Kahu's Manao
Keawala‘i Congregational Church
United Church of Christ (USA)
Second Sunday After Pentecost
Sunday, June 6, 2010
The Rev. Kealahou C. Alika
“Courageous Compassion”
1 Kings 17:8-24
“Spare change?” he asked. “I need bus fare to get to Lāhainā,” he explained.
Without saying a word I took out my wallet and gave him $2.00, all the while wondering if he really was going to Lāhainā. There wasn’t time for me to ask. Hanu and I were on our morning walk. Within moments of our encounter with the man, Hanu started biting on his leash signaling to me that it was time to move on.
The man said “thank you” and went his way. Hanu and I continued our walk. I chided him for being so impatient.
I had seen the man before – sometimes alone, sometimes with others; sometimes walking; sometimes sitting under the Banyan tree on Market Street in Wailuku. On more than one occasion I saw him holding a bottle hidden in a brown paper bag.
About a week after I gave him the money for his bus fare, I saw him walking through a crosswalk with one of his friends. Even though I had Hanu in tow I was tempted to go up to him and ask how was his trip to Lāhainā, but I knew that would have been an unkind thing to do.
Wailuku is home to a convenience store where I saw him buying beer one day. Wailuku is also home to the Community Clinic of Maui that provides medical and dental assistance to the poor. