1 Samuel 1:13

"Handfuls of Purpose"

For All Gleaners

"... only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard." 1 Samuel 1:13 .

Yet it was possible to form some opinion of the agitation of Hannah's mind. It was known that she was not in a jovial mood, but that her soul was cast down within her. The power of the soul to write itself on the face is indicative of its still larger power to write itself on all the circumstances and events through which it passes, and upon the society with which it comes in contact. Now and again we see vivid instances of mind triumphing over matter; never perhaps is this so signally seen as when grief enters into the heart, and writes its grim signature on the whole countenance. These indications of mental action may of course be misunderstood, as in the case of Hannah. Though Eli was a priest, he was not sufficiently penetrating to understand what Hannah was doing. He who ought to have been a prophet, a very seer of God, looking at the heart and reading all its woe, said in tones of harshness, "How long wilt thou be drunken? put away thy wine from thee." When sorrow is misunderstood it is doubled. When men understand our grief, and speak to us in its own tone, they go far towards removing the heartache which makes us groan. When priests misunderstand their age, either in its totality or its individuality, they make the most profound mistakes, and throw insult where they ought to offer benediction. We can conduct a silent ministry in life. We can be known as men of prayer without causing our voice to be heard in the streets: we can express our joy without blatancy; we can show how truly wise we are without trumpeting our own greatness. Sometimes all we can do is to move the lips; the voice will not come through the choked throat, or if it did come we should not know it, it would not be our voice, but another, tortured by the spirit of grief. Let us yield to our emotions up to a given point, but always seek to have some measure of control over them; otherwise we may by exaggeration or wantonness allow our character to be honestly misunderstood, and vilified with some show of reason.