Tony Evans - Mother's Day at the Cliff
Happy Mother's Day. Thank you, ladies, for the magnificent job you have done and are doing to raise up children who love God, who are good citizens, and who, off of your leadership, can build strong families for the next generation as you have done and are doing. If it were not for the great mothers that God has given us, who have stood in the gap, oftentimes having to fulfill multiple roles either because the father couldn't be there or chose not to be there. And you have been steadfast, keeping them in love with God, keeping them supporting the strong families that they are a part of because of you. And I just want to celebrate you. I wanna celebrate your faith in the midst of adversity.
I wanna celebrate your tenacity and refusal to quit, and your dependence on God to fill in the gaps when you couldn't do it on your own. And I know many have lost their mothers. Your mother is not there physically with you right now, but you're still benefiting as I am from their love, their influence, and their commitment. So I wish for you a marvelous Mother's Day. I hope you receive some flowers, and if you don't have your mother, give some flowers to a mother that you do appreciate. Perhaps someone who's still influencing your life and the life of your children. May God bless you richly. May this be the best Mother's Day of your life, and thank you again for all you have done to keep a generation focused on God and on family. Happy Mother's Day.
I wanna share a lesson with you this day about a mother and from a mother for the benefit, not only for mothers, but for us all. It's a principle that can have a life-changing effect from a well-known lady in the Bible in 1 Samuel chapter 1. Hannah's story is not only replete with the struggle of a woman and a mother, but it is thick with the nature of God, how God works when life becomes weighty, and grief surrounds you like the darkness. Hannah is introduced to us in 1 Samuel 1, first, by identifying her husband, whose name in verse 1 is Elkanah. Elkanah, we are told in verse 2 of 1 Samuel 1, has two wives. One was named Hannah, and the other is Peninnah. Hannah, being mentioned first, was his first wife, but he married a second wife, and we're told why.
Because we're told at the end of verse 2 Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children. In the Old Testament world, having children was a testimony to the blessing of God. Over and over again, God promised his people that if they would be committed to him, there would be no barren women among you. That all women would have the ability to procreate. He says that in Deuteronomy chapter 7, verses 13 and 14. That was an expectation that if you were a Jewish woman and you got married, you would automatically be a mother. It was a built-in promise of God. So when Elkanah marries Hannah and she doesn't get pregnant, the question on the floor is: is she cursed? Is something wrong here because God promised there would be no barren woman among you, and she can't get pregnant?
So he gets a second wife because the dream of a Jewish father, like the dream of most fathers today is to get not only their children, but to get that son. Because to get that son meant to pass on that name, and it meant to pass on the covenant of God. "I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob". So you can imagine Hannah's emotions. She wasn't good enough. She wasn't favored by God. He would go up, verse 3 tells us, annually for the Jewish worship. And he would go up there and take the ladies and the children of the one wife with him. But now, here is where it gets interesting: verses 5 and 6. "But to Hannah he would give a double portion, for he loved Hannah," Elkanah did, "but the Lord had closed her womb". Hm. Verse 6, "Her rival, however," the other wife, "would provoke her bitterly to irritate her, because the Lord had closed her womb".
Hannah is barren, which means as a woman and as a potential mother, she's hopeless. Where is God when God said there would be no barren one among us? And so here she is, but we discover something. We discover the Lord had closed her womb. Okay. From a medical, biological perspective, she was unable to produce. Whether she couldn't produce eggs, whether she couldn't hold a pregnancy, whatever it was, it was an inability to produce, but the text says, "For God had closed her womb". In other words, there was a spiritual reason for her biological inability. There was something going on in heaven that shut her womb down on earth. There was something in the spiritual realm that was affecting her ability to function as a mother, get pregnant, carry a child for nine months, give birth.
There was something in the spiritual realm that was denying her something in the physical realm. So if all you saw was what the doctor said, if all you saw was what the people saw, and if all you saw was what you felt, you would not have the whole story because the rest of the story is that God had closed her womb. Now, if God closes your womb, it doesn't matter what doctor you go to, what hospital you go to, what in-vitro-fertilization you try, it won't matter because if God closed it, only God can open it. If God shut it down, only God can fix it. But if you don't have the spiritual, and you're only limited to the physical, then you could be frustrated at your circumstance because you don't see what you don't see. Or, to put it in the way I frame it regularly, if all you see is what you see, you do not see all there is to be seen.
If all you see is what you see, you do not see all there is to be seen. The Lord had closed her womb. So before we go any further, has the Lord closed your womb? There may be, could be, possibly should be a spiritual reason for your barren circumstance because God had closed her womb. Now, this not only affected her physically, it affected her emotionally and psychologically because we're told year after year, verse 7. So this was not a one-year problem. This was year after year, after year, after year, and nothing changed. Anybody in a situation where year after year, after year, after year nothing has changed? It is at this point I must present a parenthetical understanding of a human reality, she was barren, connected to a spiritual reality, God created the barrenness.
