1 Samuel 1:1-2:11, How Do You Get to The Top? , Dr. John B. Carpenter

1 Samuel 1:1-2:11 and the Problem of Getting to the Top

We're 1 Samuel chapter 1 verses 1 to chapter 2 verse 11.

Hear the word of the Lord.

There was a certain man of Raphaim Zophim of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Elkanah, the son of Jehoram, son of Elihu, son of Tohu, son of Zoph, and Ephrathite. He had two wives. The name of the one was Hannah and the name of the other Peninnah.

And Peninnah 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, Hophni and Phinehas, were priests of the Lord.

On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to Peninnah, 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.

And her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her because the Lord had closed her womb. So it went on year by year. 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 Elkanah, 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 to you than 10 sons? After they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh, Hannah arose and 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, Oh, Lord of Hosts, if you will indeed look on the affliction of your servant and remember me and not forget your servant, but 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.

As 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 your wine away from you. But Hannah answered, No, my Lord. I am a woman troubled in spirit. 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 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 have made to him.

And she said, Let your servant find favor in your eyes. Then the woman went her way and ate, and her face was no longer sad. They rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord. Then they went back to their house at Ramah.

And Elkanah 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. The man Elkanah and all his house went up to offer to the Lord the yearly sacrifice and to pay his vow.

But Hannah did not go up, for she said to her husband, As soon as the child is weaned, I will bring him so that he may appear in the presence of the Lord and dwell there forever. Elkanah, her husband, said to her, Do what seems best to you.

Wait until you have weaned him. Only may the Lord establish his word. So the woman remained and nursed her son until she weaned him. And when she had weaned him, she took him up with her along with a three-year-old bull, an ephah flower, and a skin of wine.

And she brought him to the house of the Lord at Shiloh. And the child was young. Then they slaughtered the bull, and they brought the child to Eli. And she said, Oh, my Lord, as you live, my Lord, I am the woman who was standing here in your presence praying to the Lord.

For this child I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition that I made to him. Therefore, I have lent him to the Lord. As long as he lives, he is lent to the Lord, and he worshiped the Lord there.

And Hannah prayed and said, My heart exalts at the Lord. My strength is exalted in the Lord. My mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice in your salvation. There is none holy like the Lord. There is none beside you.

There is no rock like our God. Talk no more so very proudly. Let not arrogance come from your mouth. For the Lord is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength.

Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger. The barren has born seven, but she who has many children is forlorn. The Lord kills and brings to life.

He brings down to shield and raises up. The Lord makes poor and makes rich. He brings low and he exalts. He raises up the poor from the dust. He lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor.

For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and on them he has set the world. He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness, for not by might shall a man prevail.

The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces. Against them, he will thunder in heaven. The Lord will judge the ends of the earth. He will give strength to his king and exalt the power of his anointed.

Then Elkanah went home to Ramah, and the boy ministered to the Lord in the presence of Eli, the priest. May the Lord add his blessings to the reading of his holy word. Well, how do you get to the top?

How do you get to be a high flyer? Is that your goal? Of course, that depends on what you want to be the top of. Maybe it's business. Well, it'd be a billionaire tycoon like Warren Buffett, who was a few years back anyway, the richest man in America.

Buffett says to invest in something that others want, that you can see why they want it, and we can see why others will want ice cream. So Buffett owns Dairy Queen. We can see why others would want the news.

So Buffett owns the Danville Register and Bee, and a lot of other newspapers. Want to be on top in the business world? Well, provide something people want. Work hard, invest your profits, expand. Several of you are here in Danville in order to provide Chinese food, which is something people want.

Smart.

How about athletics? How do you get to be a top athlete? Now, while I wasn't a top athlete myself, I had a coach who knew top athletes. He had coached NCAA All-Americans in every event for track and field, and coached the USA track and field Olympic team at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

To be a top athlete, you need talent, hard work. You need a team. You need a coach to help you train. Now, I wonder whether there's something else, some other personality or character traits that maybe top athletes have, the rest of us don't.

They kind of all share together. That's what makes them the top. So I asked my coach, we were returning from a meet one day, driving back. I asked my coach, what are those Olympic athletes like? He just said, they're just like regular guys.

That's about it, that's all he says. How about in academics? Now, I can't say I've gotten to the top in academics, but I have seen the top. I was a teaching assistant for a Nobel Prize winner at the University of Chicago.

