Page 1 of 8

As I begin today I want to encourage you to get out this sheet that is in your bulletin.

This contains a devotion, sermon notes, and prayer sheet. Each week I share a devotion that

relates to the message that I preach. This week you have the opportunity to read five stories

about mothers—Hannah, Gabriel, Naomi, Rahab & Rachel. Some of you are starting to talk to

me during the week about this devotion. Thank you. I encourage you to use this devotion each

day. I also encourage you to use the sermon notes section of the devotion. I trust that something

will be said in this sermon that you will want to remember and reflect upon during the week.

God has a message for you.

Mother’s Day is one of my favorite days in the year in the church. I personally have been

shaped by my mother in ways that I’m still learning. You’ll see her picture later. One of my

favorite stories about my mom took place when I was in 7th grade. We lived in Worthington,

MN. Some folks wanted to put up apartment buildings near our house. My mom didn’t want

that to happen. She was worried about all the traffic. She started her own crusade. She went

around the neighborhood to talk to the neighbors. She went to the City Council meeting to share

her concerns. I still remember my mom coming home after a City Council meeting. My Dad

and sister and I were watching TV. One of the first things she said was, “I didn’t make any

friends tonight.” At that time my parents owned some apartments in another part of town. The

newspaper ran a smear job on my mom saying that she owned apartments, but opposed these

apartments. It was downright mean. What I’ve always admired about my mom was she was

fierce in her convictions even when her convictions were unpopular.

Let me share one more thing about my mom. She encouraged my faith. I don’t know if

your kids ever tell you they don’t want to go to worship on a Sunday morning. I doubt that any

of your kids’ protests match the protests that I made on Sunday mornings. When I didn’t want to

go to church, you know what my mom said? We’re going to church. When I made all the
 Page 2 of 8

arguments that church was not good for me, you know what my mom said? We’re going to

church. My mom was resolute in developing my faith. Today my sister and I are both pastors.

In every sermon I try to ask you to do one thing. I’m going to do it early in the sermon

today. Share with your mom or if your mom isn’t around share with someone else, one quality

about her that you especially admire. Can we all do that today? One more. For all husbands.

Share with your spouse today, one quality that you admire about her.

SLIDE (picture of Community Pres in Plainview)

This is the picture of the church I served in Plainview, Minnesota. Just as we are doing

here, Mother’s Day was a BIG day.

We have to be careful about Mother’s Day because this is a hard day for some women. I

remember the story of Mary at the Plainview Church. She was a very talented teacher at the

local school. Every part of her being wanted to be a mother. For biological reasons she and her

husband couldn’t conceive a child. After trying for a long time the two decided to adopt. They

participated in a program where they adopted a teenager who was in foster care. Mary and her

husband traveled to the Cities from Plainview at least twice a month for a year to receive training

on this program. During this training they had every part of their life examined. A girl came to

live with them—a teenager who had had lived in the Foster Care system for most of her life.

Last June Amy & I worshipped at the church in Plainview the day before we moved to the north

metro. That day life was going so well for them. The girl had gotten involved in the Plainview

church. In fact the Sunday after we were there she was baptized.

Over the past year things didn’t work out. This girl had anger issues that no one could

control. Mary and her husband did everything they could think of. But sadly there was nothing

that they could do to make it work. They had to give up this girl. I know Mary well. I was her

pastor. I know that she gave every ounce of her being to incorporate this girl into her family.

But it just didn’t work. I know that Mother’s Day is a tough day for her.
 Page 3 of 8

I think of May. Obviously these names aren’t their real names. May was a woman with

grown children. Almost every Mother’s day when I greeted her before worship, she would grab

me in a bear hug and cry. Her husband would tell me that Mother’s Day was a hard day for them

because their children wouldn’t come see them. May carried a deep ache in her soul.

Mother’s Day is a wonderful day to celebrate. It is a BIG day. I don’t want to overly

sentimentalize this day. It’s appropriate to celebrate and honor mothers and we acknowledge

that for some folks this is a tough day.

SLIDE Mother’s Day was started by Anna Jarvis. She was raised in West

Virginia. She was born in 1864. On May 12, 1907, two years after her mother’s death, Anna

Jarvis held a memorial for her mom. She started a campaign to make “Mother’s Day” a

recognized holiday. There had been attempts to establish Mother’s Day, but they had never

succeeded. Anna Jarvis dedicated her life to it. In 1914 Woodrow Wilson made Mother’s Day a

national holiday.

