Why Hannah’s Prayer Actually Worked (and yours can too) | Hannah Sermon Series | John Giftah

0:01 Speaker 1: Do you ever look around and think, Wow, the world is a crazy place and it just seems to get crazier and crazier. Ease your mind and take a break. This is Fuel for the Soul with John Gifta. We're a hub for inspirational Christian sermons, practical keys for Christian living, in Christian discussions and interviews. You'll be inspired to live the life that you were created for. Your host is a top ranking podcaster, best selling author, world record holder, aerospace engineer, life coach, evangelist, and founder of John Gifta International.

0:41 Speaker 1: Welcome to Fuel for the Soul with John Gifta.

0:47 Speaker 2: Helloone, Welcome to this edition of the Fueld for the Soul with John Gifta podcast. Hold through this week. We're looking at various lessons we can take away from the life of Hannah, predominantly around for Samuel chapter one. Today, one of the things I want to talk about is the moment where she's in so much of anguish and pain and she's going to the place of worship to cry and pour out her heart to the Lord. She's just emptying herself. Now, what caught my attention is that the priest who was sitting by his place notices her.

1:18 Speaker 2: If you look at the scripture from Versus twelve onwards, it talks about how she kept praying to the Lord. Eli, the priest right observed her mouth. He observed her mouth, and Hannah was praying in her heart and her lips were moving, but voice was not coming out. Okay. She was in anguish and she was in pain. And Eli thought she was drunk and said to her, how long are you going to stay drunk? Put away your wine. Now. I want you to understand what caught my attention is I mean, there's a message for us that you should not just jump into conclusion.

1:54 Speaker 2: Okay, Eli just jumped into conclusion. That's a different message altogether. But one of the things that caught my I was meditating on this. Why did Eli not realize that she was praying? I mean, Eli was a priest, and he's an old man. He's been here for a long time. He should know better that different people would come and pray. He would have observed seen different people coming and praying. But how is it that he didn't realize that Hannah was praying? How did he misunderstand and Hannah was actually praying and not was and was not drunk.

2:29 Speaker 2: I never thought about this. And when I was studying about that, I came to know that a lot of people during that period, in that time would pray loudly, Okay, they have a tendency to pray loudly. But Hannah was praying softly okay. Or there was no voice coming out of her mouth right, There was no noise, no sound from her mouth. And because a prayer was different or unusual, he I misunderstood, okay, because imagine if everybody would pray in a certain way and she's praying in a different way. He did not realize this was unique.

3:08 Speaker 2: He didn't realize that she was actually praying. You get what I'm saying, Which means that Hannah had her own unique mode of communication with God. She had her own different approach in a relationship with God that other people actually misunderstood. A priest themselves misunderstood you kidding what I'm saying. See, that's what I wanted to understand, that when you're in that pain, when you're in that mode of anguish and grief, you don't have to act like everything is fine. You don't have to put that image in front of people like, oh you know what, guys, everything is fine.

3:45 Speaker 2: I trust in the Lord, and or you want to quote a hundred scriptures, or you want to act Christian, you want to act you know, super spiritual and all of that stuff. No, no, no, no, you just be yourself. It's okay. Even if the priest, even if you're pastor even if everybody else around you misunderstands you, It's okay because it's between you and your God. Hannah understood this. Hanna understood this. That's why her prayer was so effective. Because this is why many people's prayer is not effective, because they tried to come and think that, oh, prayer means I should pray in a certain way in this posture, using these words.

4:25 Speaker 2: They think that prayer should be of a certain level of eloquence. And you know, there are standards and expectations for prayer. But you see from the life of Hannah that she departed from every standard and expectation to the point where the priest did not realize that she was praying. Her kind of prayer, a method of prayer was so different from how everyone else prayed, and that is what made the difference for Hannah. Today, I want to tell you something if you're just trying to pray like the way everybody else is praying, if you're trying to just do like everybody else in terms of your spiritual side of things or the way you want to act.

5:05 Speaker 2: Only you want to act spiritual, you want to behave in a certain Christian way. I challenge you to introspect. If that is not producing the results in your life, it's time for you to change the way you pray. It's time for you to change the way you pray. And you know, in my life, I'm just the opposite of Hannah. You know, in a today's scenario, if you see most people, they are very silent when they pray, or they close their eyes when they pray, or they are in a certain posture when they pray. That's how we see today, right Like most people pray like that.

