right? In an oyster, right? You're being shaped. You're being pearls are being produced in your trauma. And so consider even your enemies to be a providential irritant for your good. I think this passage also calls us to be active in our pain. Notice what the passage doesn't say. The passage doesn't say she moped in the house and cried and stayed there for ten years. The passage speaks of her activity. She rose. She got up. She prayed. She was respectful to Eli, this sorry priest and his sorry sons, and she's still speaking to him with honor and respect, and she's not bitter. She's quite active. God is calling you in the midst of disaster to have active faith. So rise, take a step forward, pray like crazy, pray like Hannah prayed, and keep trusting God through your pain. I think this passage, I think this passage reminds us to pray for our children, like we just did. You know, I'm 42 years old. I um I think about that more than I ever have. Most weeks when I drive into the church or drive home from church, it's usually in the morning, I'll I'll call my mom or my dad just to check in on him. Dad, how are you doing? You know, how's life? How's health? How's how's different things? And inevitably I'll begin telling him about something going on in my life and that he can pray for. And he he usually ends the time together the same way. He says, Son, I'm praying for you. He says, I just want you to know that. Son, I'm I'm praying for you. I'll tell you, I'm I've got four kids of my own, and I words can't even express what that means to me. Your children need you praying for them. Your adult children need you praying for them. If they're going to be successful, if they're going to be used of God, it's going to be because they are lifted up by the prayers of their parents. God is going to use that. You need to be praying for their holiness. You need to be praying for their spouse. Ashley and I do that all the time. We pray for our kids' spouses right now. We've been doing that since they were born. Praying for their holiness, praying that God would keep them and care for them and cultivate them. God uses the power of a praying mother and a praying father in ways, in mysterious ways that we can't fully grasp. But we need to be doing that. Lastly, this passage teaches us the practice of waiting on faith, waiting in faith. Sometimes God wants us, he waits for us to release our grip and submit things to him. He waits for us to release our grip before he grants our gift. There's a lesson to learn. Year by year. This story happens year by year. And some of you are right in the middle of that right now. Don't underestimate the power of your trust, your yearly trust, your yearly prayer. That's what God uses. And so surrender. Don't strive. You and I need to have the practice of surrendering. You know, as we close today and the band comes out, I love this poem I heard this week. It's really about a mother who did all of these things and the effect of that mother's life. It goes like this The young mother set her foot on the path of life. She asked, Is the way long? And the guide said, Yes. The way is hard. Yes, and the way is hard. And you will be old before you reach the end of it, but but the end will be better than the beginning. The young mother was happy, and she would not believe that anything could be better than these years. So she played with her children. She fed them and bathed them and taught them how to tie their shoes and ride a bike and reminded them to feed the dog and do their homework and brush their teeth. The sun shone on them, and the young mother cried, Nothing could be lovelier than this. Then the nights came. And the storms and the path was sometimes dark, and the children shook with fear and cold. And the mother drew close and covered them with her arms. The children said, Mother, we're not afraid, for you are near, and no harm can come. And the morning came. And there was a hill ahead. So the children climbed the hill, but they grew weary, and the mother was weary. But at all times the mother said to the children, A little patience, and we'll be there. So the children climbed, and as they climbed, they learned to weather the storm. And with this, she gave them strength to face the world. Year after year, she showed them compassion and understanding and hope. But most of all, unconditional love. And when they reached the top, they said, Mother, we could not have done it without you. The days went on, the weeks and months, the years, and the mother grew old and she became little and bent. And her children were tall and strong and walked with courage. And the mother, when she lay down at night, looked up at the stars and said, This day is better than the last, for my children, my children have learned much and are now passing those traits on to their children. And when the way became rough for her, they lifted her and gave her strength, just as she had given them hers. And one day they came to a hill, and beyond the hill they could not, they could see a shining road and a golden gate flung wide. And the mother said, I have reached the end of my journey, and now I know the end is better than the beginning, for my children can walk with dignity and pride, with their heads held high, and so can their children after them. And the children said, You will always walk with us, mother. Even when you've gone through the gates, they stood and watched her as she went on alone, and the gates closed after her. And they said, We cannot see her, but she is still with us. A mother is more than a memory, she's a living presence. And what we see in this passage is that a mother surrendered reaches beyond their own life. It creates a legacy for living for generations to come. And every one of us needs to strive for those kind of qualities. Now, with your heads bowed, with your eyes closed, I want to give you one last thought. Motherhood's a gift from God. But you can't do the things that we're talking about in this passage without a relationship to Jesus Christ. Hannah operated from relationship. She trusted in the relationship that she had already established with God. If you've not done that today, I want you to know the gospel. You see, the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is that all have sinned, all have fallen short of the glory of God. You have sinned that has alienated you, separated you from God. But the good news is that God sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to be the way maker, to bridge the gap. Jesus stepped into the world to live a perfect life so he could be a perfect sacrifice. He died on the cross in your place and for your sins. And he rose from the dead with this offer. Here's the offer. If you would trust in his work and look away from your goodness, your work, what would happen is you would gain the gift of everlasting life. Do you need to do that today? Cry out to God right where you're at and say, God, have mercy on me as sinner. I repent of my sin. I repent of my unbelief, and I turn in saving faith to Jesus Christ to trust Him that He has done the work that no human being can do. That He has died for our sins. The moment you do that, the Bible says if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart, you'll be saved. If you'll confess that Jesus is Lord, you'll enter into that relationship and you'll be able to handle trials in a whole new way. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the reality of this passage. Thank you for the gospel that comes out in the story of Hannah. Lord, we thank you that you have loved us and Father, that you have drawn near to us in the gospel. We ask now, Lord, that we would become better, not bitter. We ask, Lord, that our trials would overwhelm us so much so that they push us to you. And we find ourselves satisfied in you, not in our circumstances. And so, Lord, we love and thank you. We submit ourselves to you today in prayer, with our posture, with our pain, with our peace. And may the people of God here today leave in the peace of God. We ask this in Jesus' name. And all God's people say it together. Amen. Let's stand.