Jottings

by J. Miller | Category: Jottings | Nov 1960

Peter in his first epistle writes of the subjection of servants to their masters and the proper conduct of servants. He also writes of the behaviour of husbands to their wives, but he writes somewhat more lengthily of the subjection of wives to their own husbands, and of women's adornment. He writes of the adorning of the hidden man of the heart, in the incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. Then he adds,

"For after this manner aforetime the holy women also, who hoped in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands: as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose children ye now are, if ye do well, and are not put in fear by any terror" (1 Peter 3.5, 6).

Peter does not speak of "holy women," but of "the holy women." He has definite women of a certain class before his mind as he writes. Of such women he particularizes and mentions Sarah, Abraham's wife. She obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. When she called him lord was on that notable day, when the LORD visited the tent of Abraham in company with two angels. He had come primarily to announce to Abraham and Sarah the birth of their son Isaac who would be born within twelve months. Secondly, He had come to acquaint Abraham of the proposed visit to Sodom.

Paul sets our minds at rest as to the question Sarah asked when she laughed, in reply to which the LORD said, "Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old? Is anything too hard for the LORD?" Sarah had said, "After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?" (Genesis 18. 12-15). Her laugh and question did not rise from incredulity, for the apostle in Hebrews ii. 11 says, "By faith even Sarah herself received power to conceive seed when she was past age, since she counted Him faithful who had promised."

The faith of Sarah in what her husband Abraham had told her, for he it was who first received the promise of a son (implied in the original call of Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees, Genesis 12. 1-3, which was renewed in Genesis 15.5, 6, and yet again in 17.15-19 and 22.16-18), was unlike that of Eve, who, through being deceived, rejected the words of her husband, who had received the command from the LORD God to abstain from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In this matter of subjection Sarah rises high in God's estimate of the place that a wife should fill relative to her husband. And no doubt her adornment was in keeping with her subjection.

The introduction of concubinage and the plurality of wives led to a good deal of rivalry and unpleasantness in the homes where such existed. We can see this in the case of Sarah and Hagar. Here again we have the matter of subjection emphasized in the words of the LORD to Hagar, after she fled from Sarah. The LORD'S words to her were, "Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands" (Genesis 16.9). There can be little doubt that God's original purpose of one man, and one wife, was what God intended for the human race. The teaching of the Lord and His apostles has put marriage relations back to what was originally intended. We can see the rivalry that existed between the sisters, Leah and Rachel, to capture the love of their husband, Jacob. Though they are said to have built the house of Israel (Ruth 4. 11), yet God, no doubt having in mind the rivalry of Leah and Rachel, commanded in the law, "Thou shalt not take a woman to her sister, to be a rival to her, beside the other in her life time" (Leviticus 18. 18). This rivalry, and the consequent hatred which it engendered in the children to Joseph, found vent in the sons of Leah and of Bilhah and Zilpah, for it says that they hated him, and then at length they sold him into Egypt (Genesis 37). What we say in nowise casts any reflection upon Jacob, for he was trapped into having Leah for his wife by her father Laban, for it was Rachel that he loved, and what followed resulted from the scheming of Laban, who behaved shockingly towards Jacob in this and other ways. But he was up against a man of far greater ability than himself, and besides, Jacob had God on his side, and that was what really mattered in those days, as well as now.

We have on record the rivalry of the sisters Leah and Rachel, the wives of Jacob. Yet these two women built the house of Israel (Ruth 4. 11), 50 that in the great unpleasantness of marital rivalry, the consequences, in some ways to be deplored, were not without their lasting results for good. Only God can turn what is planned contrary to His mind to a good purpose, as Joseph said to his brethren, "Ye meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive" (Genesis 50.20).

Turning now to the story of Elkanah and his wives Hannah and Peninnah, we see the same rivalry between these women as was the case with Leah and Rachel (1 Samuel 1). Great unhappiness existed in that home of which we only get a glimpse in consequence of Hannah's vow and prayer. One can understand Hannah's misery as her rival, with her sons and daughters around her, received their portions from Elkanah's sacrifice, while she, though she received a double portion, remained childless, meanwhile her rival, Peninnafi, provoked her sorely. Elkanali tried to comfort Hannah, but his words could not allay her grief, nor cause her to dry her tears. Her grief drove her to God. And whatever it is that drives saints to God will truly turn for their good. God is the Comforter of His people and of the sorrowing. Did not the Lord say, "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted" (Matthew 5. 4)? Of Him the hymn says,

"A mourner all His life was He,

A dying Lamb at last."

Whether Hannah realized, or realized to the full, how much God needed a man to lead and judge His people, it would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to say. But she arose after having eaten of the sacrifice and at the temple (which was the tabernacle which Moses made in the wilderness), in the bitterness of soul she prayed, weeping sorely. In her prayer she vowed unto the LORD and said,

"0 LORD of Hosts, if Thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of Thin" handmaid, and remember me, and not forget Thine handmaid, but wilt give unto Thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto the LORD all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head"

(1 Samuel 1. 11).

Peninnah, though she had sons, could not spare one of them for the LORD. She kept them all to herself, and she and her sons fade from view in the sacred page. She kept all, and, in a sense, lost all. But if the LORD would but give Hannah one man child she would give him to the LORD all his days. Here is one of the holy women of whom Peter writes (1 Peter 3.5, 0). Eli, partially blind in his old age, thought Hannah to be a drunken woman. She told him that she was not drunken. "Count not," said she, "thine handmaid for a daughter of Belial: for out of the abundance of my complaint and my provocation have I spoken hitherto." Evidently Eli knew not what Hannah had asked of the LORD, for he immediately said, "Go in peace: and the God of Israel grant thy petition that thou hast asked of Him. And she said, Let thy servant find grace in thy sight. So the woman went her way, and did eat, and her countenance was no more sad" (1 Samuel 1. 10-13).

What Hannah vowed she fulfilled. God gave her Samuel (Heard of God). When he was born she said to her husband Elkanah that she would not go up to the yearly sacrifice until the child was weaned (which might be around five years of age), "then," she said, "I will bring him, that he may appear before the LORD, and there abide for ever." In full agreement with his subject wife, Elkanah said, "Do what seemeth thee good; tarry until thou have weaned him; only the LORD establish His word" (verses 22, 28). We can well imagine the tug at Samuel's heart when his mother denied him his pleasure in the time of his weaning, and to be left by his loving mother in the strange surroundings of the temple: and we can also understand the greater tug at the heart of Hannah as she left her darling boy, in his innocent childhood, in the temple in the care of others. But the higher purpose in human life was to be accomplished in him, namely, that of the service of God.

J. Miller | Nov 1960
Jottings