Now, to get to the top in academics and scholarship, you have to have good grades, obviously, but also to have graduated from some of the best schools. Unlike business or sports, in which you can start really from nowhere, like Warren Buffett, who came out of Omaha, Nebraska, or Usain Bolt, who came out of a small town in Jamaica.

In academics, at least by your bachelor's degree, you need to have come out of an elite university. Now, I've never seen someone at the top in academics coming out of Piedmont Community College. Not anything against that or any other community college, but in order to get recognized as a top student, top scholar, the people who are looking, who are doing the recognizing, will only look at elite schools.

You can complain about that, but that's just the way it is. Maybe you don't want to be a top in academics, maybe you want to be top in business, or you just want to be able to get a good job that pays well.

And a community college is a lot cheaper, and it won't hurt your job prospects, and it won't, by the way. But that's fine, that's fine, but it means that you have to choose, and pretty early on, what you want to be the top of.

How do you get to be the top? Now, many people assume that church is, at least in part, for help giving you the secrets to making it to the top. You're hoping I'll give you the secrets to how you can be the best in business, or.

Sports, or whatever.

People who want to be high flyers, who want to be successful, or raise kids, who can make it to the top, they want to hear how God can help them do that, help them be a high flyer in the business world, or a sports star, or to get into an Ivy League school.

People come looking for the secrets to make it to the top, and yet, what they hear of the gospel is to make it to the top, you need a king who goes to the bottom, who is raised from the dead. And we see that here, 1 Samuel, in four parts.

The Problem of Hannah’s Barrenness and Rivalry

First, the problem, second, the prayer, third, the proclamation, and finally, the praise. Well, first, the problem. How do you get to the top? Is that your problem? How am I going to get there? Now, if you're a wife in a marriage, when you're not the only wife, that's a problem right there, but you need children.

The problem is that Hannah had no children. Now, we might think the problem was polygamy, and that is a problem, as we see here. Now, skeptics sometimes accuse the Bible of commending polygamy, but the truth is that probably every time, I can't think of an exception in the Bible, in which we're given any insight into what's going on in these marriages with multiple wives, we say, man, they got problems.

Now, there's a man in the hill country of Ephraim where we've just come from in Judges, at the end of Judges. The history here in 1 Samuel begins flowing out of the end of Judges. His name was Elkanah.

He must have been a wealthy, prominent man because his genealogy is given for four generations back. And, of course, he has two wives. They are Peninnah and Hannah. Peninnah is fertile. Hannah isn't. Every year, the whole family would go to Shiloh, where the tabernacle was.

They went there to worship the Lord. And notice he's called the Lord of Hosts in verse 3. Now, that term is used 261 times in the Bible. And this is the very first, in chapter 1, verse 3, is the very first one of those times.

The Lord, it's all capital letters. It means it's Yahweh. He's the self-existent, covenant-making God. And of hosts is the translation of the Hebrew word saboth. We just sang it in a mighty fortress.

Lord Saboth, his name, and he must win the battle. Saboth means armies, referring to God's armies of angels and the saints. In other words, he's the God of the armies of heaven. He has armies, plural, at his command.

The Elkanah family with a man, his two wives, a bunch of kids trailing after their mother, Hannah notably with no one to look after, all go to Shiloh to sacrifice to the Lord of Hosts. Although the sacrifices were sacrificial, that is taking something from you, they were also usually a time for a feast, probably a good time.

Unless it was a whole burnt offering, the offerings were given to the Lord. The blood was drained from the animal. The fat was burned to the Lord. The priest would take a portion. And after that, the rest is returned to the offerer for him to eat.

And so if you bring a bull, big animal, you can then have a big barbecue. You have a lot of meat left over. There should be plenty of meat for the whole family. A sacrifice then, besides being worshipful, can be an enjoyable family event with wasi, unless, of course, if your husband's other wife is a rival who's provoking and irritating and mocking you because you have no children.

And she does. That's not so enjoyable. That's the problem. Elkanah takes his family on their yearly trip to the tabernacle. He sacrifices his animal. And then when it's done, he distributes the meat to everyone in his family, to Peninnah, his other wife, and all their kids in verse 4.

But in verse 5, he notably gives a double portion to Hannah because he says he loved her. When Elkanah makes a show out of giving Hannah twice as much meat as Peninnah, she retaliates in verse 6 by provoking her, Hannah, provoking Hannah grievously to irritate her, mocking her, insulting her, infertile Hannah, whatever.

She's called Hannah's rival in verse 6. And that was their relationship. Rivals, not sister wives. I've heard people trying to describe polygamous marriages. They're sister wives.

They get along like sisters.

Yeah, not anything like that. Try to make polygamy look good. It was a rivalry. Now, notice twice in two consecutive verses, we're told the Lord closed her.

Womb.

In verses 5 and 6, the Lord had closed her womb. That's repeated, you know, one verse after another. Not because they forgot or the copyist, I think, copied it twice back. I don't think it's anything like that.

It's on purpose. It's repeated to emphasize that Hannah's problem was under God's control. It wasn't nature that's out of control. Now, there may have been a natural cause for it, but if there was, the natural cause was God's instrument.

God had caused the problem. Now, this went on for years. The family would go to their yearly pilgrimage to Shiloh. It should have been a good time, capped off by a delicious picnic, barbecue on the grounds of the tabernacle.

But Peninnah kept irritating Hannah so much so that Hannah didn't feel like eating in verse 7. Elkanim is meaning well, I think, I guess. But in verse 7, starting verse 8, actually, he sounds like a bonehead trying to comfort Hannah.

He says, Hannah, why do you weep? Because I have no kids and this horrible second wife you got won't stop irritating me. Why do you not eat? I lost my appetite. Why is your heart sad? After all this time, you still don't get it?

Am I not more to you than 10 sons? Nice try, I guess. But no, that's an apples and oranges comparison. Husbands do not fill the place for children. Sorry, it didn't work that way. She probably cried harder after that.

The problem, Elkanim, is Hannah has no children. She's at the bottom. She's a childless Israelite woman, a barren wife, and a polygamous marriage being provoked.

That's the problem.

Twice we're told Penelope provoked Hannah. Provoked her to do what? Oh, she was trying to provoke her probably to cry, to be depressed. But she ended up provoking Hannah to pray. The problem provokes the prayer.

Hannah’s Prayer and God’s Sovereign Control

Second, the prayer. Everything works for good for those who love God. For Hannah, Penelope's provocation produced the prayer from verses 9 to 18. The family enjoys their barbecue, but Hannah won't eat.

Instead, she goes to pray in the tabernacle called the Temple of the Lord in verse 9. She was deeply distressed. The Lord had closed her womb. Her rival is rubbing her nose in it all the time. Elkanim is obtuse.

Hannah is not on top. She's not a high flyer. She's low. She's about as low as you can get. God might be bringing you low to provoke you to pray. How do you get to be on top? You get low and pour out your soul to the Lord.

So, she vowed a vow in verse 11. Now, we've seen in Judges how seriously they take vows. Remember, Jephthah thought that vows were so unbreakable that he had to kill his own daughter in order to keep a vow he had made.

The whole nation of Israel thought that their vow not to allow their daughters to marry Benjamites was so binding, they had rather wipe out another city and then allow girls dancing out of Shiloh to be abducted, allow that, do all that, rather than break.

Their vow.

So, a vow, maybe for us, a covenant, was a way to worship the Lord. And it absolutely must be fulfilled. Here in this situation, the Lord has closed Hannah's womb, twice we're told. Peninnah is provoking, Elkanah isn't comforting.

All of this is to get her to this place, low. So, she'll make this vow. The vow in verse 11, O Lord of hosts, Lord, sabaoth his name. If, this is the condition, you will indeed look on the affliction of your servants, the way she refers to herself at least three times, your servants.

Speaking of herself as someone low, an afflicted servant. And remember me, and not forget your servants. Remember my distress. But, if you will remember all that, probably best translated, and will give to your servant a son.

If the Lord will do that, give her the son she seeks, then what she will do, that is the result from her, I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life. Specifically, she says, no razor shall touch his head.

Meaning, he'll be a Nazirite for his whole life. Many Nazirites were like temporarily, over a few months or maybe a year or so. But she's going to dedicate her son, if the Lord will give her one, to be a Nazirite for his entire life.

Like Samson, and judges, like John the Baptist. That's the vow that the Lord has provoked her to make. And she continued praying to the Lord, with Eli sitting beside the doorway into the tabernacle, praying passionately.

She's praying passionately, pouring out her soul, but silently, probably hoping to keep all this secret. And so Eli, the religious professional, thought, she's drunk. And he tells her in verse 14, how long will you go on being drunk?

Put away your wine from you. You know, how low can you go again? She's been made infertile by God, provoked by her rival, brought to praying desperately, uncomforted by her kind of clumsy husband, pouring out her soul to the Lord in the tabernacle.

And then, when she feels the lowest, the most desperate, the priest there accuses her of being drunk. She answers in verse 15, no, my Lord. Small l, so respectful, like for us, like a sir.

No, sir.

I am a woman troubled in spirit. It's bereft, provoked, now falsely accused. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink.

No liquor.

But I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Some accuse Calvinists of not praying, of not caring, not evangelizing, because we believe that everything is under the Lord's control, that He's sovereign.

His will will be done, not ours. But that may be true, I guess, of some people. Some people call themselves Calvinists. But the truth is, it's when you believe that God is sovereign, and so every problem is under His control, under His power.

When you believe that, that He rules over it all, that He can turn the hearts of anyone to believe in Him, that the Lord can make your husband or wife or children into believers. It's then that you'll pray, that you'll pour out your soul.

To the Lord.

After all, if you believe that salvation ultimately depends on human desire or effort, it depends on them, whether they accept it or not. It ultimately depends on people's free will, whether they're going to choose to believe.

Or maybe you believe that barrenness, like here, depends on nature, and it's out of control. God's kind of set it up, but now it's out of His control. If that's what you believe, why pray? Why would you pray for someone's salvation if it ultimately.

Depends on their will?

Nothing God can do about it. He's made the offer possible, but the only thing you could do what you do is try to coax the other person to believe.

Why pray?

God can't change what they want. But if God can steer free will, or He can change nature, then you pray. If He's Lord Sabaoth, the Lord of hosts, who commands armies and steers hearts and sustains every atom with His word, then you'll pray.

You might even, if provoked, pour out your heart.

To the Lord.

Well, Hannah appeals to Eli in verse 16. Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman. Now, worthless is the same term used in Judges 19 for the worthless fellows who attacked the Levi in Gibeah. Worthless fellows, only feminine here.

She's saying, don't think I'm a daughter of Belial, of wickedness, the self-indulgent, immoral, so immoral I get drunk at the tabernacle. Don't think that because all along I've been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation.

How do you get to the top? Through great anxiety and vexation. Through much tribulation, you must enter the kingdom of God. In Acts chapter 14, verse 22. So Eli blesses her. There's no indication she actually told him what exactly she was praying for.

She just says, I've been pouring out my soul, great anxiety and vexation. But Eli blesses her in verse 17. Go in peace. Others, be relieved of your anxiety and vexation. Let not your hearts be troubled.

Believe in God. Go in peace. And the God of Israel, grant your petition that you have made to Him. She responds to verse 18, let your servant find favor in your.

Eyes.

Look on me well, your servant, someone who's low. And without the blessing, her appetite was restored. Her face was no longer sad. She was hopeful. That's the prayer which leads to the proclamation. How do you get to the top third?

By recognizing who is there. By proclamation, proclaiming Him. The Lord granted her prayer. She had prayed, remember me. And God remembered her. In verse 19, the result, she got pregnant and had a son whom she named Samuel in verse 20.

Interesting that it specifically says she named him, not Elkanah. Samuel sounds like heard by God. And Hannah figures she prayed and was heard. So she gets to name him heard by God. The family keeps going on their yearly pilgrimages to Shiloh for Elkanah to fulfill his vows, whatever they were, but he's fulfilling his vows.

But for several years, Hannah didn't go along. She said in verse 22 that she'll wait until Samuel was weaned, which in their culture could be as anywhere from three to five years old, so that he may appear in the presence of the Lord and dwell there forever.

She can only take him to Shiloh when she can leave him there permanently. Elkanah seems like an easygoing guy. Always kind of obtuse sometimes, but yeah, whatever. Do what seems best to you. Wait until you have weaned him.

And then reminds her, because remember, he's going there to fulfill his vows, so he understands vows have to be fulfilled. He's apparently reminding her of the command from Numbers chapter 30, verse 2.

If a man vows a vow to the Lord or swears an oath to bind himself by a pledge, he shall not break his word. He shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth. And so Elkanah says, only may the Lord establish his word.

His word is that you keep your vow. And he'll establish it, Hannah, by causing you to keep it. Like Augustus prayed, may the Lord grant what he commands. He commands self-control. Grant what you command, and command what you will.

So she finally weans little Samuel and brings him to Shiloh.

In verse 24.

Brings him fully provisioned with a three-year-old bull. I assume that's full-grown. A lot of flour and some wine. They're going to have the best barbecue ever for Samuel's dedication and his going away.

In verse 25, it says, bittersweetly, and the child was young. Then they sacrificed the bull by slaughtering it, and sacrificed Samuel by giving him to Eli, now to be under his care. Then Hannah proclaims, here's the proclamation.

Oh, my Lord, again, a respectful, sir, as you live, my Lord, talking to Eli, I am the woman, that desperate, provoked, insulted woman, that woman who was at the bottom, who was standing here in your presence, praying to the Lord.

She was pouring out her soul to the Lord, who had closed her womb, who was in total control of the problem. And so she prayed to him because he's in control of it all. And now she proclaims, verse 27, for this child, I prayed.

Remember, she apparently didn't tell Eli what she was praying for, and now she's proclaiming it. For this child, I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition. Eli said, may the Lord grant you your petition.

And she's proclaiming, yes, the Lord has done it. The Lord granted me the petition that I made to him. She proclaims the gospel, the good news. For unto us, a child is born, and unto us, a son is given.

And through this begins the chain of events that leads to that other son, that the prophecy is really about. For this child, I prayed, maybe holding him when she says, this child, and then holding him out when she says, therefore, because of my prayer and vow, because you granted it, Lord, I have lent or given him to the Lord.

Or maybe, maybe he's a little older, maybe he's like four to five, and she's standing beside him with her hand kind of on his back or the back of his head maybe. And then with the, therefore, I have lent, she gently nudges him forward toward Eli.

And she proclaims that the Lord who closed her womb, who was in control of her problem, has now given her the solution to her problem. And she's going to keep her vow. And she says she's loaning him to the Lord.

As long as he lives, he is lent to the Lord, in verse 28. Now, with everything she's been through, you may be, you've got your theology pretty, you know it pretty well, you may be thinking, wait, wait, Hannah, that's not quite the right way to put it.

But everything that she's been through, we can be gracious to her and let her little theological error go by here, can't we? Can we speak gracious with her, kind to her? We won't rebuke her. Of course, it's God who lends to us our children.

Maybe Mother's Day is a good time to remind us that. The Lord lends to us the children. Not the other way around. We don't lend to him. They're always the Lord's. We don't lend anything to God. But we'll let that slide now.

Let's not rebuke Hannah right now because we're happy for her. Her proclamation is that the Lord has granted her prayer and now she's keeping her vow and giving Samuel to the service of the Lord. The Lord wanted Samuel.

Think of that.

The Lord is in control of all this, making Hannah barren, bringing her to this place where she's so low and desperate, she vows this vow. The Lord wanted Samuel for his purposes and now he has him. And so, with the end of chapter 1, Samuel worshiped the Lord there at his new home.

Hannah’s Praise and the Great Reversal

How do you get to the top? Recognize the Lord's in control of the problem with prayer pouring out of your soul, with proclamation of what he's done, the gospel, and finally, with praise. Chapter 2, verses 1 to 10 is Hannah's praise to the Lord.

She begins, my heart rejoices in the Lord. She's not anxious and distressed anymore. Have you noticed that Peninnah has disappeared from the story? Ever since the prayer, no more mention of Peninnah. Oh, she's still around, I guess, but she's just not a factor anymore.

Not after Samuel. She's the world trying to afflict us, to provoke us, telling us that God won't save us, tell us not to trust in the Lord. And when God does, well, their voices disappear. Hannah says that her heart rejoices as she hands over Samuel.

And my horn is my strength, like an animal's horn shows its power. My horn is exalted, is lifted up in the Lord. The Lord has lifted up high her strength. He has made her strong. She begins and ends this poetic praise with thanks for the exaltation of her horn.

It frames this idea of a horn, the strength frames this praise. It's the theme of the song, a praise, that she is now, she's now at the top. Now, she's a high flyer. My mouth derides my enemies. Here in the ESV, it's the way it's translated.

It could literally be translated, I smile at my enemies, at Peninnah. Remember from Chapter 1, her face was sad? Now, she's smiling, especially at her rival, grinning with joy. Who's on top now? She's smiling because she's rejoicing in the Lord's salvation.

She's been saved from her problem, which was lifelessness. The Lord saves her from the problem he caused. We're saved from God. Scoffers sometimes mocked, we used to talk about someone so-and-so got saved, or I got saved.

What do you save from? Our problem is with God's wrath. What we're saved from is God himself, his holy justice, that he would hold our sins against us. That's what we're saved from. Here, she's been saved from God closing her womb, and now she's smiling because God has saved her.

So she celebrates the Lord. There's none holy like the Lord. Other gods, you know, like money, mammon, serve us. They do our bidding. The Lord is holy, he's high, he's lifted up, and we do his bidding.

There's none beside, that is, none like, none comparable to the Lord. There is no rock, there's no foundation stable enough to build your life on like our God. And so Peninnah, talk no more so very proudly.

No, you don't hear anything more from her now, do you? Let not arrogance come from your mouth. If the world puts you on top because you went to an elite institution, don't be so arrogant. Don't be proud if you're a high flyer because in verse 3, the Lord is a God of knowledge.

He knows you. He knows you deep down. By him, actions are weighed. He's the judge. If the world puts you on top, maybe he will judge you and put you much lower. Beginning in verse 4 is the great reversal, the meek inheriting the earth, the first being last and the last first.

The bows, the weapons, the expressions of power that people are proud of, the things that they have that they think put them on top for warriors, then bows, for us now maybe money, businesses we own, degrees we have, Nobel Prizes, Olympic medals, the bows of the mighty, the high flyers.

They're broken. They don't mean anything anymore. But those who today, they stumble in weakness, who bow down in prayer to pour out their souls to the Lord, the feeble, the weak, they put on strength.

So the weak say, I am strong, and the poor say, I am rich because of what the Lord has done. Those who were full in verse 5, now, this is the reversal, now they have to get a job just to afford a slice of bread.

Those who were hungry, they were not full, they were hungry. They were hungry for bread or hungry for a child or for the salvation of a wife or a husband or for their children, hungry for the kingdom of God.

Now, they are satisfied, like Hannah, smiling. The barren, like her, has a full amount as she did. She ends up having at least six more children. Her rival, the world, now withers away. Then look at verse 6, the Lord kills and makes alive.

It's verse 6, the Lord kills and makes alive. The Lord had been killing her in a way, but closing her womb, and now has made her alive by giving her children. God kills. He predestined that Herod and Pontius Pilate would kill the son.

It was the Lord's will to crush him, and he raised him from the dead. He brings down, the Lord brings down to Sheol, that is to the grave. He brings people to be buried. He brought Jesus to the tomb, and he raised him up.

In verse 7, the Lord makes poor and makes rich. He brings low. He brought her low. He brought the son low, and he exalts. He puts on top. How did he get it to be? On top? Here, the Lord lifts up. The Lord puts you on top.

In verse 8, he raises up the poor from the dust. He raised the son from the dust of death. He lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. He lifted up the son to sit at his right hand.

He can lift up those who rule. He can make them high flyers, make them presidents, make them prime ministers, make them kings. He can do that because, she says, the pillars of the earth, that is what the world is founded on, are the Lord's.

And on them, he has set the world. In other words, he made it so he could put anyone on top of it he wants. And so he will guard the feet of his faithful ones, of those who trust in him. He will protect them.

He will hold them fast.

He preserves them.

But the wicked who don't trust him shall be cut off in darkness. Their feet won't be guarded. They stumble and fall in the dark. Because, at the end of verse 9, it's not by might shall a man prevail, not by their talent, or their hard work, or their connections, the elite institutions they graduated from, or their money.

It's by the Lord's grace, the adversaries of the Lord, his rivals, those who afflict his people shall be broken to pieces. And we were his adversaries. We were enemies of God. But God broke in pieces the Son.

Again, it was the will of the Lord to crush him, the servant, who became low for us, so he wouldn't have to break us in pieces. Against them, his adversaries, he will thunder in heaven. The Lord will judge the ends of the earth.

His kingdom will come. Then, oddly enough, remember where we are. When there is no king in Israel, Hannah praises the Lord in verse 10.