A glorious future awaits those who trust in Christ. Yet that is not where we are today. In this world we will continue to experience hardship and trouble. There will be difficult times in our earthly pilgrimage—times where we feel sad and frustrated, times where we suffer even though we have done nothing wrong. That is the normal everyday reality of life in a fallen world, a cursed world. Even though we do not live under the terms of the old covenant, we still live in a world that is under God’s curse (cf. Genesis 3:17–19). Infertility, cancer, motorcycle accidents, discrimination, slavery, theft—your Christian faith will not isolate you from these things.
But as people who belong to Jesus, like Hannah, we can have the confidence to know that the Lord of hosts hears our prayers. We have an Advocate in the presence of the Father. That advocate knows our affliction. He is a priest who was made like us in every way except for sin (Hebrews 2:17–18). And he wants us to come to him with our fears and our feelings. He is not blind or indifferent. He sees, he knows; and one day he will come again to make all things right.
Whilst we wait for that day, let us pray for the Spirit to make us strong, so that we will submit to suffering and the mysteries of God’s providence, instead of looking for ungodly ways to escape it.
1 There was a certain man of Ramathaim-zophim of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Elkanah the son of Jeroham, son of Elihu, son of Tohu, son of Zuph, an Ephrathite.