Elijah is alone in the cave but no more alone than he has
felt already in the midst of the people.
His refrain of "I, even I only, am left…" tells the tale. If I am going to be the only one then I want
to be alone in reality, my ministry has had no effect at all so why bother any
longer. He is afraid because they want
to take his life but asks the Lord to allow him to die or to kill him. Elijah wants to know that his life and his
work on behalf of Yahweh, his suffering on that account, have mattered at
all. The Lord speaks to him and
manifests Himself to Elijah but even then, what difference does it make if he
has labored in vain. Only after the Lord
has told Elijah to go back and anoint a new king and a new prophet does He
inform the prophet that there are others.
He has not been the only one faithful.
The disciples are together but being together isn't solving
the problems they face with the storm. They
need Jesus in order to calm the storm, all their effort isn't getting them to
shore. When Jesus is added to the mix
everything changes. We often labor on
our own power and according to the devices and desires of our own hearts and
when we do we make no headway. It is
only when Jesus comes along with us that we are able to accomplish anything of
significance. The followers on whom
Jesus had such great compassion yesterday note He has gone, know that He wasn't
in the only boat that left that evening and chase after Him in the morning but
their only query is when He came, not how He came across. The really important question was left
unasked and by this He knew why they had come.
Paul is clear that we are not materialists believing that
this life is all there is, there ain't no more, indulging the sinful desires of
the flesh to grab all the gusto we can get.
The other idea is that the flesh doesn't matter anyway so let it have
its pleasures while the soul remains aloof from it all, evaluating the
experience the flesh has philosophically, as if that were possible. We are both flesh and spirit at once, not two
separate entities. The Spirit is to
control the flesh, to discipline it. It was
flesh into which God initially breathed His Spirit and flesh that He took on to
redeem. He could have redeemed the soul
immaterially but He didn't, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We are to enflesh the indwelling Spirit
because life and how we live it matters.
Life reveals the Spirit within us.
Paul sees the importance also of life together, that is where we reveal
the life of the Trinity, the real life is not solitary.
No comments:
Post a Comment