What’s ironic that later in her life Anna Jarvis regretted her campaign to establish

Mother’s Day. She felt it had become too commercialized.

It’s always been hard to be a mother, but I think it’s more complicated today than it was

even 20 years ago. I came across a fascinating study on mothers this week done by the Pew

Research Center. Some of their study is on this graph. They discovered

SLIDE
Mothers are becoming older—the age line was trending up in 2008 compared to 1990
Mothers are becoming racially more diverse
Many more mothers are unmarried—41% of all mothers were unmarried in 2008

It takes courage to be a mom today. It’s more complicated.

This brings me to the woman whom I want to focus on today. Her name is Hannah. No

not the Hannah who sang a solo today, though the Hannah who sang a solo today received her

name from the Hannah about whom I will talk. I’m talking about Hannah the mother of Samuel.
 Page 4 of 8

I want to share part of her story.

There are four characters in today’s story and one location. The four characters are

Elkanah, Hannah’s husband; Penninah, one of Elkanah’s wife; Eli, the priest, and, of course,

Hannah. The location is Shiloh.

Besides Hannah the names of these characters might seem odd to us. I don’t want the

strangeness of their names to prevent us from experiencing the power of the story. So if it is

okay with you I want to change their names to make the story more relevant to us. Is that okay

—to change the names? Good. Even if you said, no, I was going to do it.

SLIDE
Elkanah Bob
Penninah Sally
Eli Pastor John
Shiloh Minneapolis
Hannah Hannah

Is all that straight?

Let’s say Bob lived in the wetlands of Blaine/Lino Lakes/Forest Lake.

Every year Bob would leave the wetlands of Blaine/Lino Lakes/Forest Lake to worship and
sacrifice at the ark in Minneapolis.

The ark contained the two tablets upon which a person could discover the special religious laws.
We know them as the Ten Commandments.

Bob would take his wife Sally and their children, and he would take his wife, Hannah. Hannah
was not able to have children.

Going to visit the ark was very special. People believed that the ark was a direct representation
of God. So when the family went to the ark to worship he was experiencing the presence of God

When Bob worshipped he would give portions of his meat sacrifice to Sally and their children.
While the clan went to worship Sally would always tease and point out in quite a rude way that
Hannah was less special because she could not bear children. Hannah received the scorn of
Sally.

This went on year after year. Hannah was grieved, of course, by the ridicule. Bob knew about it,
but couldn’t stop this ridicule. He went on to share a double portion of the meat sacrifice with
Hannah when they were at the ark in Minneapolis.

Hannah wept and wept. She would not eat.

 Page 5 of 8

Finally Bob asked Hannah “why do you weep? Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad?”
And then he asked a question that revealed quite a lot about him.

“Am I not more to you than ten sons?”

There are two questions in this story towards which I am driving today. This is the first

one. Bob’s question to Hannah, “Am I not more to you than ten sons?”

I am guessing that most husbands have had the basic theme of the question flash through

our minds during our marriage. I know I have. At some point we see our wife suffer from

sadness, we watch her cry, and we wonder when it is going to stop. Then we quite arrogantly and

narcissistically wonder, “honey, why are you so sad. I know you are hurting, but you have me.

Aren’t I enough? Aren’t I more to you than what you are lacking?” That was the essence of

Bob’s question. “Aren’t I more to you than ten sons?”

The question revealed Bob’s weakness of character. Of course, Hannah’s grief didn’t

indicate her lack of love for Bob or her dissatisfaction for Bob or what she didn’t receive from

him.

In the story she didn’t answer Bob’s question. But I think that she did answer the

question. If Hannah had answered Bob’s question, “Am I not more to you than ten sons?” what

do you think Hannah’s answer would have been. There is no doubt in my mind that her answer

was no. Hannah wasn’t about to let her well-being be defined only by her husband’s needs.

Let’s push this a bit deeper. For Hannah to say “no” revealed her courage as a woman.

Remember this was a patriarchal and sexist culture. Women didn’t have legal rights; women

didn’t keep the money they made. Wives were dependant on their husbands for their livelihood.

One of the worst things that could happen to a wife was to be divorced by her husband. If

divorce happened a wife had no source of money or food.

Not only was Hannah dependent on Bob for her financial livelihood Hannah hadn’t been

able to bear what was most valuable to men in that day. A son.
 Page 6 of 8

Hannah’s rival, Sally, already had children with bob. I’m guessing that Sally pointed out

to Bob what a nuisance Hannah was when the two were alone. Bob probably was told why he

should leave Hannah.