So you've got something happening on earth that comes from something that's happening invisibly in heaven. One of the things we have often said is that two doctrines that you must keep in your mind, in your head, and operate in your life is the sovereignty and providence of God. Sovereignty means God rules. Sovereignty means that nothing, absolutely nothing to the minutest detail of anything about anybody, anywhere, anyhow misses him. But within his sovereign is providence. Let me explain. Providence is the mysterious way in which God brings about results through the way he connects people, places, circumstances, and things in order to connect them to accomplish something else. Sovereignty is what he wants to happen. Providence is how he connects things so that they do happen.
The difference between providence and sovereignty is that sovereignty includes everything, but providence includes you. Providence includes me. The decisions we make, that's where free will comes in. Our choices come in. They affect the way God manipulates things in a way that he often stays hidden. You don't even know it's God, but he's just working behind the scenes like a puppet master in order to connect people, places, things, and circumstances in order to bring about sovereignty. Ah, let's go deeper. So Hannah is in the temple, I'll say a word about that in a moment. The house of the Lord. Verse 10 says she is greatly distressed. She's at the bottom. She couldn't get any lower, and she prays to the Lord.
So let's talk about this prayer. First of all, she prays to the Lord of hosts. Let's go further with this prayer. "If you will indeed look on the affliction of your maidservant and remember me," 'cause sometimes when you've gone year after year, and nothing has changed, you feel like God has forgotten you. Sometimes when you've looked for a solution or deliverance and none has come, you feel like God has forgotten you. "Remember me, and not forget your maidservant, but will give your maidservant a son, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and a razor shall not come on his head".
Oh. This is a different prayer. I am sure before she's prayed for a child, because they went to worship regularly. She says, "No, no, no. Lord, this time, Lord of hosts, I want a baby, and I want him to be a boy. So I'm not just asking for a child. I'm asking for a male child. If you give me a boy, I'm gonna turn the boy over to you so that that boy becomes beneficial to you for the rest of his life". So let me give you secret number one. Secret number one: if you're barren in circumstance, when you go to God, let him know what he will get out of it if he answers your prayer. What will he get out of answering your prayer? She may have asked for a baby, but this time she says, "No, I not only want a baby, I want a son, and I'm gonna turn that son over to you so you can use the son for the rest of his life".
Because when God sees, he's gonna get glory out of it, his kingdom is gonna be advanced because of it, he's much more tuned to the conversation of the prayer. See, we all pray for what we want, and that's legitimate to want a child. If you are a woman who's married and wants to be a mother, that's legitimate. But what God was after was something bigger. He wanted something that went beyond what she wanted, to what the kingdom of God needed, and what the glory of God required. General prayers get general answers. If you just say, "Lord, bless me," and you just leave it hanging out there like that, you won't even know if it came because you were so vague and general. No, one of the reason God delays things is you're too vague. You really haven't asked for anything because you have not been specific to what you are wanting God to do.
That's one reason. But as you'll see, there's another reason. She makes her request known. She wants a son. So she's praying before the Lord continually, verse 12. She's praying in the house. She says she went to the house of the Lord. Let me say a word now about the theology of the house. It's called ecclesiology. Ecclesiology is the biblical doctrine of the church. Throughout the Old Testament, the temple, which is where they were, or the Tabernacle, is called the house. The house was the localized place of God's presence in the Bible. God is everywhere, but he would localize himself in the temple in the Old Testament.
In the New Testament, the Bible says, he collectively localizes himself in the church. The reason why the house is important is because God told his people, "You may come to me personally, but when I hear you coming to me from the house, that is from a homestead, from the place where I hang out, you will get my undivided attention". 2 Chronicles chapter 7. "When I hear you call upon me from this house". Ephesians chapter 3, verse 10 says that it is from this house called the church that we are able to rebuke the principalities and the powers. Many people do not understand the church. They just think it's a place you come for a song and a sermon and hang out with folk. Uh-uh. It is the localized collective presence of God.
Let me say it another way. There's certain things God will do for you just because you're his son or daughter. Just because you're his child, you can go to him in prayer and there's certain things he's going to do. But there's certain things he will not do for you if you only come individually. There are certain things he will only do if it comes from the house. If he knows that you are a part of something bigger, because his plan is always bigger than you, as you'll see in a moment. So one of the reasons you come to church and one of the reasons you should engage in church is so that you get the benefit of things God will do in the house that he won't do in your house. Okay?
