His Mother’s Son

Luke 7:11-15

You wonder why specific stories, of all the stories that must have happened, make it into the Bible. John’s gospel implies that a whole lot more could have been written about what Jesus said and did. So when I look at a particular story, I like to ask, “Why this one?”

These are not stories just for entertainment. These are teaching stories, stories to tell us something specific about God and God’s messenger/son, Jesus, and to call us to responsive action.

No controversy with feisty adversaries or confrontations with conflicted disciples here. No impeding cultural or sin problems with the “helpee”. In fact, the “helpee” is dead. Literally and completely. No whys or wherefores. No previous connections with Jesus, as Lazarus had.

Just a dead son and his mother, a widow, from a nondescript town called Nain not far from nondescript Nazareth where Jesus grew up.

Study Bibles can get in the way. Personally I don’t like them because I tend to read into the Bible text what someone else is thinking (kind of like what you are tempted to do by what I write here ). So I note in my own non-study Bible the reference to stories in I Kings 17 and II Kings 4. In these Old Testament passages, Elijah and Elisha raise to life the dead sons of widows. My Bible also references Mark 5 where Jesus raises Jairus’ daughter back to life and John 11 where Lazarus is resurrected.

So I am distracted for a moment. What do all these other stories have to do with this one? I can think of nothing other than they all have to do with offspring or siblings being brought back to life. Then I think that maybe this story stands on its own. None of the other gospels mention it. It happens shortly after the Centurion’s servant is healed and before John’s disciples come to Jesus with a question from the imprisoned and discouraged John. But this story comes on its own.

Right here in this little hamlet and now in this funeral procession, Jesus bumps into this grieving widow. I am struck by the scene. They are at the narrow and crowded town gate. Jesus, accompanied by a large crowd, is going in. The widow, also accompanied by a large crowd, is going out. I understand the crowd scene – I have been in many an Asian intersection myself. Everyone is moving ahead with his or her own agenda and not even noticing those coming in the opposite direction.

For Jesus, crowds are nothing new. But at this moment, as these two groups flow through each other just outside the gate, Jesus meets the woman and the stretcher carrying her dead son. He has not been dead long – in such primitive settings, the dead were buried right away – but he is definitely dead. And the woman, as any mother with an only son would do, is grieving. She has not just lost a relationship, she has lost her provider and livelihood, her identity in society. She is now economically and socially destitute.

I wonder how many times Jesus passed by a funeral procession. These days you rarely see them, it seems. But in those days, death was common and in-your-face. This particular procession struck at the heart of Jesus. He did not raise back to life every dead person he met, but something was unique here. He was, after all, his Father’s only son.

God, the Bible says, has a special love for widows, orphans and aliens – the displaced and misfit people in our world. And no one was more displaced in those days than a widow whose only son was dead.

In this moment, Jesus first comforts the woman – “Don’t cry” – then commands the dead son to get up. The first order is a kind, gentle one. Jesus is not put off by her crying – he is deeply touched by it and is announcing to her that her tears, though understandable, are no longer needed. The second order is also a kind, gentle one. He doesn’t need to shout to be heard by the dead. He simply speaks and the man comes back to life.

Two things of note then happen. First, as soon as the son returns to life he sits up and starts talking. He is back all the way, right where he left off. Second, Jesus makes the point of giving him back to his mother. He has returned this son to life, simply because his mother still needs him. And this point is not lost on the observers, nor, I dare say, the son himself. He is resurrected for a purpose not of his own.