barren no more.

At work, my boss brought a new little plant into the office. It was a bamboo plant, so it basically looked like a cute little green stick that was stuck into some rocks. Neither one of us expected that this little plant would ever be more than a stick-like plant. A few days later, my boss came in only to find that the bamboo is now sprouting tender green leaves out of the top of the plant. What seemed to us to be just a stick-like figure with no hope of producing green life was really just waiting to sprout forth.

So this year, one of my main goals is to read the Bible in a year. Yeah, I know, I have tried every year for the past three years and each time I start strong and then basically I fall into the abyss that is Leviticus-Numbers-Deuteronomy (who else has been there??). This time is different. My friends and I are trekking through and we have made it, y’all, into 1&2 Samuel. What a journey it has been already. It’s simple because I love the book of first 1 Samuel because, well, David is bae. But before David, there was Samuel, to whom I also share a deep affection for. Before Samuel there was a woman named Hannah. See, Hannah and her husband, Elkanah couldn’t have any children. She was barren. However, Peninnah, Elkanah’s other wife, had many sons and daughters and she would taunt Hannah about her barrenness. The Bible says that “6 [Hannah’s] rival, however, would provoke her bitterly to irritate her, because the Lord had closed her womb. 7 It happened year after year, as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she would provoke her; so she wept and would not eat” (1 Sam. 1:6-7, NASB). Hannah was so desperate that she wouldn’t even eat. She was grieved, hurt, feeling abandoned by her creator. I am sure that she wondered why this woman Peninnah, who had ugliness in her heart, was receiving these blessings and gifts that were denied Hannah. Maybe she didn’t ask those questions, but let’s be honest, I would have. “God, why? Are you seeing this?? Where are you?” But the story doesn’t stop there.

One year when Hannah, Elkanah, Peninnah and all of her children went up for the annual sacrifice. While they were there, Hannah stopped at the temple and began to pray quietly before the Lord. She wasn’t trying to make a fuss, she was only trying to pray to the Lord, all alone. Sometimes that’s what we need most, quiet prayers to the Lord, just us and him. No productions. No elaborate service. Just a stripped away prayer time between us and the Lord.

Here’s where the story becomes a bit comical, though. Eli the priest of the temple heard her quietly mumbling to herself and he thought that she was drunk! Hannah responded by saying “‘No, my Lord, I am a woman oppressed in spirit; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have poured out my soul before the Lord’” (1 Sam. 1:15, NASB). Eli sent her away in peace and she was no longer sad. Once Hannah and Elkenah returned home, the Bible says that “the Lord remembered her. It came about in due time, after Hannah had conceived, that she gave birth to a son; and she named him Samuel, saying, “Because I have asked him of the Lord” (1 Sam. 1:19-20, NASB). After Samuel was older, Hannah dedicated him to priestly work and he became one of the great prophets and judges of Israel.

What does all of this mean for us? Notice how verse 19 says “in due time”. The Lord had a plan that was far greater than Hannah, Elkenah, or even Eli the priest, could discern. God’s timing is not our timing. And sometimes that means that we must wait in the barren season, when things look hopeless and perhaps impossible. Hannah prayed to the Lord in her barren season; she didn’t forsake her God or her sacrificing. In other words, she was faithful while she was barren and she was faithful to God during the fruitful season. Let’s be honest with one another, the year that we just came from was rough. In my life, I found that there was pain, loss, sorrow, and just heaviness of spirit, in this past year, just like Hannah described. As we entered into 2021, I felt a tinge of hope, maybe something that was growing inside of my heart?

The time of barreness is coming to a close, friends. I am declaring over my life and yours that this will be a new season of fruitfulness and abundance. Because I believe that it is time. Now, obviously, I don’t know the Lord’s timing, but I do know that when we trust Him, He is faithful to bring it to pass “in due time”. And whatever “it” is for each of you, may it come with a time of joy and rejoicing. I pray that we will be like Hannah and place the name over that which we are seeking, just like she did for Samuel: “Because I have asked [it] of the Lord” (1 Sam. 1:20b, NASB).

Just like that little bamboo shoot, perhaps there is something growing within our spirits that we just can’t see yet? What looks barren, dry, and stick-like to the outside world could be teeming with life that has yet to break forth. Whatever you are praying for today, just remember that He takes barren things and creates abundant life from them.

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