1 Kings 17:8-16
Proper 5 (10) - Year C
Proper 27 (32) - Year B
In a culture of hospitality, how did G*D “command” or “instruct” or “designate” a widow to feed Elijah?
Would that signs would be as straight-forward as a first encounter. There in the entrance to a city, two people meet.
Note the care with which the unnamed widow prepares a last meal. A little flour, a little oil, are prepared as best she can in what would be expected to be a weakened condition. Setting a good table is as valuable as welcoming others to share what is available.
This ability to notice and play out a scene is something we are still in need of. To note details such as childless widow or making a feast out of little continue to remind us that that which seems so empty, is not. Loss is not just the emptiness of necessity, though it may sometimes be, but it is also an opening to see the freedom and possibilities that have grown through cement since the last time we looked. In the midst of despair, there is a trust and hope that sits zazen.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2013/06/1-kings-171-16-17-24.html
In the midst of Baal worshiping Phoenicians Elijah found G*D at work. Elijah appealed to the ancient virtue of hospitality - first make me, the traveler, a little something from your less than little supply.
When the virtue held, the blessing came, eyes were opened to see the abundance that was overlooked before.
How might we continue to offer the gift of hospitality beyond any scarcity-fear of our own? Has the church lost this gift of hospitality among its own members as well as an offering for others? What are we afraid of when we turn our GLBT sisters and brothers away from the little we have? What are we afraid of when we retreat from literally standing alongside the poor? Are we afraid of contagion or compassion?
This morning we are training our greeters and ushers in some of the attitudes and actions of hospitality. A part of that will be a sensitivity to be on hospitality-duty (though that is a less than felicitous way of putting it) even when not listed as part of the greets or ushers for the day.
Do you believe that going out of your way for another is simply what you are to do? Have you been taken advantage of too many times to risk it again? Do you know you have enough, and more, to share?
This gift can be learned from those who do hospitality best, the outcast and the poor. G*D observes this in the "widows." May G*D observe this gift in you and me.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/november2003.html
It is very easy to move this passage into a prosperity theology - Give me your last dollar and you'll be mightily rewarded with a never-failing supply of dollars - your resource base (read, "son") will be restored to you and see you through the rest of your life.
Isn't it intriguing that with a goose that lays golden eggs, we are still fearful and ready to blame G*D for not being only a positive force in our life. Here the widow still had her unending supply (good) but loses her son (bad) and that the latter is seen as G*D's judgment, not the former.
It is as if the wonders of G*D are very Rodney Dangerfield-like - they get no respect and will be set aside on a moments notice. These wonders have a very short shelf-life before we look around for more coming our way and are easily distracted if we don't keep getting something that is better today than it was yesterday. G*D is like an addiction, we keep needing ever bigger signs/rewards and diminishing difficulties. If it doesn't work this way then we search around for a G*D that is more manageable.
- - -
Zarephath synonymous with impossible situation
an immigrant asking a starving national for foodtime after time
the impossible presents
an imposing face
will god be god
in a foreign landgod as hospitality
shows up regularly
in every out-of-the-way place
in what appears
as extraordinary valorhospitality is built-in
to creation's action
most evident
where death appears
to limitthose most well-practiced
at ease with real death
work through dilemmas
delineating me from you
resolved in hospitality anywayZarephath a hidden away place
a closed room
revealing a wondering spirit
binding our common lives
with hospitality language
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_06_01_archive.html
1 Kings 17:8-16 or Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
Psalm 127 or Psalm 146
Hebrews 9:24-28
Mark 12:38-44
When called to put in to life all we have, it is helpful to have little. We don't have to sort through tough decisions about what to save when a fire is bearing down on us or the flood waters are rising. When it is very clear that we only have this cup of flour or these two coins, we might as well offer them now rather than wait for another hand - sort of like going all in when short-stacked - it is the only reasonable decision in an uncertain world.
Our senses are heightened when everything is on the line and, at the same time, there is a blessed quietness. This combination of choice and non-choice leads to the type of living that will force action. When in this space we are open to doors we never would have considered and, if nothing else, we are a blessing to any who observe our response to a dilemma - invest where you can your reputation, resources, and hope.
- - -
a house is being built
a habitat for humanity
rises from random materials
a foundation here
a stud there
insulation blown or blanket
paint all arounda house is being built
a model of participation
sweat equity
partnering with G*D
and one another
pick your skill set
and use it wella house is being built
its transformation
to a home
is in vain
without today's risk
sleeping with Boaz
cooking for Elijaha house is being built
that requires
everyone's hands
to raise it up
not even G*D
does this alone
without a widow's help
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html
Nain? Zarephath? There are widows and soon to be widows all over the place - even in the place you are. A part of our work is to not narrow a definition of widow beyond that of the root of "widow" in Hebrew - 'alam, "one unable to speak" and, by extension, unable to be spoken for.
In this larger role of being silenced, we can get beyond our usual picture of a widow - "a woman who has lost her husband by death and usually has not remarried."
Who is being silenced these day? There is widowhood.
Of interest is the possibility of there having been an Order of Widows in the early Church - see references in 1 Timothy 5:9-16, through to the 3rd century Didascalia Apostolorum, and beyond.
It may be time to return to officially recognizing and affirming an Order of the Silenced that we might hear their story from their own lips and not just talk about people who are not able to be at the table. In some denominations the silenced person is a gay man or lesbian (some narrow that silencing to ordination, but that doesn't help the silencing and shunning). In many places the silenced include an immigrant without official papers. Additionally there are all those who by age or class or educational/economic status or (_____, your experience of a silenced person) cannot be heard by those in power.
Traditionally an Order of the Silenced was authorized to engage in prayer, which seems safe enough. I expect, however, that their prayers all kept coming back to Jesus' prayer, "Forgive them, they don't know what they are doing" and a correlative, "Wake them to what division is caused by silencing people and help them engage them in a new common-unity."
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010/06/1-kings-178-24.html