1 Samuel begins with the story of childless Hannah crying out to God for a son in “anxiety and vexation.” To not have children and a son in particular suggests that being barren was about the worst possible situation for a woman in those times. Despite having a husband who favored her over the other wife, Hannah could not be consoled. Her anxiety suggests that being barren was beyond a matter of pride and shame but consequential to her security and well-being. Which is not to say she desperately wanted children only to offset any future hardship as a result of famine, war, violence and other situations where life can be easily snuffed out. But in those times (and even today in many parts of the world), prosperity meant food to eat and safety from pillaging, rape, murder and slavery. Therefore, the harvest season was a time of rejoicing and celebration. Security and peace meant having a strong king and a strong army with chariots, horses and menacing weapons.

The request for a son is of such importance that Hannah vows to “give him to the LORD all the days of his life, and no razor shall touch his head” – the visible mark of a Nazirite. God grants her petition and her prayer in response is the prayer of a woman who has experienced dramatic deliverance, such as from a great enemy or from death itself. In her prayer, Hannah exults in the LORD, derides enemies, rejoices in God’s salvation. Her prayer describes God as confounding the ways of the world in breaking down the mighty, giving strength to the feeble, the prosperous begging for bread, the hungry satisfied, the lowly seated with princes, and the rich brought low. In other words, God executes justice.

The scene quickly changes to the matter of Eli the priest’s two wicked sons who were the modern equivalent of shakedown thugs operating in God’s temple. Acutally, perhaps there is not really a modern equivalent of blatant thuggery occurring in a place of worship.  Today’s sins are expressed through addictions and passive aggression. The heart of the matter in God’s eyes was that the two sons “treated the offering of the LORD with contempt.” As people offered animal sacrifices to God, the priest’s servants would beligerantly and greedily take the best of whatever they wanted. “Thus the sin of the young men was very great in the sight of the LORD.” (1 Samuel: 2:17) The men had no sense of the sacrificial offerings as being a bridge to God.

A few paragraphs further into the narrative, it is revealed that “it was the will of the LORD to put them to death.” It is interesting to note that throughout the telling of the account of Eli’s sons, the author interjects here and there that the young Samuel was ministering before the LORD, grew in the presence of the LORD,  continued to grow in stature with the LORD…

A prophet visits Eli to pronounce severe judgement upon his house and descendants – forever. The judgment is pronounced again by way of Samuel when God calls to him as he was lying down in God’s temple. When God calls out his name to get his attention, Samuel has no inkling that it is God as explained in the following :

Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, and the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him. (1 Samuel 3:7)

Samuel knew and heard about God but he had not yet met the living God. God had not yet spoken to him directly. And anything that God says to us is “the word of the LORD” meaning that what He tells us is to be regarded with reverence and accepted in order to obey wholeheartedly and remembered always.  In this way Samuel did not yet know God. (In our day, the normal and perhaps safe way that we communicate with God is through reading scripture and prayer in response to scripture. We now have “the word of the LORD” in print.) In a later episode, when the people cry out for a king, Samuel “repeated them in the ears of the LORD” which is a striking way of expressing Samuel’s privileged and intimate relationship with God. After an earlier reading of this verse, I remembered it as Samuel whispering into God’s ears. Samuel had the kind of relationship with God that Moses had, in God speaking to him face to face, as one speaks to a friend (Exodus 33:11).

We grow in knowing God as we encounter who He is in His compassion, as well as His severity, with both attributes expressed in His laws and commandments. We see God’s compassion with Hannah in giving her a son who would achieve for her significance and security. Hannah’s story is of course a shadow of the one and only Son of God who delivers those of us who also cry out to God as Hannah did. God tells us repeatedly that His steadfast love endures forever, that His faithfulness reaches to the clouds. But this is not the whole story; there is God’s severity and His uncompromizing verdict that we are accountable for our wicked hearts and deeds. When Abel was murdered by Cain, his blood cried out to God for justice. As other examples, should God forgive genocide, the child abuser who destroys young lifes? Blood must be shed in order to have peace with God and He will not allow His creation to go down the drain as a result of hatred, selfishness, injustice and the list goes on. In some cultures, people cannot accept a God who forgives because they understand that some atrocities are just too mind-boggling. Yet, if we seek forgiveness, God has provided a way out for us. His love and mercy compelled Him to send His only begotten Son to shed blood on our behalf, the only possible sacrifice worthy and sufficient in order to satisfy God’s wrath. If not for His grace, we would be on the receiving end of His severity, which is what befalls Eli in all its horror:

Then the LORD said to Samuel, “Behold, I am about to do a thing in Israel at which the two ears of everyone who hears it will tingle.” (1 Samuel 3:11)

God’s first message to Samuel is that Eli’s house will be punished forever and that there will be no atonement by way of sacrifice…forever. What is Eli’s response? “It is the LORD. Let Him do what seems good to him.” (3 Samuel: 18) I think certainly Eli knew God too.