1Sa 1:6-7, 6 And her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her, because the LORD had closed her womb. 7 So it went on year by year. As often as she went up to the house of the LORD, she used to provoke her. Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat.
The story of Hannah is one of my favorites in the Bible. It portrays the life of an ordinary woman provoked to have extraordinary faith. I wish for us to consider 6 points in 6 devotionals from her story that constitutes to effective praying.
1. Channel your bitterness to passion/burden. The grief of the childless wife drove Hannah to God. There she found her only resources. She turned her bitterness into passion and sought God to reverse a situation He caused. Hannah teaches us what it means to have an effective fervent prayer life. You must have a driving force, something provoking you to zeal. The drive serves as a challenge to believe God for the impossible in the midst of challenges. We should see rivals as friends, they are agents to put pressure on reserved tanks, and bust them open for good. Hannah perhaps would have been content being childless with the love of a husband and all that she already had, but God used her rival Penninah to push her to want a child, but for a different reason as we shall see. To quote Charles Stanley, “sometimes God will want more for you than you want for yourself” in that He will allow or put you under certain circumstances to stir you up.