Episode Transcript
[00:00:11] Hey, everybody. Pastor Chuck Allen here with another weekday podcast. Today, let's talk about the prayer that nobody could hear.
[00:00:19] On this weekday podcast, I want to make sure first you understand how grateful I am that you've joined me today.
[00:00:27] I also want you to put this image in your mind. A picture of a woman standing at the entrance of a place of worship. She's not singing. She's not smiling. Her lips are moving. No sound is coming out. And the man that's watching her from across the room thinks she's drunk. That's where we start today, because sometimes the most spiritual thing you'll ever do looks like nothing at all.
[00:00:52] This lady's name is Hannah. If you don't know her story, I want to introduce her to you because I think she's about to become one of your favorite Bible people. Hannah was married.
[00:01:04] Married to a man who loved her deeply.
[00:01:07] But Hannah also had a second title, not just wife, but she was the barren wife.
[00:01:15] Year after year, her family would travel to Shiloh to worship the Lord.
[00:01:20] And year after year, she watched her husband's other wife parade her children in front of her like a trophy case.
[00:01:28] Scripture tells us that this other woman tormented her just to make her miserable every single year.
[00:01:37] I want you to just kind of settle in on this picture about her heartbrokenness.
[00:01:44] She didn't get bitter, and she didn't get quiet toward God. She got honest.
[00:01:50] 1st Samuel 1:10 says Hannah was in deep anguish, crying as she prayed to the Lord. She didn't clean it up, y'. All. She didn't perform it for the room. She brought God the real deal. The real deal.
[00:02:05] And she made a vow. She said, God, if you'll give me a son, I will give him right back to you all the days of his life. Now, here's where it gets almost comedic. If. If it weren't so tender, it would just blow our mind.
[00:02:22] Eli, the priest, is watching her from his seat, and because her lips are moving and she's making no sound, he assumes that she's drunk and calls her out in front of everyone.
[00:02:36] Now, can you imagine? I mean, that's. That's a little embarrassing. You're pouring out your deepest ache of your soul to God, and closest religious authority in the room completely misreads you, sister. Hear me.
[00:02:52] Some of the people watching your prayer life will not understand it. Hey, guys, there are people that are going to misjudge your posture. They'll question your process. That does not mean your prayer isn't reaching heaven. It means not everyone is positioned to Recognize what you are wrestling with and what that wrestling looks like. But Hannah corrects him respectfully, but clearly, she says, I was pouring out my heart to the Lord.
[00:03:25] And Eli, to his credit, softens, and he says, may the God of Israel grant the request you have of him. That's it. No fireworks, no audible confirmation, just a blessing spoken over in unanswered prayer.
[00:03:42] And verse 18 says, Something remarkable happens next. Hannah goes back to her room and she eats again. Her face is no longer sad. Nothing has changed circumstantially. She's still not pregnant in that moment. But something shifts internally the second she releases her request into God's hands.
[00:04:05] That, my friend, that. That's a move I want you to catch today. Hannah didn't leave the altar with an answer.
[00:04:14] He left with peace. There's a difference between waiting for God to move and resting while God moves. Hannah found the second one before she ever held Samuel, her son, in her arms.
[00:04:31] We know how the story ends. The Lord remembers her. She conceives, and she names her son Samuel because she asked the Lord for him. And true to her word, when he's weaned, she brings him back to Shiloh and gives him to the Lord's service for the rest of his life.
[00:04:50] Here's my question for you. As you drive or fold laundry or sit in the carpool line or on a treadmill today, what are you still praying with your mouth but moving? No sound. Not nothing's coming out.
[00:05:08] And can you trust, like Hannah did, that God hears the prayer even when the room misreads it?
[00:05:14] You don't need anyone else to understand your anguish for it to be valid. You just need to keep bringing it to the only one who validates it.
[00:05:26] Let our prayer sound like Lord, for everyone who is carrying an unanswered longing today, meet them the way you met Hannah.
[00:05:37] As a matter of fact, Lord, I'm asking you today to meet me there.
[00:05:42] Let me leave this moment with a lighter face even before the answer comes in Jesus name, my friends, That's. That's faith.
[00:05:56] That is joy, and that is a confidence in a God who adores you. Thanks for joining me today. I'll see you back tomorrow on another weekday podcast.
