S
Starrsmother
Guest
2583 After Elijah had learned mercy during his retreat at the Wadi Cherith, he teaches the widow of Zarephath to believe in The Word of God and confirms her faith by his urgent prayer: God brings the widow’s child back to life.
This was a quote today from a different Catholic study site. As I was reading it and really listening to it, something occurred to me that hit home and I thought I’d share it and see what some of the rest of us think.
In this story, we have a woman whose husband died, and she was now confronted with the death of her apparently or possibly only son. This would represent a calamity of the worst kind to a woman of her day—as sons were expected to provide for widowed mothers, thus this would probably mean that at the least the woman would end up as a beggar just to eat. The son is described as a “child”, so for the sake of our discussion and this post, I am going to assume that her son was a little boy and thus she may have well still been in her child bearing years—and I realize that I’m making unprovable assumptions here—but bear with me.
The widow must have been praying though we certainly can’t know her prayers, but as she watched her little boy become more and more ill and realized that he too would die, I wonder what her prayers might have been? I wonder if they might not have gone, at least in part, something like this: “God, I am beyond hope or of knowing what to do. My son is going to die and I love him so much that my heart is broken AND he was my last hope—but had you even spared my husband, there would be a man in my home --the husband I loved and marred–and maybe even other sons would have been born. Now I have no family and will have no provider in my old age either!”
So, along comes Elijah and raises her son from the dead! I’m sure the widow was ecstatic. But here’s where I see the message:
Elijah did NOT raise her husband from the dead which would have saved her NOW—instead and with God’s assistance and according to His plan and desire, he gave her back her son—so that she could raise him to manhood. She would then have to work hard all her days to feed and provide for this boy with only the spiritual belief and hope that he would grow into a good and able man who would in turn, care for her in her old age. God gave her something to work with in other word–but not a finished product.
I think this is a lesson in how God approaches our prayers. We ask Him for something in prayer. God may well answer us–but not by presenting us with $20.00 to buy a lottery ticket which will miraculously turn out to be the winning one. He may instead, give us the $20.00 and the ability to invest it wisely and turn it into $40.00 and the $40.00 into a $100.00 and so on. Thus, even what we see as unanswered prayers may well have beeen answered—but it’s up to us to figure out the “how” part! Do I make any sense?
This was a quote today from a different Catholic study site. As I was reading it and really listening to it, something occurred to me that hit home and I thought I’d share it and see what some of the rest of us think.
In this story, we have a woman whose husband died, and she was now confronted with the death of her apparently or possibly only son. This would represent a calamity of the worst kind to a woman of her day—as sons were expected to provide for widowed mothers, thus this would probably mean that at the least the woman would end up as a beggar just to eat. The son is described as a “child”, so for the sake of our discussion and this post, I am going to assume that her son was a little boy and thus she may have well still been in her child bearing years—and I realize that I’m making unprovable assumptions here—but bear with me.
The widow must have been praying though we certainly can’t know her prayers, but as she watched her little boy become more and more ill and realized that he too would die, I wonder what her prayers might have been? I wonder if they might not have gone, at least in part, something like this: “God, I am beyond hope or of knowing what to do. My son is going to die and I love him so much that my heart is broken AND he was my last hope—but had you even spared my husband, there would be a man in my home --the husband I loved and marred–and maybe even other sons would have been born. Now I have no family and will have no provider in my old age either!”
So, along comes Elijah and raises her son from the dead! I’m sure the widow was ecstatic. But here’s where I see the message:
Elijah did NOT raise her husband from the dead which would have saved her NOW—instead and with God’s assistance and according to His plan and desire, he gave her back her son—so that she could raise him to manhood. She would then have to work hard all her days to feed and provide for this boy with only the spiritual belief and hope that he would grow into a good and able man who would in turn, care for her in her old age. God gave her something to work with in other word–but not a finished product.
I think this is a lesson in how God approaches our prayers. We ask Him for something in prayer. God may well answer us–but not by presenting us with $20.00 to buy a lottery ticket which will miraculously turn out to be the winning one. He may instead, give us the $20.00 and the ability to invest it wisely and turn it into $40.00 and the $40.00 into a $100.00 and so on. Thus, even what we see as unanswered prayers may well have beeen answered—but it’s up to us to figure out the “how” part! Do I make any sense?
