To listed to today’s homily please select the audio file below:
All this week and most of the following week our readings at Mass are about the Prophet Elijah from the Book of Kings. Jesus, remember, is often compared to Elijah. “Who do people say I am?” he asks his disciples. “Some say you are Elijah,” they answer. On the Mount of Transfiguration Moses and Elijah appear with Jesus in glory. Elijah is a prophet who helps us know Jesus.
He’s a mysterious prophet, first of all. We know little about his origins. The scriptures call him, “Elijah, the Tishbite.” Like Jesus, his origins are mysterious.
Elijah is also a lonely prophet. By “lonely” I don’t mean he chooses to avoid people or prefers a solitary life. Elijah is lonely because he got into trouble with the powerful establishment of his day and is continually on the run, hiding out in caves and wadis. His loneliness comes because he fearlessly challenges the wicked king Ahab and his notorious wife Jezebel, who have absolute control over Israel. He himself has no political party, no cadre of followers to back him up. Yes, people like what he’s doing, but when danger comes, they abandon him, like the disciples who abandoned Jesus when danger came to him.
Like Jesus, Elijah speaks the truth and defends the truth, but speaking the truth and defending the truth can also make you unpopular. It can be a lonely, thankless path.
Our reading today from the Book of Kings is from the first part of Elijah’s mission. On God’s authority the prophet announces to King Ahab a drought is coming to the land of Israel. Because Ahab and his people are unfaithful to God no rain will fall, no crops will be harvested, no money will come in from trade. Of course, the king and his queen are furious and want Elijah’s head.
On a pilgrimage to the Holy Land some years ago, I remember standing on Mount Carmel in northern Israel, which is Elijah’s traditional home, looking out to the east and to the south. Our guide pointed east toward the Jordan valley, where Elijah went to hide from Ahab and Jezebel near a mountain stream, the Wadi Cerith. The king knew every water hole, every hiding place and he sent his soldiers out to hunt down the prophet. No one would be foolish enough to shelter or give food to an enemy of the king. But God kept Elijah safe and alive. A poor widow with an only son took him in.
That’s where we find Elijah in today’s reading. He’s in hiding with a poor widow and her only son. The only people who will take him in. But suddenly, the widow’s son dies. This poor woman trusted in God, taking Elijah in, and now her only son is taken from her. She has no one else, nothing else in this world.
You can hear in our reading the poor woman’s anger and regret as she lashes out at the prophet she’s taken in. Is this the way God rewards her good deed? “Why have you done this to me, O man of God?” Elijah too bitterly complains to God: “O LORD, my God, will you afflict even the widow with whom I am staying by killing her son?” He’s fed up with it all.
Then, he calls on the God of life to bring back this boy. He places his body on the dead body of the son, and God raises the boy to life and Elijah gives him to his mother. “Your son is alive.”
The story of Elijah is an old story, but it’s filled with interesting insights into our world and the way God works in it. Elijah himself is a powerful prophet; he raises the widow’s son to life. But really, he’s powerless most of the time, just a poor man on the run, not knowing where to go or what to do next. The world he’s challenging doesn’t seem to change. No matter what he says, Ahab and his wife Jezebel seem to keep running things. The society is corrupt and people are too afraid to do anything about it.
But God keeps the prophet going. In the worst of times, God tells Elijah to be faithful. Even when he is ready to give up, God calls him again, to speak the truth, even to raise the dead.
I mentioned earlier that Jesus reminded people of his time of Elijah. “Some say you are Elijah,” they said. Today’s gospel story would give them reason to compare the two. Jesus raises a widow’s son as they are carrying him from the town of Naim for burial. But it might also be true that people see their own times like the times of Ahab and Jezebel. They were living in a tough, unjust world they couldn’t see being changed. To do that, you would need someone who could raise the dead.
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