MATERNITY.[ToC]
"Moreover his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice."—I Samuel 2:19.
The stories of Deborah and Abigail are very apt to discourage a woman's soul. She says within herself: "It is impossible that I ever can achieve any such grandeur of character, and I don't mean to try;" as though a child should refuse to play the eight notes because he cannot execute a "William Tell." This Hannah of the text differs from the persons I just now named. She was an ordinary woman, with ordinary intellectual capacity, placed in the ordinary circumstances, and yet, by extraordinary piety, standing out before all the ages to come.
THE MODEL CHRISTIAN MOTHER.
Hannah was the wife of Elkanah, who was a person very much like herself—unromantic and plain, never having fought a battle or been the subject of a marvelous escape. Neither of them would have been called a genius. Just what you and I might be, that was Elkanah and Hannah. The brightest time in all the history of that family was the birth of Samuel. Although no star ran along the heavens pointing down to his birthplace, I think the angels of God stooped at the coming of so wonderful a prophet.
As Samuel had been given in answer to prayer, Elkanah and all his family, save Hannah, started up to Shiloh to offer sacrifices of thanksgiving. The cradle where the child slept was altar enough for Hannah's grateful heart, but when the boy was old enough she took him to Shiloh and took three bullocks, and an ephah of flour, and a bottle of wine, and made offering of sacrifice unto the Lord, and there, according to a previous vow, she left him; for there he was to stay all the days of his life, and minister in the tabernacle.
Years rolled on, and every year Hannah made with her own hands a garment for Samuel, and took it over to him. The lad would have got along well without that garment, for I suppose he was well clad by the ministry of the temple; but Hannah could not be contented unless she was all the time doing something for her darling boy. "Moreover his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice."