1 Samuel 2:2-3

There is none holy as the Lord.

The four perfections of God

1. She speaks of his holiness; “There is none holy as the Lord.” St. Mary the Virgin echoes her, when in her song she says: “Holy is his name.” This would be a very sad thought for sinners, whose thoughts, and words, and actions, are so unholy, were it not that our Lord Jesus Christ has atoned for our sins by His death, and has also in our nature led a perfectly holy life; and that, if we join ourselves to Him by faith, God looks at us through Him, and accepts us for His sake.

2. Next Hannah speaks of the power of God. “Neither is there any rock,” says she, “like our God.” So St, Mary in her song calls God, “He that is mighty;” and says, “He hath showed strength with his arm.” So the people of God may securely trust in Him because of His great power. And now observe what particular exercise of God’s power both Hannah and St. Mary celebrated. It is this, that when men grow proud and ambitious, He immediately, to however great a height of power they may have reached, strikes them down. God’s favourite way of displaying His power in the kingdom of Providence is to cast down the proud and lift up the humble.

3. The third attribute of God which Hannah speaks of is His wisdom. “The Lord,” she says, “is a God of knowledge,” and she gives this proof of it, that “by him actions are weighed.” His knowledge reaches to the depths of the character; He is “a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” He does not take an action for a good one, because it looks good outside. It is interesting to observe that St. Mary in her song does not make any explicit mention of God’s wisdom or knowledge, though she does mention twice over another attribute, of which Hannah makes no explicit mention. This is the fairest and most smiling of all God’s attributes--His mercy, that is to say, His goodness to the undeserving and ill-deserving. Hannah’s song was delivered unto the Law, while God’s people were yet under that sterner and more severe dispensation, which designedly made them more acquainted with His holiness, and power, and wisdom, than with His love. But St Mary’s song, ushering in as it did the birth of Christ, could not possibly be without an allusion to the tender mercy of our God,--the mercy which led Him to give His Son out of His bosom for the salvation of the lost. (Dean Goulburn.)