There were good reasons for Hannah not to tell the truth to Bob. It would have been

safer for Hannah to say “yes, honey you are worth more to me than ten children.”

What is courage? I looked it up in the New American Heritage Dictionary this week.

One definition that I found was this:

SLIDE: Courage: The state or quality of mind or spirit that enables one to face danger
with self-possession, confidence and resolution.

Hannah faced danger with resolution when she said “no” to Bob’s question.

The story goes on. Hannah went to the ark to pray to God. As she was there she poured

out her soul to the Lord. She was weeping—bitterly. But don’t take her tears as a sign of

weakness as many men do. I still remember in seminary when a woman starting crying in my

presence. I wasn’t quite sure what to do. This woman rose out of her tears and told me quite

directly, “If you are going to be a pastor get used to being with people who cry.”

Hannah’s tears revealed her determination.

As she cried she made a vow to the Lord. The vow was this:

SLIDE
“O Lord of hosts, if only you will look on the misery of your servant, and remember me, and not
forget your servant, but will give to your servant a male child, then I will set him before you as a
Nazirite until the day of his death. He shall drink neither wine nor intoxicants, and no razor shall
touch his head.”

While Hannah was praying her lips moved, but no sound came out of her mouth. Pastor Joe was

watching Hannah pray. Pastor Joe had two sons who were pastors. If you read further into 1

Samuel you will discover that that they were described as scoundrels. The story doesn’t say that

Pastor Joe was a scoundrel. But I do wonder about Pastor Joe’s judgment.
 Page 7 of 8

When Pastor Joe saw Hannah’s lips move and no sound come out he misjudged the

condition of Hannah. Do you remember what Pastor Joe thought about Hannah?? He thought

she was drunk. Instead of understanding that she had been pouring out her soul to the Lord he

thought that she had been pouring cheap wine down her throat.

Pastor Joe said to Hannah.

SLIDE
“How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself?

This is the second question upon which I want to focus.

If we think the power differential between Bob and Hannah was immense, just think of

the power differential between Pastor Joe and Hannah. We already know that Hannah’s

financial well-being depended on her husband. Pastors had even more power. They looked over

the ark, the place where God resided. If a pastor accused you of something, the proper response

was to accept deferentially the accusation—even if it was wrong.

But did Hannah accept Pastor Joe’s accusation of being drunk?

SLIDE
“No, my lord, I am a woman deeply troubled; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I
have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Do not regard your servant as a worthless
woman, for I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation all this time.”

What is courage? Courage is sticking to the truth even when doing so places us at risk.

It would have been far easier and safer for Hannah just to nod her head deferentially when Pastor

Joe accused her of being drunk. But Hannah didn’t. She stuck to the truth even though it placed

her in danger.

When Pastor Joe realized that he was wrong and when he heard that Hannah was pouring

out her soul to God, he blessed her. She was able to bear a child. We know her first son as

Samuel. Samuel became one of the most significant prophets in the Old Testament.

Look at the order of what happened—courage, blessing, impact. The story started with

courage and ended with impact.

 Page 8 of 8

I hope this order grabs our attention. Part of our Purpose Statement at Chain of Lakes

Church is for us as disciples to impact the world. We will have impact when we have the

courage of Hannah.

These stories of impact on Mother’s Day are all around us. I asked on my Facebook page

this week if people had stories to share about mothers they knew who had courage. One person

mentioned the stories of adoptive mothers. One person sent me an E-mail reminding me of the

story of a woman giving of her child for adoption because she knew she couldn’t care for the

child.

Today is a day of imagining. We’re so new in our life together as a church. Let’s

imagine a community of courageous people who make an impact. Let’s imagine a community of

people—you and I at Chain of Lakes going out of our way to support mothers. Let’s imagine a

community of people—you and I at Chain of Lakes accepting all mothers without judgment no

matter what has happened on their journey—acceptance is one of our Core Values. Let’s

imagine a community of people—you and I at Chain of Lakes supporting with deep compassion

women who want to be mothers, but just can’t. Let’s imagine a community of people—you and

I at Chain of Lakes where women are encouraged to be courageous. We will have role models

of courage all around us. When people on the outside of Chain of Lakes talk about us they will

say, “Those people have courage.”

Hannah is our model. She started something in her courageous response to these two

questions. On Mother’s Day 2010 she is our hero.