Today, we will be looking at verse 10 from our passage, 1 Samuel 2:1-10. I will begin with summarizing verses 6-10 and then verse 10. In this devotional, we will learn more about God’s judgement of the earth and the exaltation of the Messiah-King: Jesus.
III. God gives and takes away all life, wealth, honor, and power; declaring those against Him destroyed, those with Him protected, and the Messiah King exalted (verses 6-10).
E. God judges the earth (smashing His enemies) and exalts His Messiah King (verse 10).
10 “They that contend with Yahweh will be smashed to pieces; He will thunder in the heavens against them; Yahweh will judge the ends of the earth, and He will give power to His King and exalt the horn of His Messiah.”
In verse 9, God taught that He will ultimately silence the wicked. Here, in verse 10, God further describes that silencing as “smashing” his enemies “to pieces” as He “thunders” against them. Three different ways are used to describe this judgement: (1) “They that contend with Yahweh will be smashed to pieces,” (2) “He will thunder in the heavens against them,” and (3) “Yahweh will judge the ends of the earth.” Repeating the same thing in three different ways shows the highest level of emphasis, showing that God Himself—with all of His sovereign power—will bring it about. (We see this same sort of emphasis in the Great Commandment—about loving God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our strength—each of which represent the totality of the inner-man: our whole self repeated three times). The idea is that God will by no means allow for the wicked to go unpunished. God personally set Himself as the One who both (1) sentences and (2) carries out judgement against the wicked; He both knows all things that everyone has ever done, and He has the perfect power to carry out His perfect knowledge in a way that is inherently good. No one can be more qualified and good for that role than Him, since He is perfect in all His being and in all His ways. So, it is with the strongest sense of surety and finality in His judgment, that God will personally smash all the wicked of the earth to pieces in thunderous judgement.
There also appears to be a close place to our passage, using similar language of God’s thundering against the wicked. God’s use of thunder represents His sovereign power, will, and glory. His voice is often described as thunder (such as in Ex. 19:19), so there is a sense in which God “thundering” against His enemies represents His divine will acting against them. 1 Samuel 7:10 says that “the Lord thundered with a mighty sound that day against the Philistines and threw them into confusion, and they were defeated before Israel” (ESV). God “thundering” against the Philistines resulting in them being subdued. At the time, the Philistines were the biggest threat to Israel, and God came and used His sovereign power to subdue them before Israel, because Israel obeyed Him and called on His name. This is a foreshadowing of what God will do to the whole earth when His Son returns. (God’s voice as “thunder” also contrasts the silenced voices of the wicked in the last verse. When God speaks, it is inherently far greater than any man’s).
Another use of God “smashing” in judgement can be found in Isaiah 30:14. This verse does not have the same underlying Hebrew word, since that construction does not appear again in the Old Testament. Yet, it does convey the same idea, and gives more context for understanding how the idea is being used in Hannah’s song:
12 Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel, “Because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perverseness and rely on them, 13 therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant; 14 and its breaking is like that of a potter’s vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that among its fragments not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern.” 15 For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” But you were unwilling, 16 and you said, “No! We will flee upon horses”; therefore you shall flee away; and, “We will ride upon swift steeds”; therefore your pursuers shall be swift. 17 A thousand shall flee at the threat of one; at the threat of five you shall flee, till you are left like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain, like a signal on a hill (ESV, italics added).
The idea is that the wicked—those who contend against God, and therefore reject His judgements and commands—are those who will be judged suddenly and absolutely. They will be judged in such a way that they will become suddenly entirely impotent or powerless. Their strength will be shattered in an instant, so that nothing will be left of the power that contends against God.
Many passages and overarching themes in the Bible also teach that God will judge the whole earth. For instance, Revelation 16:18-21 refers to the final judgement of the all the wicked, where He will come in “flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder” and they had to drink “the cup of the wine of the fury of his wrath” (ESV). This will lead to the fall of Babylon the Great, never to rise again (Rev. 18:21). All the wicked are affected by that judgement, since at that time God would be judging the whole earth and smashing that wicked power to pieces. It is almost immediately afterwards that God gives all power and glory to His Son (Rev. 19). Just as it is written in 1 Samuel 2:8, the saints are also to be given “thrones” and “authority to judge” (Rev. 20:4-6). Likewise, since God judges to the ends of the earth, there is no place for people to hide from His judgement, whether in the depths of the sea, under a mountain, in the heights of the heavens, or in death (see Rev. 6:12-17; 20:11-15; Luke 23:28-31; Ps. 139:7-12). God’s judgement will be complete and total.
It is significant to know that it is with the same level of surety and finality, according to God’s infinite power, that He will give power and glory to the Messiah King over the whole earth. While not always translated, there is an “and” that connects the momentum and power of the judgement with the exaltation of the Messiah. The implication is that the same God with the same perfect power will ensure that the Messiah receives the power that was at once destroyed in the wicked, but through a perfectly exalted way. In other words, the power that the Messiah will receive will not have limitations or restrictions imposed by God through redistribution that was due to human wickedness. Rather, the power meant for redeemed humanity will be perfectly and permanently endued for use for God’s purposes. Power given to redeemed humanity will be perfectly exalted, reflecting the goodness of the Messiah.
In the second half of verse 10, for the first time in the Bible, there is direct reference to a coming Messiah-King. While the idea of God’s salvation through One like Moses and the coming Seed was taught about the Messiah before this passage, and there were “types” of Christ that pointed to Him, this is the first direct reference to the forever-reigning Messiah-King who will be given all power and glory from God when the whole earth is judged (referring to His second coming). Literally, the Son is referred to as “His King” (belonging to God) and “His anointed one” (the “Messiah”). There is a double application regarding the Messiah King. First, it likely applies to David as a type of Christ. He was anointed king by Samuel and became king when Saul died and even had a song that echoed Hannah’s (2 Samuel 22:1-51), but he could only be recognized as the messiah king in a limited sense (God only gave some power and dominion to him over the earth and David’s life precedes the final judgement). Saul was not God’s anointed one because he came as a result of the people of Israel rejecting God as king (1 Sam. 10:19). (Saul was “anointed” in a lesser sense, merely as a temporal king by God). Second, the line of David was the line through which the coming Messiah King would come in the spirit of Moses (2 Sam. 7:11-13; Deut. 18:15-19). Hence, the anointing and blessing of David was only to point towards the coming of Jesus Christ, the true Messiah King, to whom God will give all the power and dominion of the earth forever (Matt. 26:64; see also Ezek. 37:22-25). David was only a shadow of Christ, and the Messiah-King Jesus—in the line of David—was the perfect fulfillment of the Davidic covenant promise of His line ruling Israel forever. It is important to note that the ancient Jews commonly believed that this reference to the Messiah King in 1 Samuel 2:10 was also to the coming Christ, which is also reflected in the LXX’s (Greek Old Testament) rendering of “His Messiah” as “His Christ” (χριστού αυτού).[1] Only Christ will fulfill Hannah’s prophecy in the full sense. Of important note as well is that there are many parallels between Hannah’s song of Christ and Mary’s song of Christ (see Luke 1:46-55). It is as if Mary’s song is meant as a direct allusion to Hannah’s song, declaring in the New Testament that Jesus was the fulfillment of Hannah’s prophecy. Because of all this, one can be certain that Hannah’s prophecy had the Christian Faith in Christ in mind when it was given. Only He can fulfill Hannah’s prophecy.
Next time we will be looking at some closing application of Hannah’s Song.
[1] “Apostolic Bible Polyglot.” Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/interlinear/apostolic/1_samuel/2.htm.