10th. Sunday of the Year
(C)
(1 Kings 17:17-24; Galatians 1:11-19; Luke 7:11-17)
In
today’s Gospel reading we are told of a very significant miracle performed by
Jesus when He raised a young man from the dead.
What most impresses us today however, is not so much, perhaps, the
objective fact of the miracle itself, for we believe Jesus to have been the Son
of God made man, One very capable of performing such an act, but the human
sympathy of Jesus which led Him to spontaneously involve Himself and perform so
striking a miracle with such tender Personal compassion. There are deep and most powerful human
emotions involved here which secretly stir-up and evoke our own sympathetic
involvement even today. For here was a
tragically distraught woman appearing before Jesus: already a widow, her only son
-- a young man Jesus called him --
had just died as the promise of the fullness of life had begun to dawn
for him and bring some measure of warm hope back into her heart. For a second time now she was walking alone,
though followed by a crowd of sympathizers; walking upright in body yet with
head bowed and her heart overwhelmed with grief as tears blinded her eyes. She was no longer young in years and, most
probably, had little or no idea of her future livelihood and security, let
alone of any hope of love and companionship.
At the best, the crowd of sympathizers could suggest that she might find
herself with some happy memories of friends and family; but would that enable
her to face up to a doubly lonely and possibly threatening future?
In such
circumstances, was Jesus foreseeing His own mother’s grief and loneliness on
Calvary? Possibly.
For, in
the course of His public ministry Jesus was compared to, even mixed-up with,
Elijah:
Jesus
went on with His disciples to Caesarea Philippi. And on the way He asked His disciples, ‘Who
do people say that I am?’ And they told
Him, ‘John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the
prophets.’ (Mark
8:27)
And
Elijah was not merely one of the prophets Jesus had remotely heard of, but one
whose life and work for the glory of the God of Israel against the wicked queen
Jezebel’s worship of Baal He admired, one who
– as would be shown at His Transfiguration when Elijah appeared with
Moses speaking with Jesus – came readily to Jesus’ mind:
Jesus
began to speak to the crowds: Truly I say to you, among those born of women
there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. All the Prophets and the
Law prophesied until John, and if your are willing to accept it, he is Elijah
who is to come. (Matthew 11:7, 11-14)
Jesus
would, therefore, have been acutely aware of the similarity between His present
situation and that of Elijah who performed a miracle for the widow of Zarephath
grieving for her dead son, as we ourselves have just heard in our first reading
Elijah
said to her, ‘Give me your son.’ Taking
him from her lap, he carried the son to the upper room where he was staying and
put him on his bed ... Then he stretched himself out upon the child three
times, and called out to the Lord: ‘O Lord, my God, let the life breath return
to the body of this child.’
Now, had
Elijah stretched himself out upon the
child not only three times, but also in the form of a cross: with the
prophet’s outstretch arms and full length body covering those of the child to
symbolize the warmth of life being transferred from the prophet to the child by
God’s healing goodness and mercy? A
great miracle of vindication in Elijah’s time indeed, but in God’s Providence a
truly wondrous foreshadowing not only of the crucifixion of Israel’s promised Messiah, but of the life-giving,
death-and-sin-destroying, power of
His resurrection as the Saviour of
all mankind.
After
Elijah restored the living child to his mother:
The woman
replied to Elijah, ‘Now indeed I know that you are a man of God. The word of the Lord comes truly from your
mouth.
The word
of the Lord spoken by Elijah was a prophetic word. The word of God in Jesus was salvific, a word
bringing salvation for mankind; and such a word, Jesus knew, could only come
from His Cross-transfigured heart and soul, blood-drained body and being; it
was indeed a word of life from the One Who alone could and would engage and
conquer death.
Again, was Jesus
at that very moment foreseeing and anticipating His own mother’s grief and
loneliness on Calvary? Quite possibly,
for we are told that, after His miracle He simply, and quite mysteriously, gave
the widow her restored son without any further Personal words of sympathy or
encouragement, not even words of blessing.
