Mars Hill Fellowship

MESSAGE |

How Do You Regard the Lord?

SERIES |

Ask

SCRIPTURE |

1 Samuel 2:1-12

SPEAKER |

Pastor Joseph Ardayfio

KEY THEME |

1)      For some of us, the stumbling block to answered prayer is our ability to handle the additional responsibility of answered prayer. In 1 Samuel 2, Hannah exemplified a Godly mother who understood this additional responsibility.

a)      Hannah put God first, believed in prayer, kept her vows, and gave God all the glory. Although Hannah’s first son was a great blessing, she vowed to give him to the LORD.

2)      As a mother, Hannah made a difficult sacrifice. This child represented fulfillment of the Lord’s promise to remove her barrenness; validation from the feelings of illegitimacy as a wife and mother; and encouragement in her role as a mother. In light of all of these things, Hannah realizes that this child had a destiny that was bigger than her need to horde the blessing.

3)      Hannah not only regarded the Lord in high-esteem but she instilled in her son the same level of regard for the Lord, his instructions and his precepts.

a)      Generations can be affected by how we regard the Lord. Based on Hannah’s testimony, she regarded the Lord as a deliverer. Verse 2 states: “² “There is no one holy like the Lord; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God.”  ³ … for the Lord is a God who knows, …  ⁸ “For the foundations of the earth are the Lord’s;  upon them he has set the world. ⁹ He will guard the feet of his saints, but the wicked will be silenced in darkness.

b)      Without a high-regard for the Lord, Hannah would have resisted giving her son over to the Lord because the blessing meant so much to her personally. A proper view of God allows us to see sacrifice to God as our gain rather than our loss. We must always examine what we are doing with the things that the Lord has blessed us with? Are we faithful in using them for the glory of God, or are we simply hoarding them for our own pleasure?

c)       When we hold the Lord in high-regard, we live to please Him in everything that we do. We recognize that something that fulfills us at the expense of God’s plan is an illegitimate fulfillment. Sadly, we are living in a society that has not only ratified illegitimate fulfillment as acceptable, but glorified it as a mark of independence.

d)      As Hannah regarded the Lord in high esteem, she experienced fruitfulness. ^{1 Samuel 2:21} And the Lord was gracious to Hannah; she conceived and gave birth to three sons and two daughters. Meanwhile, the boy Samuel grew up in the presence of the Lord.

4)      Although Eli was a faithful man of God, he did not pass on the high level of regard for the Lord to his sons. Eli sinned before God, because he had a responsibility to instill in his children a regard for the Lord. Instead he honored his sons more than God.

5)      When you disregard the Lord, you will treat the things of the Lord with contempt. Eli’s sons pilfered the sacrifices in the temple and engaged in detestable acts. It is shameful that those who profess God to be Lord and Savior walk in contempt towards His Word and His precepts.

6)      When you contrast Hannah’s family versus Eli’s family, you see that each family handled the responsibility of answered prayer in very different ways. Hannah bore the responsibility of instilling a high-regard for the Lord in her children, while Eli disregarded that responsibility and instead esteemed his children above God.

7)      When we have the proper regard for the Lord, we will be:  (1) Faithful to his purpose for our life (2) willing to obey his instructions, (3) submitted in our every action, and (4) trusting in the Lord’s methodology