SHILOH, Samaria – Three thousand years ago in Samaria, a woman asked God for a son, and he answered her prayer. Today, on that same ground, people are still praying and getting answers.
Long before Jerusalem became Israel’s capital, Shiloh was the center of worship. Scripture says the tabernacle stood here for nearly 400 years.
Moriyah Shapiro of Shiloh told CBN News, “Our history began here 3,000 years ago when the people of Israel, we came back from Egypt. Egypt is all the way back down (to the west). And we crossed the Sinai Desert. We went all the way around and then entered Israel through Jordan.
Over the years, CBN News has covered major events here and groundbreaking archaeological discoveries.
Eliana Passentin is the international desk director for the Binyamin Regional Council in Samaria. She explained, “We’re smack in the middle of Samaria. So how do we know this is ancient Shiloh? When an archaeologist comes to an ancient site, they have a dream to find three things: some kind of verse with an explanation; An inscription – it doesn’t have to say Hannah was here, but some kind of inscription; and the preservation of the ancient Hebrew biblical name.”
She added, “And here, we found all three.”
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Shapiro says Shilo continues to draw people today for reasons beyond its ancient history.
“I got here when I was one-year old (in) 1978, when this area was completely empty,” she recalled. “My family were part of a group that had a dream to find ancient Shiloh and to build it again. People come from all over the world to pray in the place where Hannah actually prayed.”
Among those visitors are the Flynns and Burnses, who traveled thousands of miles to stand where the book of First Samuel in the Bible unfolded.
It’s where Hannah, barren, mocked, and misunderstood, silently poured out her heart to God, and God answered, giving her son who would become the prophet, Samuel.
Kamesh Flynn told us, “What I realize is that the same God that Hannah prayed to then is the God we serve now, and it’s unmistakable because when you stand on the land where she prayed, you feel the sense of the Holy Spirit. I just had my 10-year-old son say to me, mom, I think I was saved right then when we were praying.”
Believers contend that the same God who answered Hannah still answers prayer today. Women from Israel and around the world come here with hopes of having children, and many leave with testimonies of answered prayer.
Eliana Passentin continues to carry the tradition of the prayer forward.
She remembered, “Thirty-two years ago, Hannah from Miami comes here and prays for a boy. Nine months later, she gives birth to her son and names him Samuel…But the story doesn’t end here.
Years later, Passentin would meet the next generation of that family arriving at Shiloh once again.
Passentin explained, “She said, ‘I can’t get pregnant naturally, and you told us to pray here, and I prayed for a boy and a girl. This is my boy, and this is my girl. And every single time I tell the story, somebody has a tear rolling down their cheek. I’ve never prayed before. Can you tell me how to do it?'”
Two generations of answered prayers. Although Passentin is careful to point people to the heart of the message.
“The moral of the stories is not to come to Shiloh, touch the stones, and you’ll be cured,” she insisted. “Not at all. It’s about being humble – when we speak to God from a place of humility.”
For Carolyn Burns, that truth is deeply personal.
“God saw her. And God hears our prayers, and like Hannah, to come in humility and desperation for that longing. It’s humbling,” she said of her son, Easton. Easton is a gift because he’s a miracle child to our family after a season of loss. I’ve prayed Hannah’s prayer for our family because I knew our family wasn’t complete, and he’s my Hannah’s prayer.”
Flynn urged, “I implore you to bring your requests, make them known to a God who’s living and breathing, and as alive and willing to answer them as he was 3,000 years ago today.
Here in Shiloh, archeology confirms the Bible, prayer bridges past and present, and answered prayer testifies to an unchanging God.
