[One-Verse Meditation]

1 Samuel 1:18 (NIV) “She said, ‘May your servant find favor in your eyes.’ Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast.”

[Meditation]

Reading Hannah’s story, one might wonder why God would give such great suffering to one woman. The Bible clearly states the cause of her suffering: “because the LORD had closed her womb.” In those days, for a married woman to be childless was to be without a future. How can this God be a good God? It is a question anyone might ask from Hannah’s perspective, and from our own perspective in the midst of suffering today.

But here lies a paradox. It was her “broken heart,” which could not be comforted by anyone, that led her to God. Her prayer was no longer a request for revenge against Peninnah or for her own glory. “If you give me a son, I will give him to the LORD”—a prayer for a son transformed into a prayer of dedication, not possession; in other words, a prayer seeking God’s glory, not her own pride.

The Lord heard her prayer and answered through Eli the priest: “Go in peace.” Today’s verse describes the scene that follows. Although there was not yet any sign, Hannah believed the word of promise and cast off her place of sorrow. She came to enjoy true peace through faith in a “good God” first.

“She went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast.”

Herein lies a mystery of faith that runs through the books of Ruth and Samuel. The very time of suffering, when “the LORD had closed her womb,” paradoxically becomes the place where one “experiences” the goodness of God most deeply. Without that time, God’s goodness would have remained a cold doctrine, known only in the head. But now, it has become a faith experienced with her whole being. It is for this very purpose that God works in our lives today.

[Prayer]

Lord, help me not to forget that the place where I stand right now is the very time to enjoy Your goodness. I desire my every day to be a life of praying that Your will, not mine, be done in my life. Let this be another blessed day of walking in that prayer of faith. Amen.
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[Daily Reading]

1 Samuel 1:1-18