Today, we will be continuing our series on Hannah’s Song, this time looking at verse 5. The first point summarizes verses 3-5, and afterwards, summarizes verse 5. May we worship God by contemplating and applying His Word.
II. Hannah speaks of God as sovereign judge over all spoken words, controller of all power, distributor of all food, one who blesses with children, and as taker of life (verses 3-5).
C. God is sovereign over the distribution and sustainability of food and over all life (verse 5).
5 “They that were full have hired themselves out for bread; and they that were hungry ceased, while the barren have borne seven, and she that had many sons became feeble.”
In verse five, there are a couple of extreme contrasts. The first is about those who had much food and little worries about need, but who had to hire themselves out to others because they could not sustain themselves, even with their own land and possessions. (Having a steady supply of food was a life and death struggle in the Ancient Near East, which is very different from the present situation in the West today). That is then contrasted with the hungry gaining what was necessary for them to sustain themselves. The hungry gained everything that was needed to ward off their hunger in a sustainable way. Their gain was such that they could no longer be categorized as “they that [are] hungry” (their sustenance became ongoing). The two groups being contrasted switched situations so that those that were full are now those that are hungry, and those that were hungry are now those that are full. Both, then, had their situations reversed, depicting the new stations in life that were provided for them.
God’s involvement in relation to our food is very evident. Through Hannah’s Song, God is communicating to Israel that He alone is sovereign over who gets bread and who does not. People can seek to erect as many storehouses as they want and fill them to the brim; yet, ultimately, it is God who permits them to have food or to not have food. Having an ample supply of food, then, gives no true assurance that their possessors will not simply go hungry the next day. God may bring natural disaster to destroy them (Joel 1:16-18), He may take the owner’s life and give it to others (Luke 12:16-21), or, if they obey God, he may bless the production of their food and preserve it (Deut. 28:8). Matthew 6:33 also says, “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” The message in Matthew 6 is that we do not need to worry about what tomorrow will bring, since worry cannot bring us any good thing (rather, worry is not trusting in God’s sovereignty). Rather, we need to work diligently with our hands, seek the Lord in all that we do, and He will supply for our needs in His own perfect way. Once again, the power belongs to God, and assurance is for those who trust in Him. The opposite of this message is to assume that a person should not seek to make or produce food. Rather, God commands people to work for their food and to be productive with their hands, since diligent work is the usual mode for this blessing (Deut. 24:19). It is those who trust and obey God who can have ultimate assurance.
The second contrast was between the barren woman and the woman with many children. Like the first contrast in this verse, the end result of both depicts something that is essentially permanent. The barren woman, who should have never been able to give birth, now had seven sons, while the woman who had many sons lost them all. God thus holds all sovereignty over who has children and who does not. God’s direct intervention is evident. As an act of judgement, God can diminish or withhold children from individuals or even entire populations, if He so desires. He can also bless those who seek to be faithful to Him by giving them abundant children who then praise and image Him for the next generation. Raising children for God is a good and blessed thing, and is one of the main purposes of marriage, as Malachi 2:15 says, “what was the one God seeking [from those with faithful oneness in marriage]? Godly offspring.” Yet, God can also use barrenness in the faithful to further other aims that He may have, which ultimately bring Him glory. We cannot know how different things may have been if someone who was barren could have children, but this we do know: “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” So, even in the case of a God-honouring believer being truly barren, God has a good purpose for that, meaning that He will ultimately use their barrenness for the good of that individual and His Church. God chose for everything to play out in human history for our good and for His own glory.
Having seven sons born to a person (1 Sam. 2:5) also carries with it a sense of divine favor. For example, in reference to how Ruth was to Naomi, Ruth was regarded as being “better than seven sons” (Ruth 4:15). That is saying a lot, given that having seven sons was already a major blessing. In Ruth’s situation, as with the barren woman who bore seven, God is the one who bestowed the blessing. God is the only One who could have led Ruth to marry Boaz as she did, and only God can cause a barren woman to bear seven children. Seven is a number of blessing or completeness, depicting the fulness of divine favour. Hannah herself was a barren woman who prayed to God and gave birth to Samuel (Sam. 1:11). It is possible that she too, being barren, was anticipating more children at this point (she had five more children after Samuel was born in 2:21). The contrast there may also be an allusion to Peninnah, her husband’s other wife, who had many children. Peninnah often taunted her for having no children (1:6); but, in the end, it was Hannah alone who could boast in the Lord.
The same is true of us as believers in our present situations. While we may look at the wicked today and see many of them living with abundance (like Peninnah, with her many children), we can know that, without God, they will certainly lose every good thing. If they do not repent and turn to the Lord, then they will certainly plunge into the darkest recesses of existence, bringing no good thing with them past the grave. Yet, this is not the case for us, since all things have been given to us through Christ, and one day we will forever enjoy them. We will never experience need or lack, and even the faithful barren will be regarded as the mothers (or fathers, in the case of impotence) of many faithful believers in the Lord. So, we will have everything that we need to serve the Lord faithfully to the end; and, even when we experience earthly need in this life, we can know that what we do have is sufficient for His good purpose. We have humble estates now, but soon, we will be exulted with Christ: turning our hunger into fulness, bareness into abundant offspring, and forever satisfying our every need perfectly and forever. So, we can both trust in God’s good providence now, and look forward to our perfect satisfaction in Christ. We will never be in true lack or despair. God is in control.
Next time we will be looking at verse 6.