I bumped into an new blog today. It made me realize I don't share much of my faith on this blog. Considering I find my spirituality to be one of the most dominant and important parts of my identity, this was an important realization. It is my spirituality that tethers me to personal peace, strength, and commitment.
Christine had a poignant picture on her blog
capturing one of my fav old testament stories. The story of the woman of Zarepath came to life for me when I studied in the Holy Land. Becoming acquainted with the landscape, culture, customs and history of this region brought a new framework to the Old and New Testaments.
In this story, the widow is preparing her last meal for her son and herself, when the prophet Elijah is directed by God to her.
Important to this story are the faith of the prophet and the faith of this woman. Elijah literally is relying on his God for every meal (and in the heat of the Middle East, that requires faith!). She is preparing herself to die for want of food. His promises to her require faith: after she gives, she will be given.
“And she went and did according to the saying of Elijah: … and the
barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the
word of the Lord, which he spake by Elijah” (1 Kings
17:15–16).
She then has her oil and meal multiplied. True to my life and maybe yours, trials come even immediately after her hunger is filled:
17 ¶ And it came to pass after these things, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick; and his asickness was so sore, that there was no breath left in him. 18 And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do with thee, O thou man of God? art thou come unto me to call my
asin to remembrance, and to slay my son?
Her son has stopped breathing, and she wonders what kind of a prophet Elijah really is. Elijah is put on the spot, unsure of God's intentions. He takes the boy to his own bed, and prays. Unsure of God's purposes:
20 And he cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, hast thou also brought evil upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?
"You commanded me to find her. You performed a miracle. Her son has no breath. Is it you who brought this upon her?" And he show his faith by blessing the boy and praying for God to revive him. God hears and answers by restoring the boy. Elijah returns the boy to his mother, and she realizes he is, indeed, a prophet. There are many applications that I won't delve into here.
I love the remarkable faith of many of the women in the scriptures: Esther, Eve, Sarah, Mary, Ruth, mothers of the 2,000 stripling warriors. They make such an important contrast to some of the deceiving women figures in both the
BoM and Old/New Testaments:
Pharaoh's wife, daughter of
Herodias, daughter of Jared,
Isabael.
God knows his daughters and his sons, and is a cultivator of faith. If we have no faith, or a little; are waning or waxing in our belief and knowledge of his existence and plan -- it makes a difference to him. He will show his tenderness when we are willing to accept it. And often times even when we are not. We just don't care enough to see it.
