Welcome to the Valley Baptist Church sermon podcast.
We're so glad you're here,
and we hope this message inspires you,
builds your faith,
and moves you toward a deep relationship with God.
Today, you'll find great insight into the Bible
and learn how you can apply it straight to your life.
So welcome and enjoy the message.
If you have your Bible, please open it with me to 1 Samuel chapter 1.
And we just want to thank all our moms for all that you do.
You have a very, very hard job, and we are thankful for you.
I know a mom who was asked if you could do it all over again, would you?
And she said, absolutely, just with some different kids.
Absolutely.
Well, maybe you feel that way today.
You know, Mother's Day is one of the most interesting holidays that we have
because it's filled with such powerful emotions.
For many of you, Mother's Day is a beautiful day.
Your mom's here, your kids are here, you feel celebrated.
That's a beautiful thing.
We want to honor you today.
But I also know that for some of you, today is very hard.
Maybe your mom's no longer with us, or you've lost a child, or you have a wayward child,
or maybe you've been trying to become a mom and that has not yet happened.
And so instead of joy, today you feel a sense of sadness.
Now, maybe you feel both.
The mom we're looking at today in 1 Samuel 1,
I think if she were here with us today on Mother's Day,
she would probably be filled with some intense emotions of both joy and maybe even sadness.
Her name...
was Hannah. And she gave birth to a son that she named Samuel, who was among the top five
most significant men in the Old Testament. He served as a prophet and a priest. He
helped Israel transition to become a monarchy with a king.
We pick up the story in verse number two.
Speaking of a man named Elkanah, it says,
And he had two wives.
The name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other, Peninnah.
Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children.
Okay.
We see here that young Hannah was facing some major challenges in her life.
For one, she was part of a polygamous marriage, meaning her husband had another wife, which
was clearly against God's design.
Someone asked Mark Twain one time, where in the Bible does it say that we can't have more
than one wife?
And he thought for a moment, and he said, well, the Bible says that no man can serve
two masters.
Well, that's true.
Hannah didn't just have a bad marriage, though.
She also was struggling with infertility.
And that weighed very heavily upon her because for women in the ancient world, and really even today,
women often find their identity in being a mom.
Now, as Christians, it's very important that each and every one of us learn that we are to find our identity in Christ and nothing else,
because our identity in Christ is eternal.
That can never be stripped from us.
It's the essence and the core of who we are.
We are new creations in Christ Jesus, but there's no denying.
That we are tempted at times to find our identity in other things, especially something as instinctual for women as being a mom.
So Hannah, no doubt, had a difficult home life.
She was sharing her husband with another woman.
She can't get pregnant.
And on top of all of that, verse number six says, and her rival, that's the other woman her husband's sleeping with.
You know, I've learned as a pastor that at times women can be very brutal with the way they treat one another.
Right?
Poor Hannah couldn't give her husband a child,
and so she's grieving, and she's mourning that,
and Peninnah just starts rubbing it in,
how she's got a bunch of kids, and Hannah, you don't have any.
And so Hannah's distraught at this point.
She stops eating.
And so the question is, why didn't God just give her a child?
Because it says here that God is the one who closed her womb.
I mean, that's one of the most interesting and surprising parts of the story, that God closed Hannah's womb.
Now, I think it's important to recognize that just because God closed Hannah's womb doesn't mean that he's done the same for you.
There are things in life that God causes, and there are things in life that God allows.
This verse is not saying that God directly causes all infertility.
Sometimes infertility is simply a tragic result of living in a broken world.
But in this case, it says that God caused it.
Now, why would he do that?
Well, because God was about to do something big in the nation of Israel.
And whenever God does something big, he often starts with a miraculous birth.
That was a pattern that we see throughout the Old Testament.
Think about Sarah.
and Rebecca, and Rachel, and now Hannah.
God wanted it to be very clear that the child He was about to give Hannah
was a special gift from Him.
Now, we see in the passage that her husband tried to fix her paint,
and he started off pretty good in verse number 4.
It says,
And whenever the time came for Elkanah to make an offering...
He would give portions to Peninnah, his wife, and to all her sons and daughters.
But to Hannah he would give a double portion, for he loved Hannah, although the Lord had closed her womb.
Elkanah knew that Hannah was hurting, and even though he had another wife, he really truly did love Hannah.
So he gives her a double portion.
But Hannah is so depressed at this point, she can't eat any of it.
And so in verse number 8, it says,
Then Elkanah, her husband, said to her,
Hannah, why do you weep? Why do you not eat? And why is your heart grieved?
Am I not better to you than ten sons?
Yes.
Like Hannah started off so well, but when Hannah kept crying,
he kept trying to fix that which he was not able to fix,
and he sticks his foot in his mouth.
Am I not enough?
As if that's going to take away her pain from not having any kids.
Listen, guys, the Bible is very clear in the New Testament
that you and I as husbands are to dwell with our wives with understanding.
That's one of the hardest verses in the Bible for us men.
Because oftentimes, we don't understand our wives.
But the goal is always to dwell with them with understanding.
And in times of emotional pain like Hannah was experiencing,
Elkanah, he would have been a whole lot better off sitting with Hannah and holding her while she cried.
But instead, he tried to convince her that her emotions were illegitimate.
I think all of us men, unfortunately, have been there from time to time.
And we need to learn from Elkanah that instead of trying to always fix everything,
sometimes we just need to hold our wife and let her cry.
So Hannah, she's in deep emotional pain.
Her husband can't fix it.
In fact, he made it worse.
So what does Hannah do?
Well, she goes to the one person who can heal her pain, the Lord.
Verse number 9, it says,
So Hannah arose after they had finished eating and drinking in Shiloh.
Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat by the doorpost of the tabernacle of the Lord,
and she was in bitterness of soul and prayed to the Lord and wept in anguish.
Here's our principle.
A godly mother is a praying.
mother. That's the most important job you have as a mom, is to do business with the Lord. Hannah
goes to the tabernacle and Eli, the high priest who was also the judge of the nation of Israel,
was there. But Hannah doesn't stop to talk to this big prominent person in Israel with Eli. No,
she goes right past him. She goes directly to the Lord.
And with all of the raw emotions that she was feeling, she opens her heart to the Lord in prayer.
Now, Hannah was not yet a mom at this point, but she was already doing the most important job that moms do.
She was praying.
Now, moms, here's some very quick tips on how you should pray for your kids.
First of all, be emotionally honest with God.
Some people form these formal and sophisticated sounding prayers.
That's not what Hannah did.
It says that she prayed and wept in anguish.
Verse number 12 says, and it happened as she continued praying before the Lord that Eli watched her mouth.
Now Hannah spoke in her heart and only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard.
Therefore, Eli thought she was drunk.
I mean, Hannah's a hot mess at this point.
I imagine her eyes are swollen because of all of the crying.
She hasn't eaten for some time, and she starts praying in her heart.
Her mouth is forming these words, but she's not projecting any sound.
And Eli thinks she's drunk.
So Hannah eventually explains herself.
We don't have time to look at her explanation,
but the point is she was being honest with God in her pain.
She didn't need Eli to hear her prayers.
She needed the Lord to hear her prayers.
And she's honest.
And we all need to learn how to be honest with God in our pain,
especially when our pain is connected to our kids.
When we're worried about our kids, there's something freeing and healing when we pray honest prayers to the Lord.
He brings healing to us that we need, and He meets us exactly where we are, and He begins working in incredible ways.
Now, I think it's also that we...
Learn when we pray for our kids to find our peace in the Lord.
Ladies, you're not going to find your peace in your husband, I can tell you.
He might actually create some more stress for you.
You're not going to find your peace scrolling Instagram, trying to numb your mind there.
You'll likely feel worse after that.
You're only going to find your peace in Jesus.
You see, as significant as a wife is and being a wife, as significant as being a mom is or whatever job is that you do, you'll never find your peace in those things.
If you find your identity in those things, that is a recipe for unrest in your soul.
I find that so many women are emotionally torn apart
at the seams because of identity confusion.
Now, not gender identity confusion
that our culture's hung up on,
but identity confusion nonetheless.
What defines me as a woman?
Is it my beauty and my sex appeal?
Is it my duty as a wife?
Is it my duty as a mom?
No, none of those things define you.
You must allow Jesus to define you.
If you're a believer, you're a daughter of the king.
Period. That's enough.
Nothing else needs to be added for significance.
Nothing else needs to be added for peace.
Jesus is enough.
Now, the last thing that I would say about your prayers for your kids is you need to depend on the Lord with very specific prayers for your kids.
That was Hannah.
We see in verse number 11, it says,
Then she made a vow and said,
O Lord of hosts, if you will indeed look on the affliction of your maidservant,
she's humbling herself as a servant before the Lord,
and remember me, and not forget your maidservant, but will give your maidservant a male child.
Then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and no razor shall come upon his head.
Now, no razor coming upon his head was a sign of the Nazarite vow she was making to the Lord
that her son would be completely dedicated to the service of God.
Hannah prayed a very, very specific prayer for a little boy.
Mamas, it's very important, whether you're praying and asking God for a child, a baby,
or whether you already have one and you're concerned about something happening in his or her life,
that you have enough faith to ask God for some very specific things in their life.
That you go out on a limb of faith and ask big, bold prayers for your kids.
Now, just because you ask God in faith doesn't mean that God automatically is going to give it to you.
It may not fit his plan.
But I promise you that God blesses your prayers in one way or another.
Now, in Hannah's case, she attached a vow to her prayer.
That's something we should never, ever do
unless we are fully committed to following through with it.
And Hannah was.
I mean, she's desperate and she makes this vow to the Lord
and she means it.
And long story short, God grants her request.
And she conceives and she has a little boy and she names him Samuel, which means heard by God.
Hannah nurses her son.
She begins raising him.
She loves her son.
She teaches him all about the Lord and how to love the Lord.
And after she weaned him, many believe that was probably between the ages of three and five in that culture.
She took little Eli to the tabernacle and she gave,
she took Samuel to the tabernacle and she gave Samuel to Eli,
just as she promised to give him to the Lord.
Now, verse number 24 says,
She took him up with her with three bulls and one ephah of flour and a skin of wine
and brought him to the house of the Lord in Shiloh.
And the child was young.
Then they slaughtered a bull and brought the child to Eli.
She said, Oh, my Lord.
She's calling Eli Lord as a term of respect.
As your soul lives, my Lord, I am the woman who stood by you here praying to the Lord.
For this child I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition which I asked of him."
Therefore I also have lent him to the Lord.
I've given him to the Lord.
As long as he lives, he shall be lent to the Lord.
So they worship the Lord there.
Can you imagine that day?
Hannah takes her little son by the hand and she walks him up to the tabernacle.
She takes her little boy's hand and she places his little hand into the hand of Eli.
And she tells the little Samuel, the Lord gave you to me on one condition, to
that I give you back to him.
So I know you want to come with me,
but you can't come back with me.
You must stay here.
You are God's.
And after worshiping, she walks away from her firstborn son and leaves him to be raised there in the tabernacle.
God blesses her incredible faith and her commitment.
Samuel grows to be one of the godliest men in the Israelite history.
Hannah had prayed for a son, and then she dedicated him fully to the Lord.
Now, there's a couple more things that I think we need to learn from Hannah today.
Not only do you need to be praying for your kids, you also need to assume spiritual responsibility for your children's faith.
Assume responsibility.
Hannah didn't leave her son's faith to chance.
She was very, very intentional.
She took all the necessary steps to dedicate him unto the Lord.
Now, if you're one of those parents who thinks, well, we need to be neutral about Jesus,
we need to allow our kids to chart their own path,
well, if that's you, you've missed the point of life.
That tells me Jesus isn't very important to you.
And if Jesus isn't very important to you, that means you don't know him very well.
Because when you get to know Jesus, you'll crawl over a broken glass to get your kids to him.
Amen.
I talk with parents all the time who are struggling
with a rebellious or defiant child.
And so I just start asking questions.
Well, how do they like their life group?
Well, they don't go.
How much are they getting out of a youth group
on Wednesday nights?
Well, they need to start going.
I wish they would start going.
Okay, let's get them to summer camp this summer.
Church will help you pay the way to get them to summer camp.
Well, I'm not sure they'll go.
And I'm dumbfounded by that.
Who's in charge?
Why are you letting your teenager raise himself or herself?
Now, I know that sounds harsh, but it's the reality.
It's true.
In no world do my kids have a choice of whether they come to church or not.
I don't give them a choice whether they go to school.
In church, their eternity is a whole lot more important than a little education.
As parents, we've got to decide what is our target that we're aiming at.
We've got to decide, and then we've got to shoot at the target.
We have to assume responsibility for our kids' faith.
Now, does that mean that they're going to automatically believe and follow Jesus?
Well, unfortunately, it doesn't mean that.
Every child must make their own decision.
But let's make it as easy as possible on them for them to believe.
Moms, you play an incredibly vital, important role that God has specifically given you in cultivating faith within your kids.
Now, I had an amazing dad.
I praise God for my dad.
But I highly doubt that all of us kids would be serving the Lord like we are without my mom.
My mom was and is a spiritual giant
who God used in absolutely miraculous ways in my life.
Earlier this week, I was telling the Lord,
as I was praying for my mom,
I was telling him about all I was thankful for,
and these words just came out of my mouth.
Mouth, God, my mom's one of the greatest masterpieces.
She's the greatest masterpiece of your grace, and the image of Christ is just placed on her like no one I've ever met before.
Thank you for my mom.
Now, that doesn't mean my mom's perfect.
It means by God's grace, God has made her something beautiful.
Now, if you're not a ginger spradling, don't beat yourself up.
God only made one of them.
You be you.
God doesn't want you to be anyone else but you by his grace.
My point is be like my mom and showing your kids Jesus with your life.
Pray your kids to Jesus.
Love your kids to Jesus.
Now here's our last principle.
We learn from Hannah that a godly mother is willing to let her children go for God.
That's a hard thing.
Let me ask you, what's your goal as a mom?
Do you want your child to fulfill all your plans that you have for them
and make you very happy,
or do you want your child to fulfill all of God's plans for them
and make him happy?
You know, we hold our little baby,
and it's like we want to just write our will upon our child.
What if we said, God, would you write your will upon my child?
Now, I'm not suggesting any of you bring your toddler down to the church and have the pastors raise him.
That would be a disaster for everyone involved, I promise.
But I do believe that God calls every mom and every dad to be like Hannah.
Hannah had a unique vow that God blessed, but he calls all of us to give our children back to God.
You know, one of the keys to having fulfillment as a parent is to recognize that our kids are not actually ours.
They don't belong to us.
They belong to God.
He's who made them.
He's who gave them.
And he's who someday they're going to return to.
We're simply stewards of them.
Sometimes we steward them for 18 years.
Sometimes it's 26 years in our day and age.
Sometimes it's only six years.
One of the things that I think got my parents through the tragedy of their six-year-old daughter, Charity,
being hit by a car and killed was their knowledge that Charity belonged to God.
That she was a gift from Him and they were thankful for the time that God gave her to them.
You see, we're stewards of that which belongs to the Lord already.
Now, to be clear, I want to say it again so none of you get any weird ideas.
God's not calling you, I can tell you, to bring your toddler to us at the church to raise.
I don't believe that.
I hope not.
But I do believe that some of you moms who are listening right now will be called upon to give your kids to the mission field.
I believe there's some kids in our preschool ministry, in our kids' programs, in our youth groups,
who someday God's going to call to leave mom and dad and go to another city and plant a church there.
God's going to call them to leave mom and dad and their country
and go to the edges of our world to take the good news of Jesus to the nation.
So let me ask you, are you willing to let them go for God?
If not, you haven't fully dedicated your kids to the Lord.
They belong to Him.
Our most important job as parents is to be like Hannah and to give our kids unto the Lord.
Now, that's going to mean a lot of different things for different people based on God's will.
But every parent, we should dig deep with honesty before the Lord,
and we must be willing to say, God, they're yours, whatever your will may be done.
Now, I know that's perhaps especially difficult for moms, but that's your calling.
And it's a high calling.
You are stewarding the gift of God that belongs to him for his purposes.
To steward the gift that God has entrusted to you.
And then to present those gifts back to him for him to do as he pleases.
As we begin wrapping up here on Mother's Day,
I think it's important to note that motherhood in our culture is sort of under attack.
The birth rate in our country is dropping like a rock.
More and more women are choosing comfort and career over being a mom.
And sadly, so, so many women
are going to miss out on the special calling of motherhood.
I want to end our time this morning
by reading a conversation between two ladies,
and one of the ladies wrote about the conversation.
She says, Time is running out for my friend.
While we are sitting at lunch, she casually mentions that she and her husband are thinking
of starting a family.
What she means is that her biological clock has begun its countdown and she's being forced
to consider the prospect of motherhood.
We're taking a survey, she half-jokingly says.
Do you think that I should have a baby?
It will change your life, I say carefully, keeping my tone neutral.
Oh, I know, she says, no more spontaneous vacations.
But that is not what I mean at all.
I tried to decide what to tell her.
I want her to know what she'll never learn in childbirth classes,
that the physical wounds of childbearing heal,
but that becoming a mother will leave an emotional wound so raw
that she will forever be vulnerable.
I want her to know.
I consider warning her that she will never read a newspaper again without asking,
what if that had been my child?
That every plane crash, every fire will haunt her.
That when she sees the pictures of starving children,
she will wonder if anything could be worse than watching your child die.
I look at her manicured nails and stylish suit and think that no matter how sophisticated she is,
becoming a mother will reduce her to the primitive level of a bear protecting her cub.
that an urgent call of mom will cause her to drop her best crystal without a moment's hesitation.
I feel I should warn her that no matter how many years she's invested in her career,
she will be professionally derailed by motherhood.
She might arrange for child care, but one day she will be going into an important business meeting
and she will think about her baby's sweet smell.
She will have to use every ounce of discipline to keep from running home just to make sure her child is all right.
I want my friend to know that everyday decisions will no longer be routine, that a five-year-old
boy's desire to go to the men's room rather than the women's at a restaurant will become
a major dilemma, that issues of independence and gender will be weighed against the prospect
of a child molester that may be lurking in the restroom.
However decisive she may be in the office, she will second-guess herself constantly as
Looking at my attractive friend, I want to assure her that eventually she will shed the
pounds of pregnancy, but she will never feel the same about herself.
That her life now, so important, will be of less value to her once she has a child.
That she would give it up in a moment to save her offspring, but she will hope for many
more years, not to accomplish her own dreams, but to watch her child accomplish his.
My friend's relationship with her husband will also change, but not in the way she thinks.
I wish that she could understand how much more she can love a man who is always careful to powder the baby
or never hesitates to play with a son or daughter.
I think she should know that she will fall in love with her husband again for reasons she would now find very unromantic.
I want to describe to my friend the exhilaration of seeing your child learn to hit a baseball.
I want to capture for her the belly laugh of a baby who is touching the soft fur of a dog for the first time.
I want her to taste the joy that's so real it hurts.
My friend's quizzical look reminds me or makes me realize that tears have formed in my eyes.
You'll never regret it, I finally say.
Then squeezing my friend's hand, I offer a prayer for her and me
and all mere mortal women who stumble their way into this holiest of callings.
Let's bow together in an attitude of prayer, if you will.
This is a special holy moment in the life of our church.
I want to encourage you moms,
that whatever your circumstance is today,
that you draw close to the Lord.
If you need to be comforted because of pain that you're feeling,
that you would find your comfort in Jesus today.
