A Barren Woman and a Careless Priesthood

Observe the two households. Elkanah's family is devout, going up year by year to Shiloh, but it is also divided, with two wives and an ongoing cruelty between them. Eli's household at the tabernacle is the priesthood of Israel, but Eli himself cannot tell a praying woman from a drunk one, and the next chapter will show his sons are far worse. The book opens with a nation that has a sanctuary and a priesthood and yet very little true perception of God.

Interpret Hannah's vow. She promises that if the Lord gives her a son, she will give him back for all his life, and no razor will touch his head, echoing the Nazirite vow of Numbers 6. She is not bargaining. She is asking for a child in order to give him to God. When the Lord remembers her, she names the boy Samuel and, after weaning him, brings him to Shiloh with offerings and leaves him with Eli. The chapter ends with worship.

Apply it. God often begins his largest works in the private grief of unnoticed people. The renewal of Israel's leadership did not start at the tabernacle. It started with a woman weeping in it.

What have you asked God for, and would you be willing to give it back to him? Where has someone in authority misread your faith, and how did you respond? How might your own family's ordinary faithfulness be the beginning of something you will not live to see?