And so, she is so distressed, when she's praying, she's praying silently. Because we're told, "She was speaking from her heart, only her lips were moving," verse 13, "her voice was not heard. So Eli thought she was drunk," because, you know, Eli said, "You've been drinking". But she says, "No, my Lord," verse 15. "I'm a woman oppresed in spirit. I have not drunk wine or a strong drink, I have poured out my soul to the Lord". 'Cause sometimes you can get so down, the words just don't come out. Praise God that he can read your heart, and he's a great lip reader. So he says, "Do not consider your maidservant as a worthless woman," verse 16. "'Because I've come out of great concern and provocation.' Eli says, 'Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant your petition that you have asked of him.' She said, 'Let your maidservant find favor in your sight.' So the woman went away, and her face was no longer sad".
Wait a minute. Let's not go too fast here. She distressed. She depressed. She prays in the house. When she started praying and said she couldn't eat, she couldn't drink, but then we read she left the house glad. No longer sad. Well, wait a minute. The prayer hasn't been answered, she still hasn't gotten pregnant, her circumstances hadn't changed, but she's changed. Because one of the purposes of the house is not only to give you the boost to get to God, but to give you an environment from the people of God while you wait on God to change your situation. That's why God creates the church. In Hebrews chapter 10 he says, "Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together, as the manner of some, but encourage one another as you await the day".
So while you're waiting for God to change your situation, being in an environment that's gonna encourage you, lift you up, lift up your spirit so that the get-up-and-go that has gotten up in God can be returned to you because you heard something in the Word, something in the song, or an encouragement from somebody who saw you crying, who put their arm around you, and who simply prayed for you while you're waiting for your barrenness to change. All of that is to come from the house. So she leaves now, eating and joyful. Verse 19.
Now that I've finished my introduction, verse 19. "Then they arose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord, and returned again to their house in Ramah. And Elkanah had relations with Hannah his wife, and the Lord remembered her". Oh, no he didn't. All of a sudden the egg dropped, the sperms knew where to go, and a conception occurs that hadn't occurred for years. So until she made a spiritual connection to her prayer request, the prayer request wasn't answered. Until the spiritual connection was made, the answer to the prayer wasn't given. Luke 6:38, "Give, and it will be given to you: press down, running over".
I know most preachers talk about that with money. And it can be, it's applied to money, but it's applied to whatever you need. Whatever you need for you, tell God how he will benefit from it as you give it to others. Give the it. What is the it you want from him? Give that to somebody else. But what's going on here? I mean, is there something else happening here?
1 Samuel comes basically at the end of the book of Judges, okay? Judges is a chaotic book. It's chaos in the book of Judges. So, God decided to administer things differently moving forward, coming out of the book of Judges, and to create a monarchy to create a king, 'cause there was no king. So he's going to shift his administration. We call that in theology: dispensations, where God administers things one way at one time, but then he shifts to another way because of what the people were doing. So he now is gonna shift from the judges to a king.
So he's in a period of transition. The period of transition had to have the right judge who could give direction to the new king. Little ol' Hannah never had any idea that the reason that God was delaying her being able to get pregnant was because he was doing something different that was a lot bigger than just having a baby growing up in your womb, because she would give birth to Samuel. Samuel would become that final judge leading the people out of the book of Judges into the anointing of Saul to be king. Hannah had no idea that the delay in God's program was because her baby boy was gonna do something bigger than any other baby boy during that time.
What I'm trying to say is if God is not moving at your speed and you praying all the right prayers, you're being very specific, the only reason he's delaying it is 'cause what he's up to is a lot bigger than what you're praying for, but you just don't see it. You just don't know it yet. So you hang in there with God. So, for three years she weans him, but we got another problem. We got a problem 'cause she promised God, "I'm gonna let him grow up at the temple and serve you for the rest of his life". "That means I don't get to raise him after he three years old. You mean you gonna let me get pregnant, have a baby, I can only keep him until he weans at three years old, then I gotta give him up and only see him when I come down here for the worship? Well, come on, I don't get the full experience of being a mama".
That's why you gotta keep reading. Chapter 2, verse 20, "Then Eli would bless Elkanah and his wife, and say, 'May the Lord give you children from this woman in place of the one she dedicated to the Lord.' And they went to their own house. The Lord visited Hannah, and she conceived and gave birth to three sons and two daughters. And the boy Samuel grew up before the Lord".
I believe Paul would put it this way in Ephesians 3:20: "Now to him who can do exceedingly abundantly above all you ask or think, according to his riches and glory". When things are not going right, keep your head up high, keep looking to the Lord. Don't throw in the towel. He knows your name, knows where you are, knows the pain you have, and he's still making babies for people who need a spiritual pregnancy in their circumstance.