Praying like Hannah

I was thinking the other day how often we pray for things and get upset when God isn't quick to answer our prayers. How we get discouraged and wonder if our father in heaven even cares about the things that are going on with us. We live in a world of impatience, we want what we want at the moment we want it and the worst part is we think we deserve it in our time. I would even say that we are slightly guilty of walking around with a "life's not fair if I don't get what I want" attitude.  We tend to blame our circumstances or sometimes even our God. The reason this has been on my mind lately is because there is something in my life that I have been praying for and its been about 4 years. It all came crashing down yesterday when I just fell to my knees and cried out to God about it. I have been so discouraged because I haven't seen an answer to my prayer and I even asked God "hello can you hear me? Are you going to do anything about this? Are you there?"

I immediately was reminded about Hannah and her situation. Let me remind you of who Hannah was. She was married to Elkanah, she was one of two of his wives. Hannah was barren and scripture says that the Lord closed her womb. Peninnah was the other wife and was blessed with sons and daughters. Now the bible also says that Hannah was taunted by Peninnah, on purpose because she couldn't have children! Can you imagine being barren and then have it shoved in your face over and over by your husbands OTHER wife who already had a handful of children? Ugh Hannah was better than I would have been, I know I would not have responded well to that kind of thing. There would have been a whole lot of eye rolling and attitude coming from me on a daily basis! Hannah was different, she was sad of course but she was persistent with the Lord. God was silent for years with Hannah and she never stopped praying. She never doubted Gods abilities and had FAITH that God had the power to heal her womb. The bible says in 1 thes. 5:17 to pray without ceasing and Hannah was definitely doing that. Hannah cried out to the Lord and made a promise that if the Lord would bless her with a son she would give him back to the Lord. God blessed Hannah for her faithfulness and Hannah kept her promise. When Samuel was born she dedicated him to the Lord just as she promised. God then blessed her with 2 more sons and 2 daughters!

My point here is that Hannah is an awesome example of how we should be. She never gave up, honored her promises to God and then praised God for his kindness and wisdom. We need to be faithful to God even when we don't see an answer to our prayers, we need to love God for who he is and what He has already done for us. Otherwise we treat Him like a genie in a bottle. God deserves more than that from us. He deserves all cause He gave us all. Is there something in your life, an area or situation, where you haven't seen an answered prayer? Are you remaining faithful? Are you praying without ceasing? Remain faithful remember Hannah waited years while the Lord was silent but in the end it was worth it!