Today's readings are 1 Kings 16.29-17.24 and 2 Corinthians 9.1-15.
Our reading today introduces us to Elijah. He has proclaimed that the Lord is sending a drought on the land. In doing this he has proclaimed a death penalty to many people, maybe even to himself.
How do we view the difficult events of the Bible? How do we view the circumstances the people are in? For that matter, how do we view difficult circumstances of our modern times? It's all too easy to look at Elijah and his encounter with the widow in a shallow manner. But I wonder how many of us have ever been in the situation that she is in? How many of us know what it is to be a widow with a young child, no means of financial support, and a famine in the land? How many of us are actually a meal away from death by starvation. Of course, it would be highly unlikely that anyone reading this blog post is in that situation. People in those circumstances don't generally have the luxury or energy to sit in front of a computer and read something.
We see here an actual person who is in actual desperate straits. She has one meal left. The fact that she can speak so frankly of dying indicates that they were not eating well to begin with. This was not someone whose larder was empty and who needed to wait a few days before food stamps came. This was not our typical homeless person who is out of food and living on cigarettes for a few days. This is someone who has nothing. There is nobody to help her. Nobody has anything to share with her. Their sharing with her will hasten their death, she dare not ask. There are no social services. There is no Christian mission which will give her a bowl of institutional soup and a piece of bread She really has nothing, no resources except God's visitation.
Maybe we can't understand what she felt when God's prophet took care of the food situation. I hope we can't. But maybe we can grow in our understanding of how we had no resources to deal with sin. We have no resources of our own to deal with death. Our Lord however has shown that he has all the resources to deal with our sin and death. He has given himself for us so that when we gather with him and eat with him, we receive life and salvation. We are no longer eating our last and lying down to die. We rather eat our last and stand up to live in Christ.
Our reading today introduces us to Elijah. He has proclaimed that the Lord is sending a drought on the land. In doing this he has proclaimed a death penalty to many people, maybe even to himself.
How do we view the difficult events of the Bible? How do we view the circumstances the people are in? For that matter, how do we view difficult circumstances of our modern times? It's all too easy to look at Elijah and his encounter with the widow in a shallow manner. But I wonder how many of us have ever been in the situation that she is in? How many of us know what it is to be a widow with a young child, no means of financial support, and a famine in the land? How many of us are actually a meal away from death by starvation. Of course, it would be highly unlikely that anyone reading this blog post is in that situation. People in those circumstances don't generally have the luxury or energy to sit in front of a computer and read something.
We see here an actual person who is in actual desperate straits. She has one meal left. The fact that she can speak so frankly of dying indicates that they were not eating well to begin with. This was not someone whose larder was empty and who needed to wait a few days before food stamps came. This was not our typical homeless person who is out of food and living on cigarettes for a few days. This is someone who has nothing. There is nobody to help her. Nobody has anything to share with her. Their sharing with her will hasten their death, she dare not ask. There are no social services. There is no Christian mission which will give her a bowl of institutional soup and a piece of bread She really has nothing, no resources except God's visitation.
Maybe we can't understand what she felt when God's prophet took care of the food situation. I hope we can't. But maybe we can grow in our understanding of how we had no resources to deal with sin. We have no resources of our own to deal with death. Our Lord however has shown that he has all the resources to deal with our sin and death. He has given himself for us so that when we gather with him and eat with him, we receive life and salvation. We are no longer eating our last and lying down to die. We rather eat our last and stand up to live in Christ.
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Dave Spotts
blogging at http://capnsaltyslongvoyage.blogspot.com
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