That if you need to be encouraged in some particular way as a mom, that you be encouraged today.
You know, maybe you're here today and you live with deep wounds that were inflicted maybe even by your moms.
Something she said, something she did.
Maybe you could never please your mom.
No matter what you did, no matter how hard you tried, and you live with this wound,
I want to invite you to allow God to heal you today.
Maybe you're a mom and you struggle with guilt.
You wish, man, I wish I had done this differently.
I wish I had done that differently.
I want to encourage you right now to just give it all to the Lord.
His grace is amazing.
It takes care of everything.
You just place your child into his hands and you trust him as you pray for him or her.
You know, moms, maybe you have a wayward child.
I want to invite you in a moment just to pour out your heart to Jesus about it.
Whatever raw emotions you have, you just let him know all about it.
And you pray for your baby.
I don't know the pain that you might be feeling or the celebration that you're feeling,
but I do know that Jesus is here for you.
Now, the focus this morning has been on our moms today, and rightfully so.
But if you don't know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior,
I want to invite you to give your life to Him today.
It's amazing. I'm constantly amazed as a pastor. I'll preach on one subject and someone else will
say, tell me something specific. Like, man, were you talking just to me? And they'll tell me about
their situation. And I'm like, I wasn't talking to you at all. It was the Holy Spirit though, right?
He takes the word of God and he applies it in very, very specific ways.
And so maybe God is speaking to your heart and it's not because you're a mom.
Maybe you came today simply because your mom drug you here.
She wanted you to be here.
So you honor your mom today.
And that is wonderful that you did that and you came,
but maybe you had no intention of meeting God today.
But perhaps as you arrive from the moment you stepped under our campus,
God began to speak to your heart that you're loved.
And I want to echo what the Holy Spirit's already been touching you about.
That you are loved.
That God sees you in all of your pain, all of your failure,
all of your brokenness, and he still loves you.
That the Bible says while we were still sinners, that's when Christ died for us.
Scarcely will a righteous man die for a righteous person,
but how much more for sinners like us?
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son
that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
I want to invite you to receive the life that God offers you today.
I want to invite you in just a moment after I pray, it's going to be a special time in our service.
We're going to stand and we're going to sing together after I pray.
And there's going to be pastors and other leaders, men and women here at the front.
Maybe you need to take one of them by the hand and say, can you pray for me?
Ladies, maybe you need to take one of these ladies by the hand and say, can you pray for me?
Maybe you need to go to these steps and let them serve as an altar and do business with God.
But I want to invite those of you who don't have a personal relationship with God to meet Him today by faith.
Maybe you've known about God, but you've never confessed your sin and turned from it and placed your faith completely in Jesus.
And that's the step that must be taken for sin to be paid for.
and for your relationship with God to begin.
So I want to invite you to get to know God today.
There's no greater gift that you can give your mom today
than to trust Jesus as your personal Savior.
There's no greater gift, ladies, that you can give your kids
than for you to be completely, fully dedicated to the Lord.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for our moms.
I thank you for my mom, Lord.
I don't want to go overboard and make it sound like she was perfect.
I know she would not want me to do that because it's not true.
But by your grace, you've done something beautiful.
Thank you for how she's loved me.
Lord, I pray for all the moms in our midst and listening in.
Lord, would you encourage them today about the high calling in their life?
Would you comfort them and bring healing, Lord, in areas where they feel guilt?
Would you help them not worry about their kids, but to take their kids and to place them in your arms,
to trust you as they pray?
Father, we need you at this time.
We're asking, Lord, that you would do a great work.
Some of us didn't have parents that loved us like they should have.
Thank you, Lord, for being our Father who loves us perfectly.
Lord, I pray that you would do a great work in our midst.
We pray that you would just stir our hearts, open our eyes, Lord, to see you for as you are.
And Lord, that you would just give people the courage it's going to take to step out and walk one of these aisles,
take one of these leaders and say, I want to give my life to Christ.
Give them the courage it's going to take to do that.
We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.
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We're praying for you
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