It would seem that this widow’s tragic suffering might well have
occasioned in Him what He had not anticipated and to which He could not, at
that moment, give any suitable expression for merely human sharing.
Saint Paul wanted
to make most clear to the Galatians this aspect of the Gospel message in his
letters when he declared that:
The
Gospel preached by me is not of human origin.
For I did not receive it from a human being, nor was I taught it, but it
came through a revelation of Jesus Christ Who died for all, that all those who
live might no longer live for themselves but for Him Who for their sake died
and was raised. (cfr. Gal. 1:11s. + 2 Cor. 5:15)
In other words the
Good-News of Jesus was not something as it were cogitated, argued, and proof-read beforehand, for St. Paul; nor was it anything of that nature for Jesus
Himself especially on the occasion of this sudden and unexpectedly-most-touching encounter with a grieving mother suffering – so much like His own
mother would soon suffer – for her beloved, only, Son.
This meeting with
the widow of Nain, this raising of her son from his coffin, bier, of death, was
uniquely intimate. Immediately before
and, in St. Luke’s narrative, straight after, this incident at Nain, Jesus restored to health the servant of a
Roman Centurion and also:
Healed
many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who were
blind He bestowed sight. (Luke 7:27)
On these occasions
He spoke directly to the attendant crowds.
But not here at Nain.
When
the Lord saw her He had compassion on her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’
Private words of
most sincere sympathy, surely to be heard by her alone who so needed them.
On approaching the
dead man’s bier He simply touched the bier to stop the bearers and then
addressed the young man himself saying:
Young
man, I say to you, ‘arise.’
Whereupon ‘Jesus gave him to his mother.’ Nothing more. All so tender and utterly intimate.
The restored son was enough for the woman, she would quite possibly not
even have heard words of sympathy about her situation from Jesus; and as we
have hinted, any words expressive of His own emotions at that moment were above
ordinary human appreciation.
Elijah
took up the restored child and, we are told, gave him to his mother. Is
that perhaps why St. Luke seems to have been in such a rush to tell us that
Jesus likewise gave him to his mother although
– according to the actual words describing Jesus’ act of healing – he was still
seated in the coffin held by its bearers?
Or was that parsimony of words possibly because Jesus, immediately on
healing the young man, turned to his mother and with a glance or perhaps a
slight gesture of His hand said, with truly sublime humility and sensitivity,
‘There you are good mother, take him’, and left the two together?
Of course, the
accompanying crowd could not fail to see and enthuse over what had happened,
and they whole-heartedly cried out: A great prophet has arisen in our midst!
Just as the widow
of Zarephath herself had done when she exclaimed: You are a man of God, the word of
God comes truly from your mouth.
Here at Nain, however, revelation is proceeding and there
is something more; not that the people proclaiming realized just what they were
saying, but was the Father perhaps once again witnessing to His Son, for all
glorified God exclaiming, GOD has visited His people?
God indeed,
God-made-man, was visiting His People in Jesus our Saviour Who would be
stretched out on the Cross of Calvary for love of men, and Whose death and
Resurrection would give life to all those touched by the Gospel of Jesus’ Good
News.
That revelatory
report of Jesus -- the crucified and risen Lord -- has spread throughout the
intervening ages indeed, and has reached us once more this day to refresh,
inspire, and comfort us with the truth it brings and the beauty it contains for
us. Truth because it is a revelation of
the Risen Lord Who was crucified for us, because Jesus is ever the
Way, the Truth, and the Life.
And Beauty, because (Psalm 27: 4, 13):
One
thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell
in the house of the Lord all the days of
my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord ... I believe I shall look upon
the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!
Truth guides and
sustains, beauty inspires and comforts; so, dear People of God, let us ever
seek to embrace God’s Truth in all its Beauty as we hear and strive to
understand, embrace and put into practice, the authentic Gospel proclaimed to
us in Mother Church, the Immaculate Spouse of her Risen Lord and Suffering
Saviour, Jesus Christ.
