1 Kings 17:17-24 & Luke 7:11-17

The readings from the 1 Kings 17:17-24 and the Gospel story in Luke 7:11-17 are somewhat similar. Both Elijah and Jesus are moved with compassion in the face of suffering and death. Both see a reality and respond to it accordingly – they gave healing and life back to the dead persons but the end results are, 1) deepening their relationship with God, 2) faith in the word of God, and, 3) the praise of God.

“Now indeed I know you are a man of God. The word of the Lord comes truly from your mouth” (I Kings 17:24)
“God has visited his people” (Luke 7:17)

There is more to these stories than dead people and mourning mothers.

On this pilgrimage of ours, we are bound to have experienced some kind of a death or something we feel is no longer part of us. Within us we have something which is dead and the consequent experience of mourning. What has died within us? Love? The ability to forgive? Selfless involvement in the church, community, politics? Do we mourn this death?

When I started praying about becoming a missionary priest, I was full of enthusiasm and zeal for God, ready to set off to change the world. Now, with so much to do I wonder why and how my strong idealism has died. I know I still have some healthy vibes within but I do mourn the loss of that initial vigour and the attraction to help the poor. I might have let myself caught in this spiral, and like the widowed mother, I lament.

However, I also sensed that like the sorrowful mothers in both stories who meet the two men of God, there is more within me than death and sorrow. I too have felt and responded like Jesus. There is a dimension which is healing, forgiving, energetic, loving.

It is not rocket science to figure out that you and I have this Jesus dimension of ourselves who can look at reality and feels the need to praise God. Ask yourself to find the Jesus who lives within and ask yourself to bring him over to the dead person within. What happens if we allow these two sides of ourselves to meet?

I know there are many people out there who are walking dead not realising their own capacity to heal themselves with the God within. We must walk the earth, not in a dream world, but with ourselves, with people who have death within, mourning within, and Jesus within.

We are called to bridge the terrible with the beautiful aspects of our lives and praise what God has done. Yes, God has visited us, not just on mountaintops, but as we walk the razor’s edge of everyday living where death and grace meet.