Our Old Testament lesson recounts a story that many of us probably first learned many years ago in Sunday School. After announcing God’s judgment that drought would afflict Israel because of its wickedness and idol worship, the prophet Elijah eventually goes to the coastal town of Zarephath in the pagan country of Phoenicia. The drought pronounced by God on Israel had spread to Phoenicia, which had to be somewhat of a shock to the Phoenicians since their “god” Baal was a god of rain, revered as the “rider on the clouds.” But a man-made god can’t answer prayers for rain or any other prayers, for that matter, and the drought had become so severe that people were literally starving to death.
When the prophet Elijah first meets this widow she is gathering firewood so that she can bake a small cake for herself and her son with her last remaining amounts of flour and oil. She does so knowing that this will be their last meal – and she is fully prepared for the fact that both she and her son will then die of starvation.
However, the true God – not some lifeless idol – has different plans for this widow and her son. The flour and oil are miraculously replenished each day. Elijah moves into an upper room of the widow’s house, and all three of them – the widow, her son and Elijah – are fed and sustained by the grace of God. Even while the people of Israel, God’s own chosen people, suffer and die of the drought brought about by their unbelief, this widow living in a thoroughly pagan country understands that obedience to the Word of God is truly life-sustaining. The widow and her son no longer face starvation. They have everything they need. Life is good.
But then it all goes wrong. The widow’s son becomes ill, quickly grows worse and stops breathing. It seemingly happens so fast that the widow doesn’t have time to turn to Elijah and Elijah doesn’t have time to turn to God. At some point in the past she lost her husband to death, and now death has taken her only child. She is hurt – and she is angry. Listen to the pure agony in her voice: “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!"
She’s already forgotten that God, in His grace, has saved her son’s life when both he and she faced starvation. The only way she can understand any of this is to assume that having this “man of God” in her house has drawn God’s attention to her sin. In other words, God is punishing her by taking the life of her innocent son. And if Elijah hadn’t shown up, none of this would have happened.
She’s wrong, of course. Elijah’s presence in her house did not draw God’s attention to her sins. God has not selected her for punishment – and a particularly cruel punishment, at that – because of some wrong she has done or some evil she has committed.
But she’s not entirely wrong. Her son is dead because of sin. Not his specific sin. Not her specific sin. But sin, plain and simple. With the exceptions of Enoch and later the prophet Elijah himself, every man, woman and child who descended from Adam and Eve eventually died because of sin … and all were placed in graves.
But even in the depths of our sin, in the very death that we rightly and justly deserve, the compassion of our God exceeds anything that we can ever understand or could ever expect. In Psalm 56, King David paints a word picture that is especially meaningful when a loved one has died. David writes that God puts our tears in his bottle. His reference is to a small bottle that in ancient times would be used to gather the tears of mourners – and would be kept as a remembrance of the departed loved one. The very idea of almighty God gathering our tears in His bottle is one of the most incredible descriptions I’ve ever seen of God’s great love for us.
So Elijah took the widow’s dead son into his arms and carried him to the upper room. Never stopping to think – or perhaps just not caring – that Jewish ritual laws declare anyone unclean for seven days if they touch a dead body, Elijah stretches himself on the boy’s body three times and calls to God: “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by killing her son? O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.” And then these wonderful words: “And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he revived.” The boy’s grave would not be filled on that day. And this pagan woman in this land of idol worship utters a confession of faith that towers even today over the wickedness of the idol worshippers in God’s own promised land of Israel. “I know,” she says, “that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”
Today’s Gospel lesson relates a remarkably similar set of events. Jesus and his disciples are approaching the Galilean town of Nain. They meet a funeral procession, and the body being carried is the only son of a poor widow. With a compassion that is so typical of our Lord, he tells the grieving mother: “Do not weep.”
Ignoring the ritual laws that would declare Him unclean, Jesus touches the coffin and orders the dead youth to arise. The boy immediately comes back to life, and the people declare: “God has visited his people!”
Are we seeing a pattern here? The son of a poor widow dies. The man of God – or, in the Gospel lesson, the God man – ignores the laws of ritual cleanliness, putting the interests of the dead child and the grieving mother ahead of law and custom. By the grace of God, the child who was dead, who had no breath, now breathes and lives. The mother’s pain is turned to elation and thanksgiving. The tears of utter anguish are replaced with the tears of utmost joy. God is glorified. The grave intended for the widow’s son is left empty.
But what is left unsaid in both the Old Testament and Gospel lessons is that these graves remain empty only temporarily. Eventually each boy will die again and will be placed in a grave. And this time the grave will remain filled.
When we think of these widows and their sons, we are reminded of another widow. Not long after the widow of Nain watched the breath return to her dead son, this widow watched as the breath left the body of her son. The difference is that her son did not die of illness. Her son was brutally murdered on a Roman cross. Her son also died because of sin, but it was because of our sin – not His. And unlike the women of our Old Testament and Gospel lessons, the lifeless body of her son was placed in a grave.
But only temporarily. On the third day Mary’s son completed His conquest of sin, death and the devil. Mary’s son rose from the dead, leaving behind a grave where echoes of emptiness can be heard through the centuries – can be heard even today. We listen with all Christians of all ages. The grave is empty. Death isdefeated. Mary’s son – Jesus Christ, the Son of God – is risen! And the words of faith that the widow spoke to Elijah speak to us still: “Now I know that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”
In verse 13 of our Gospel lesson, St. Luke writes: “And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’” Compassion. When someone dies, you feel compassion for the family and friends of that loved one. When someone is sick, you feel compassion for that person. “Compassion” is defined as “a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering.” But try as you might, you can never fully alleviate someone else’s suffering when someone is ill or someone has died. You can speak words of compassion – but you can’t do anything to make the suffering go away.
But Jesus can make the suffering go away. Jesus doesn’t just speak words of compassion – Jesus takes action. Jesus is, was and always will be the only one who could do anything to defeat death. Jesus is, was and always will be the only one who can do anything to bring about healings that the best doctors in the world can’t achieve. Some of you have experienced that in your own lives. Jesus takes action – He took action.
Just as Elijah covered the body of the dead boy with his own body, Christ covers our sinfully dead bodies. He covers us with the blood that flows from His scourged and battered back, with the blood that oozes from His crown of thorns, with the blood that drains from the nail holes in His hands and feet, from the blood that surges from the gaping hole that the spear made in his side. And Christ testifies to the Father that His blood has washed all traces of sin from our bodies, from our minds, from our souls. Christ brings us from total spiritual death – to spiritual life. From mortal death – to eternal life. What a lovely promise: eternal life with our risen Savior!
But for now, while we continue our sometimes sad and always sinful sojourn on this earth, we will continue to walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Satan may be defeated, but like a vicious, deadly, wounded beast he constantly prowls and relentlessly seeks ways to make us suffer. And so, at least temporarily, children – people of all ages – will get sick, will die. Parents – loved ones – will grieve. Graves will be filled. But only temporarily! In Christ’s own perfect time, He will return in a blaze of glory to take us and all believers to be with Him in Paradise
On that last and glorious day, the graves will for all time be emptied. The impenetrable cold darkness of the grave will be flooded with the splendid, perfect, warming light of heaven. God will no longer have any need to bottle our tears, for there will be no tears. For all believers in Christ there will be no more death from starvation, from heart disease, from cancer, no death from accident, from birth defects, from old age, from any illness or any affliction that can temporarily cause our lives to come to an end. There will be no death, period. The graves will be emptied and remain empty forever and ever.
For the Word of the Lord is indeed true. Jesus Christ has risen from the dead. And someday we will rise, too.
Return to Pastor page
