Today’s
Old Testament lesson is about faith.
Elijah
was God’s man in Israel
standing up against the King.
Fighting
the powers that be can get you into trouble,
so Elijah soon found himself a
fugitive.
Then
the Lord said to Elijah,
“Go stay with a widow in the village
of Zarapheth in Sidon.”
Nowadays,
a widow is apt to have Social Security, Medicare,
perhaps an annuity fund and a paid
off house.
But
that wasn’t the situation in 700 B.C.
Widows
were flat broke.
To
bring it up to our day, you’d have to imagine
that the Lord told Elijah to go stay
with
a homeless bag lady
and she would take care of him.
To
make things worse, she wasn’t even a Jew.
She
was from Sidon, a neighboring country
which was not a friend.
Not
only was she a widow
without a penny to her name,
she was another race, another
religion, another nationality.
She
had no natural obligation to lift a finger for Elijah.
But
Elijah did as the Lord told him.
He
went to Sidon, found the widow, and begged for food.
She
said, “I have only enough to prepare a single dish of food,
about
one good tortilla.
My son and I will eat it and then
die.”
But
Elijah said, “Feed me first.”
And
you know what, she did.
That
Elijah should hike all the way to Sidon
to throw himself on the mercy of a
foreign widow
he had never met is
amazing.
What’s
even more amazing is that she gave
what she thought was her last meal
and her little boy’s last meal, to
this stranger.
Is
it possible either one of them was that sure of the other?
I
don’t think so.
But
they were both willing to put their lives
in God’s hands.
It
was a good bet.
God
saved them all.
God
miraculously and unforeseeably provided for them.
That’s
how they lived.
Something
has been really clear to me the past few weeks.
It has been clear and on my heart in a good way.
Every breath I take is a gift of God.
I have no claim on this life of mine.
I have not earned it. I have no right to it.
If anything, I have failed to use my life
to God’s glory
so often,
that it is
only by God’s compassion and mercy,
that
I have been given this new day.
I have no right to this life.
I have no guarantee of a future.
But, God’s generous heart keeps giving me
sunrise after
sunrise, sunset after sunset,
and people to
share it all with.
I have not a clue why God does this.
All I know is that God is like that.
God does this sort of thing.
God does it for me. God does it for you.
“I am the vine and you are the branches,” Jesus said.
Our life comes from him.
Without our connection to Jesus,
we wither
inside.
We may keep putting one foot in front of another,
but it isn’t
real life.
The loving energy, the creative spark, isn’t there.
But when we put our trust -- not in our own power --
but in his
generosity and mercy,
then
we are strong.
Then we can work wonders in the name of Jesus
by the power
of the Holy Spirit.
“I am the vine. You are the branches,” he says,
Those who
abide in me and I in them bear much fruit.”
To abide in Jesus means to trust in his love,
not our own
cleverness, charm, and hard work,
to
sustain us in life.
Do we have some money? It’s easily lost.
Are we strong? Someone else is stronger.
Are we smart? No one is smart enough.
The psalmist says, “Unless the Lord builds the house,
those who
build it labor in vain.”
We cannot make ourselves safe.
It is not in our power.
But the steadfast love of the Lord abides forever.
“Though the mountains fall and the hills turn to dust”
Isaiah says,
“the love of
the Lord endures.”
“Surely it is God who saves me.
I will trust in him and not be afraid.
for that Lord
is my stronghold and my sure defense
and he will be
my Savior.”
This is a completely
different way of being in the world.
It is free from fear,
so it is free
from greedy craving,
free from
gnawing jealousy,
free from
violent grasping.
When we trust God instead of our possessions
for our well being,
we are free to
be generous.
We are free with our time,
free with our
attention,
free with our
compassion and delight.
Faith is the fount of freedom.
Without faith, we are all prisoners of fear.
But with faith, we can fly.
“For freedom Christ has set us free,” Paul said.
All it takes to know the peace of God
which passes
all understanding
is to
trust in him, and him alone, for our life.
