She Opened Her Heart To God in Prayer - TWO REMARKABLE PRAYERS

 

Hannah's two prayers, recorded at 1 Samuel 1:11 and 2:1-10, contain a number of outstanding features.  Consider just a few:

* Hannah addressed the first of two prayers to "Jehovah of armies." She is the first person in the Bible record to be quoted as using that title.  It occurs  a total of 285 times in the Bible and refers to God's command over a vast array of spirit sons.

* Note that Elkanah uttered the second prayer, not when her son was born, but when she and Elkanah offered him up for God's service at Shiloah.  So Hannah's great joy lay, not in silencing her rival, Peninnah, but in being blessed by Jehovah.

* When Hannah said:  "My horn is indeed exalted in Jehovah," she may had in mind the ox, a powerful beast that uses his horns mightly .  Hannah was, in effect, saying: 'Jehovah, you make me strong.' - 1 SAMUEL 2:1.

* Hannah's words about God's "anointed one" are considered prophetic.  The expression is the same one rendered "messiah," and Hannah is the first person in the Bible record to use it to refer to a future anointed king. - 1 SAMUEL 2:10.

* Jesus' mother, Mary, about 1,000 years later, echoed some of Hannah's expressions in her own words of praise to Jehovah. - LUKE 1:46-55. (See chapter 17.) 

Next time: When Was Jesus Born? -The Bible's Answer

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