Mother’s Day 2022 – Hannah: From Sadness to Gladness

Several of us have lost our moms lately, and we often feel the loss or vacuum that their departure has caused. With all their shortcomings and failures, most of us can say “We had the best mom in the world!”

My mom went to be with the Lord last December the 16^th and I was blest to be by her side when she entered the presence of the Lord. Her sufferings included the early loss of her mom as a teenager, emotional struggles due to the Holocaust years, and deprivations throughout her life, including several years in a nursing home.

But instead of focusing on my own mom, I would like to share with you the true story of a great mom from the Old Testament. Her name is Hannah.

The account is found in I Samuel chapters 1 – 3, where we find 2 major emphases of this godly mother:

I. The 1^st major emphasis of this godly mother is one of SADNESS

1. She lived in an environment of polygamy (1:2)
2. She lived with her “competition’s” provocation (1:6, 7)
3. She was childless (1:2, 5, 6), contrary to the desire of every Jewish mother
4. She was misunderstood by her own “spiritual” leader Eli (1:14)

Notice the (6) descriptions of her sadness:

• she wept and did not eat (1:7, 8)
• her heart was grieved (1:8)
• she was in bitterness of soul and wept in anguish (1:10)
• she was in affliction (1:11)
• a woman of sorrowful spirit (1:15)
• she experienced complaint and abundance of grief (1:16)

II. We must now hasten on to the 2^nd major emphasis of this godly mom – – one of GLADNESS

1. After Eli reassured her (1:17), “her face was no longer sad”
2. Her heart rejoiced in the LORD (2:1)
3. God gave her the deepest desire of her heart – – she bore a son (1:20)
4. We dare not miss several related observations:
   1. She promised the child to the LORD in advance (1:11)
   2. She had the blessings of her spiritual director (1:17)
   3. She continued to worship the LORD (1:19), and HE remembered her
   4.  She was a woman of persistence (1:7) and prayer (1:10, 20; 2:1)
   5. To make a “long story short,” she delivered one of the great prophets of Israel (3:19-21)

So, can you see the pattern of what it takes to bring a sad mom to the place where she is glad? Perhaps I can put it in simple words:

COMMITMENT to the LORD – – CONTINUANCE and CONNECTEDNESS with the LORD. This displayed her CONSECRATION to HIM!

As I was concluding this message, I came across a little poem put out by Moments with The Book publishers^[1]. I think you will like it, especially as we CONTEMPLATE the life of Hannah, as well as that of our own:

HAPPY MOTHERS’ DAY!!

Footnotes

[1] Moments With The Book is a non-profit organization whose purpose is to spread God’s Word to the world through the printed page and other media. Our desire is that the Lord will be glorified in the salvation of precious souls and the strengthening of believers in the Christian faith as a result of reading the Scripturally-sound literature which Moments With The Book produces and distributes.