We’ve all been there. So deep in doubt, so much in despair. Will anything work right? I’ve done all I can, Lord, and now I’m overwhelmed by life. Readings for the upcoming weekend remind us of these excursions into the Valley of the Shadow of Death…and also that God cares for us, and provides sustenance wherever we are. The Holy Writings are full of these remembrances, helping each generation to remember that “this is the house of God”.
Elijah’s story is long and convoluted, perhaps announcing that he represents the Prophetic strain of speaking Truth to Power. We pick up the story in I KINGS 19:1-9. He’s just called down fire from the sky, seen the drought ended, and killed all the prophets of Baal. Queen Jezebel was livid! Sensing that she would have him killed, he did what any of us would do: he hightailed it out of there. Filled yesterday with God’s Spirit, he was empty today: “It is enough; now, Lord, take away my life…” God told him that this was rubbish, and sent an angel with heavenly food & drink to sustain him for a long (40 days, twice more than you can count on your fingers and toes; sounds like Noah, or Jesus in HIS wilderness) journey to Mt. Sinai. Where the wild things are, God is a providential God. Haywood Barringer Spangler says, “Elijah doesn’t have to give up his frustration, but God will not let him give in to it.” (FEASTING on the WORD, C 3:151)
What does Paul say to the GALATIANS in vv. 3:23-29? “…In Christ Jesus, you are all children of God through faith.” Good thing Elijah didn’t know the song, “We shall overcome someday”–he thought that TODAY is the Day! There is an immediate need for God’s children–Jew or Gentile, slave or free–to project the ethical and spiritual stand of Jesus even in the face of power. “We will go forth in grace alone.”
LUKE 8:26-33 is the rather humorous story, especially to Jewish folks, of demons going into a herd of pigs, who rushed into the Sea of Galilee and were drowned. But the core, of course, is that Jesus found a non-Jew who had no name but “Legion”, exiled from his community and consigned early to the graveyard. Even though Legion was an alien, Jesus cast out the demons and restored him to “normal” life. Are YOU overwhelmed by voices raging at you from inside and out? Are you consigned to the Wilderness? God wants to confirm you as an individual, as a person, as a vital part of your community.
Mary Louise Bringle has written a hymn, which could be sung to the tune of “Finlandia”: As frailness grows, and youthful strengths diminish, in weary arms which worked their earnest fill, Your aging servants labor now to finish Their early tasks, as fits your mercy’s will; We grieve their waning, yet rejoice, believing Your arms, unwearied, shall uphold us still.
May these remembrances of God’s steadfast love sustain each of us through our wilderness pilgrimage…
In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King
Come join us every Tuesday to explore and be confronted by scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend by the Revised Common Lectionary…at horacebrownking.com
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