Text: Luke 7:1-17

I went into this story (these stories, actually; there are two) thinking it was about healing. And it is. Jesus does heal people in these stories. But spending time with them I realized that they are also stories about grief.

The two figures who have encounters with Jesus here almost couldn’t be more different from each other. The centurion is a Roman soldier in command over a ‘century’ or unit of 100 other soldiers. Powerful. Foreign. Occupier. Master of his household. Wealthy enough not only to have a household but to build infrastructure for the community out of his own pocket.

The woman is a widow. While there were women of means, usually ‘widow’ signals vulnerability. She’s a woman who is local to this town. And now she may have no way to provide for herself, never mind generous gestures to her neighbors. 

What these folks do seem to have in common is grief bourn out of deep loss – or impending loss – of people they love. The centurion with an unusually tender level of care for someone in his charge. Some queer interpretations of this text suggest that there may have been a romantic or sexual relationship between the centurion and his slave but I think that’s pretty speculative. It’s certainly clear he believe he is losing someone who is very special to him.

The widow has already lost her husband. Now as Jesus encounters her, she is in the funeral possession of her only son. And though the centurion appeals to Jesus for help and the woman doesn’t even ask, Jesus is compelled to compassion for their immense grief.

I will readily admit: I haven’t personally had a big experience of personal loss like the death of a child or spouse or parent. I have had the sobering and privileged experience of being a friend or pastor through some of that kind of grief. And we’ve all had difficult and devastating experiences of one kind or another. I think we can say without reservation: grief sucks!

We end up asking things like, “Why did this happen?” “What could I have done differently?” “How can I make sense of this?” But simple and trite answers to these kinds of questions is also not at all comforting or healing.

I loved Kate Bowler’s book about her cancer diagnosis and treatment and very close call with death. It’s called Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Lies I’ve Loved. She says,

“Everything happens for a reason.” The only thing worse than saying this is pretending that you know the reason. I’ve had hundreds of people tell me the reason for my cancer. Because of my sin. Because of my unfaithfulness. Because God is fair. Because God is unfair. Because of my aversion to Brussels sprouts. I mean, no one is short of reasons. 

So if people tell you this, make sure you are there when they go through the cruelest moments of their lives, and start offering your own. When someone is drowning, the only thing worse than failing to throw them a life preserver is handing them a reason.”

The flip side to this – when people are healed – also comes with questions. Why did they get healed but I didn’t? Why can’t God heal the person I love? 

When Jesus began his ministry he sort of addressed this difficult question. First he gave his “mission statement” saying that he was fulfilling the prophet Isaiah’s mandate to release the prisoner and minister to the oppressed and give sight to the blind. And then he reminded his audience that in the time of the prophet Elijah, there were many in Israel who were suffering from drought and famine and Elijah went to a particular widow from Zaraphath.

In fact there’s an echo here with Jesus going to a widow who has lost her only son. He goes not because other people aren’t suffering but because when he sees her, he is moved to compassion and he acts immediately on that compassion. When he is asked by the centurion’s neighbors to come help his servant he immediately goes. 

There’s no reason for healing other than that he was compelled by his compassion and he follows it. There’s nothing that the people who are healed do or don’t do. There’s no reason. There’s only Jesus seeing or hearing and being moved by compassion.

When I read scripture, especially hard stories, I will sometimes ask, “Where is the good news?” In this story it’s easy to see the good news – at least for those who are grieving and have this encounter with Jesus. But in this story I found myself asking, “What is the invitation?”

Sometimes look at hard stories from bible and asking ‘what’s the good news?” – here the good news is kind of clear – at least for the ones who are healed –

“What’s the invitation?” I think the invitation here is to do as Jesus did: Act on the impulse to care. Act on the impulse to reach out, to go, to connect, to walk alongside.

Not all Jesus stories are like this. Jesus sometimes needs to be convinced. Sometimes he retreats to find space away from suffering crowds. But often he is compelled to reach out to the one who is in front of him who is suffering. He sees the grief, the pain, the illness and he acts with compassion in the moment of need.

There is an invitation in this story to do the same. Kate Bowler talks about what this kind of compassion can mean to someone who is in the depths of suffering and grief.

At a time when I should have felt abandoned by God, I was not reduced to ashes. I felt like I was floating, floating on the love and prayers of all those who hummed around me like worker bees, bringing notes and flowers and warm socks and quilts embroidered with words of encouragement. They came in like priests and mirrored back to me the face of Jesus.

It is interesting to me that In some ways, this was actually already happening for the people in the story. They had communities of people around them who cared about their grief. Advocates who came to Jesus in their place. Friends and neighbors who were crying out so loudly that Jesus turned his head. Because of those friends walking alongside the person grieving, Jesus noticed and came.

We can be those friends and neighbors. We can be like Jesus and allow our impulse of compassion to compel us to reach out. Especially in the second story, Jesus could have left well enough alone. Could have continued on his way rather than approach the grieving party. 

I’m really terrible (though I’m trying to get better) at staying connected to people, even when I care about them. Even if I’m thinking of or praying for them, I can get in my own head about why now’s not a good time, or I’ll just be imposing or getting in the way. But I’d like to think that when we are the neighbors who offer advocacy or when we walk alongside in grief, when we reach out with care (not with reasons and platitude!) we become the priests and the face of Jesus that Bowler talked about.

Friends. I do not wish you pain at all. I do not wish you grief. I do not wish tragedy. But I pray that we may be compelled by compassion when we see suffering. That we may act on the impulse to care when we are aware of suffering and pain. May we indeed be the face of Jesus.