Collect of the Week
O Lord, Father of all mercy and God of all comfort, You
always go before and follow after us. Grant that we may rejoice in Your
gracious presence and continually be given to all good works; through Jesus
Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever. Amen.
1 Kings 17:17-24 (Last
Sunday’s Old Testament Reading)
17 After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the
house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left
in him. 18 And she said to
Elijah, "What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to
bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!" 19 And he said to her, "Give
me your son." And he took him from her arms and carried him up into the
upper chamber where he lodged, and laid him on his own bed. 20 And he cried to the LORD,
"O LORD my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I
sojourn, by killing her son?" 21
Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the LORD,
"O LORD my God, let this child's life come into him again." 22 And the LORD listened to the
voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he
revived. 23 And Elijah took
the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and
delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, "See, your son
lives." 24 And the woman
said to Elijah, "Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word
of the LORD in your mouth is truth."
Devotion
In the name of + Jesus.
Her son had died, and her first thought was that God was
punishing her. She thought that God was
using his death to heap on guilt upon her.
How often we do the same.
A flat tire on the way home from work; a day when nothing seems to go
the way you had planned; news from the doctor’s office isn’t what you had hoped;
or even the same bad news that she had received—a loved one has died—and somewhere
deep inside we wonder to ourselves, “What does God have against me? I knew I should have ________.”
To be sure, the calamity we face in this world is a result
of sin, and sometimes, it is a result of our own sin. This world is broken, and unless the trumpet
would sound, and the Son of Man would be seen coming down from above, that isn’t
going to change. We are plagued by our
sinful flesh, and daily fall short of the glory of God. Maybe that’s why we fear God’s wrath, and see
the calamities of life as a sign of God’s judgment on our sin.
But God isn’t out to get you any more than He was out to get
the woman at the death of her son. In
order to relinquish her fear, God granted the prophet Elijah healing and
resurrection to that woman’s son. And by
his resurrection, the woman knew that God was not against her, and either was
God’s prophet. In order to relinquish
your own fear, God has granted us all the healing and resurrection of His own
Son, Jesus Christ.
Jesus was stricken, smitten, and afflicted as the Father’s
wrath was poured out on Him. If you want
to see someone being punished for your sin, look there to the cross, and you
will see where the wages of all your sin was paid for Jesus. That is where God’s wrath was poured out on
your sin, so that you need not fear it being poured out on you today. And just as the woman’s son was raised to convince
her of Elijah’s authority, Jesus was raised to convince you of the authority of
His promises.
In a broken world, days don’t go as planned, and calamity
falls upon us all. But God isn’t against
you. His wrath has already been poured
out on Jesus. And whatever you are given
to endure in this world, because of the cross of Christ, you can do it knowing
that God isn’t against you, but loves you enough to make your suffering
temporary, and your joys eternal.
In the name of + Jesus. Amen.
Prayer
In suff’ring be Thy love my peace, In weakness be Thy
love my pow’r; And when the storms of life shall cease, O Jesus, in that final
hour, Be Thou my fod and staff and guide, And draw me safely to Thy side! Amen
(LSB 683, 4).
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