Proper 28 B + Hannah's Faith +11.14.21
M. Campbell-Langdell
All Santos, Oxnard
(1 Samuel 1:4–20; 1
Samuel 2:1–10; Hebrews 10:11–14, (15–18), 19–25; St Mark 13:1–8)
Today we hear the story of Hannah in our passage from First
Samuel. This is the story of a woman who is yearning for something so badly,
and many of the people around her are insensitive or do not understand her
pain. Who can relate to this mother who as yet is without children? Perhaps the
mother who wishes to be who endures in vitro fertilization and hormone
injections and all sorts of tests just to get a chance to hold her own baby.
Perhaps the mother who had a baby but had to give the baby up due to life
circumstances. Perhaps the foster parent who cares for a child, draws them
tight into their hearts, and then has to give them up. Perhaps another parent
to be who suffers a miscarriage knows of Hannahs’ grief and yearning.
Elkanah simply could not understand Hannah’s grief- am I am
not more to you than ten sons? This is said from his perspective as a man in
his particular role and although said with love does not show care for Hannah’s
condition. Peninnah on seeing Hannah’s grief, uses it to give her more grief.
How sad. How much more human it would be to see the grief and respond with
compassion. And Eli the priest sees Hannah and instead of seeing her faithful,
heartfelt prayers, he thinks she has been drinking! As one commentator pointed
out, it had been so long since he saw true prayer, he didn’t recognize it.[1]
Wow, that is a sobering thought for any priest. He didn’t see her faith. Just
like those at the moment of Pentecost thought those touched by the Spirit’s
flames were drunk at 9am.
How will we see faith?
I think we see faith in the example of Hannah, who stands up
to the religious authority of her context and states her true intentions. We
see faith in how she trusts God to answer her even if those around her are
dismissive. “No, my lord, I am a woman deeply troubled; 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 I have been
speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation all this time.”
Hannah was full of faith. And God did bless her and fulfill
her request. But it was not just about her. She dedicated that precious child
to service in the temple. He went to live apart from her to study, and became
one of the prophets of Israel, one of the ones to interpret God’s will to the
people. God does not always answer our prayers in the same way we see in this
passage. Sometimes God gives us other ways to be fruitful. And God’s
fruitfulness is always about being there for others not just for ourselves.
I recently read about an example of a similarly persistent
woman. A mother for all the disappeared girls in New York City at the turn of
the 20th century. Mrs. Grace Humiston, a lawyer who had gone to
night classes as a divorced woman in New York City, heard about a young woman
who had disappeared in 1917. While the police were quick to malign this young
woman as simply another young girl lured away by a man, Mrs. Humiston knew
something else was afoot. She carefully researched every aspect of the case and
persevered. The authorities of her time, the police, were at times cooperative
and at times tried to thwart her progress. And through her persistence she was
finally able to locate the place where, hidden under the motorcycle repair shop
where Ruth last sharpened her skates to go ice skating. A man had tried to accost
her and then ended up killing her when she resisted. Although it was a very sad
ending, Grace was able to redeem Ruth’s reputation by asserting that she had
defended herself. Which is not to buy into the school that says that purity is
the only form of godliness, but at the time it was a win for women who felt
that men in authority constantly disregarded cases of missing girls, deciding
that they had clearly run off with men rather than seeing them as potential
victims of crime. Mrs. Grace Humiston stood up to the authorities and helped
women feel seen and valued.[2]
Perhaps you see faith in many other ways. Another person I
see faith in is Greta Thunberg. In last week’s news I saw a picture of her
comforting another young adult as the emotional impact of climate change hit
them. The young woman was grieving and Greta, small and still, held her.
Despite being on the spectrum, which might make that kind of closeness more
challenging for her. They were standing up together to tell the world once more
about our moral obligation to act on climate change, for the future of all our
children.
Where do you see faith? Perhaps you have seen it in your
foremothers or in those you know who have served in the military and whom we
honor this week. I suspect you have seen it strongest in those who spoke truth
to power, even when the authorities- religious or otherwise- in their lives
could not see the faith in them.
The good news is that God responded to Hannah and will respond to your faith
too. May we say with Hannah in time: My heart exults in the Lord;
my strength is exalted in my God.
And may we, like Hannah, like Grace and Greta, do our small
part to bring about a better world.
May we exalt in the good that God will do in and through us
to protect those who are in danger and vulnerable, and to protect our planet,
and our human future together.
Amen.
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