ELIJAH REVIVES THE WIDOW’S SON

A Contemporary Service Talk by Rev. Coleman S. Glenn

February 7, 2010

Etobicoke, ON

• Previous part of story:
• Drought because of evil
• Starving widow feeds Elijah first
• We might expect that to be the end of the story – “happily ever after”
• Reading: 1 Kings 17:17-24
• Summary
• The widow had done what Elijah had said – she fed him first – and STILL her son died
• She did not understand – she thought maybe Elijah was punishing her for her past sins
• Elijah took the child to an upper room
• He laid him out on his own (Elijah’s bed)
• He prayed to the Lord
• He measured himself over the child three times
• The child’s life returned
• Elijah brought the child down to the widow
• She acknowledged that Elijah truly was a man of God
• We’re like the widow
• We have made a commitment to putting the Lord first
• Even though we’ve put the Lord first, even when we’re doing exactly what the Lord wants, bad things can happen – we are not always happy
• A son represents faith – our ideas about the way things are supposed to be
• Sometimes things we used to believe in seem to be dying
• Sometimes it can even seem like the Lord has made us unhappy!
• Example: You’ve always believed that everyone goes to heaven
• You read in the Word that some people choose to go to hell
• Your faith is under attack – how can you continue to believe in a loving God if He lets people go to hell?
• When following the Lord seems to have made us unhappy, we can still turn to the Lord and His Word for help – the woman gives the child to Elijah
• Elijah carries the child to the upper room
• Going to the upper room means raising our minds to the Lord.
• It means trying to see the good – asking, how might the Lord bring good out of this?
• Elijah lays the child out on the bed
• This means calling to mind all the Lord’s different teachings
• In our example, it means trying to find out all the things the Lord says about freedom of choice, about heaven, about why hell exists
• Elijah cries out to the Lord and prays that the child’s soul be restored
• We can pray to the Lord to get through difficult times
• We can pray for the Lord to help us understand
• Elijah measures himself over the child three times
• Measuring himself means ordering, or arranging
• Three times means completely
• Elijah is the Lord’s Word
• So all together, this means completely allowing the Word to rearrange the way we understand something
• In the example, it means allowing the Lord’s Word to change how we think of the Lord’s mercy
• We used to think that the Lord’s mercy meant making everyone be happy
• Now we learn that His mercy involves allowing us to freely choose
• We learn that if the Lord didn’t allow people freedom of choice, we wouldn’t be people at all – we’d be robots
• Elijah brings the child back downstairs
• We take our re-born faith into life
• E.g. we try to lead people toward a heavenly life, but we don’t FORCE it on them
•  By living it, we see the truth of it
• And we do not have to let go of the most important parts of our faith
• In this case, we don’t have to let go of the idea that the Lord loves everyone, that the Lord IS love
• We can feel the joy that that widow had when she realized her son was alive again.
• We realize that following the Lord and turning to His Word and praying to Him really does lead to greater happiness
• We can say, along with that woman, “Now by this I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is the truth.”

Amen.

Lessons: 1 Kings 17:17-24