Day 3: Hannah and Arwen
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood [contending only with physical opponents], but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this [present] darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly (supernatural) places.
Ephesians 6:12 AMP
Scriptures: Ephesians 6:12; Exodus 14:14, 1 Samuel 1:4-7, 13, 19-23, 1 Samuel 2:19-21
In middle school I did wrestling and one thing that stuck with me was what my coach said.
“Winning isn’t about getting the pin or hardest take down, it’s about staying up and in the fight the longest.”
Someone asked him why if the fight would be over with a fast takedown. Another kid asked why did we strength train if not for a powerful hit. Our coach answered calmly but firmly.
“Because if our goal is up, we stay up. If our goal is a takedown we will end up down. It takes more strength to stay up than it does to go down.”
Ephesians 6:12 is trying to remind us to look up. Because our enemies are trying to take and keep us down. Unfortunately, our enemy will even use loved ones or people who are supposed to help us up, to try to keep us down. To distract us and make us use all our strength on getting them off instead of just looking up. Our enemies want us to forget that God already won. That hope is continually there if you stay in the fight and look up. Two women who stayed in their fight and looked up are Hannah and Arwen.
In the story of Hannah, she was already sad and downtrodden about being barren. Yet here comes Peninnah ready to provoke, taunt, and make Hannah worry about the same thing she’s beating herself up for. Her husband, who dearly loves her, tries to make things better but he does not understand the weight of her sorrow.
In Lord of the Rings, there is a war spanning centuries going on. The war and the sins before it, have affected Arwen’s life and the lives of those she loves. The war has taken friends, family, and now she must wait for her love to finish his fight to come back to her. A choice that not many others make.
The things these women were up against were much bigger than themselves, but they didn’t run to grab a sword. They didn’t even defeat their enemies by throwing harder punches or saying clever comebacks. Arwen stayed where people believed there was no hope because she loved and believed there was. She saw a vision of hope beyond the war.
Hannah went to God’s temple crying such a sorrowful prayer, words could not express her heart. Eli, a man of God intended to support her berated her and labeled her drunk. Hannah had to plead with Eli to stay. She had to state her faith, her belief, that God would grant her petition. Eli let her and sent her on her way and Hannah left her petition along with the sorrow there. She went back to her husband and Peninnah, her head up.
Belief, love, and hope, was what these ladies had to fight with. It’s what they used to stay where they needed to be. Then in the end, Hannah not only had a great prophet as a son, she also had five more children. Arwen did get to marry Aragorn with her father there as well as be a part of the vision of hope she saw. By keeping their eyes on the goal above the enemy, they ended up with a life full of growth. A life that can only go up.
God has the victory. He already won the war. Now, He wants to build up His kingdom, His warriors, His children, you. God took down these dark forces we struggle with. He defeated them. Therefore, if we are in God, and He is in us, our struggle can be just another stepping stone upward.
Something Good 