Peninnah and Hannah have had quite the battle going on year after year. While both of these wives of Elkanah are sinners, Peninnah acts on selfish ambition to the detriment of those around her. She is a contrast to the broken vessel of Hannah, who eventually chooses to act upon faith.
Elkanah blessed Hannah with love and double portions, revealing no grudge against her in their childless marriage. Yet, Hannah allows herself to sink away from faith in God. As Peninnah provokes her to tears each year, Hannah accepts despair as an appropriate state of mind in her relationship with God. She is distracted from worship because of what she feels she is missing out on. Honestly, her future was bleak outside of God's hand, for sons would carry on their family inheritance within the Israelite tribe. In that day, it was normal for women to outlive their husbands, so widows were common. Sons would be a boast of God's blessing upon a family, as well as breadwinners able to care for their aging parents and widows. Hannah had a mountain of evidence waiting to affirm her despair.
Yet, one day her husband challenged her despair by offering the blessing of himself. He suggested to her that what she needed was right in front of her. Her husband's willingness to alter the family dysfunction opened a door for healing in Hannah. I assume that God whispered into Hannah's heart, moving her to believe that what she needs IS right in front of her. Next, Hannah went straight for the Tabernacle where she poured out her heart to the Lord. Hannah loved her husband, but her greatest need was the Lord.
Ladies, as much as we may want a man who gives of himself and desires to be our pursuer, there is no replacement for the centrality of Jesus Christ in our heart. If I were Hannah, it would have been so easy to rest in the man's assuring words, not moving to a place of active faith in God. I may have simply rest in the advantage of a supportive husband. I admire Hannah for acting dependently on God to rule over her situation. More than comfort in her husband's love, Hannah allowed her desperation to become God's business. As women, we are responsible for seeing that we choose to yoke ourselves with men who love the Lord and serving Him in their masculinity, but who also push us to greater faith in God instead of allowing us to rely on him for all of our needs. (How exhausting would that be for him to bear!)
You've got to love the expression of Hannah's heart in the temple. The priest confronted her as if she were drunk, but Hannah confessed complete dependence on God. Her expressive prayer has an audience of one. Though it was her prior reason for hiding in shame, Hannah now shared honestly with the most honored man in all of Israel, the High Priest. She had no reason for shame any more, because the Lord had accepted her into His house and heard her plea.
We have no reason to cower in shame. Those who approach the Lord through the High Priest (for Hannah it was Eli, for us it is Jesus) have appropriately approached God. There is no reason to hide our expression of love for God, nor relent when the highest of the high come before us. We stand secure in the righteousness of Christ and may rest in the peace of having our place before God. As Hannah did, so we too may go our way, eat, and have a face that no longer bears the sadness of sin's weight. Truth lives in our hearts and is replacing the lies of the evil one.
© 2006 by Kendra Hinkle.
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