5:40 Speaker 2: But I'm just the opposite. Okay, if you ask me to close my eyes, I start sleeping, or if you ask me to just sit quietly and while my mind just wanders, so I cannot pray like that. And then for me, the way I pray is I walk a lot. I walk, and I'm loud, and I need to pray. No one is around because I'm too loud. But that's when I can connect with God. Because in my brain, if I have to talk to a real person, I need to be loud. That's how I'm able to connect. So if I want to understand that God is real, I want to talk loud.

6:17 Speaker 2: That's the way my being or my brain is wired. Okay, so that's how That's what works for me. So how I pray is different from how others we pray, and that is what sometimes makes the real difference because sometimes when you're in a certain setting or everybody's quietly praying, you also said quietly pray, and you're not able to connect. Right. See, sometimes in church you have to behave in a certain way, the decom and all of that. That that's the place for that. But I'm talking about the default mode between you and God.

6:48 Speaker 2: In that place of relationship with God where you need to convey or communicate with the Lord, you need to have your own personal lingo, your own personal rhythm. Even if you're being misunderstood by people, it's fine. Just pour out your heart to God. Just be in the place where you just cry to the Lord or you want to listen to his voice. You want to just scream to the Lord, or you want to open him out and shout, or however the Lord is leading you, go for it. You don't need to act diplomatic, you don't need to act in a certain way.

7:23 Speaker 2: You can just be yourself. And I think that is what really made the difference for Hannah, because she was not you know, she was just herself. She was just crying our anguish to the Lord. And even we see this because when you're really in the Lord, the fruit will be seen in your life, when you're really being opened before the Lord, when your prayer is genuine before the Lord, the fruit will be seen. You will carry that grace. See, even when Eli misunderstood Hannah, Hannah could have just gotten mad at Eli and say, you are such an incense to a priest, don't you know I'm in pain?

8:02 Speaker 2: And she could have screamed at him. But if you see, Hannah was filled with grace. Where she says saying, oh, do not take your servant for a wicked woman. She's calling herself as a servant to the man who just misunderstood her. And she says, I've been crying because of great anguish and grief, and even then Eli just says, go and peace. May the Lord grant you what you have asked, and she goes on to Saint verse eighteen, requesting him to show grace and for him to pray for her. In one of the translations, you see the humility of Hannah.

8:42 Speaker 2: The man who just judged him, the man who just misjudged her, the man who just misunderstood her, the man who just rebuked and scolded her without even trying to understand her, the man who just assumed without trying to clarify.

9:02 Speaker 1: And what is she doing.

9:04 Speaker 2: She's humbling herself and saying, please pray for me. She's humbling herself to say, please don't misunderstand me. I'm just your servant. I'm not a wicked person. She's saying, I'm a servant to the one who just made a huge error of judgment. And I think that is what you see as one of the greatest changes in Hannah's life, where her countenance changes because she is just emptied out all the negative. Right when you empty something in a transparent bottle or something, right when there's something of a different colored liquid in it and you empty out, what happens the color of the bottle becomes transparent again.

9:56 Speaker 2: See that's what happened with Hannah. She empty out her pain, empty out everything to the Lord. And what happened. She was filled with the countenance of the Lord, and she was filled with joy, and her countenance changed. And the thing is, not only is she going out better with that peace of God. Very soon the Lord shows up and she has a child who becomes one of the greatest profits of the nation. So today I want to challenge each one of you that if you're in that place where you're being misunderstood, or if you're in that place of you know, introspecting your life of prayer, think about this.

10:41 Speaker 2: Are you having your own personal lingo with the Lord which genuinely transforms you and genuinely brings that fruit in your life. You're not just saying, oh, I'm a prayerful person because I can pray for a long time, But you are prayerful person because you're actually connected with the Lord and the Lord is transforming your life. I really challenge you to leave a comment and share this with someone and I will see you back next time. God bless you.

11:17 Speaker 1: You've been listening to Fuel for the Soul with John Gifta. We hope you were blessed and inspired to live the life that God has for you. Make sure to subscribe to the John Gifta YouTube channel for regular uploads of sermons, skits, interviews and more. Follow John Gifta on Instagram for regular inspirational posts, and don't forget to check out the best selling books written by John Gifta, Who Am I which will help you understand your identity and the latest number one best seller Unveil your Purpose, helping you discover your purpose and to start walking in it.

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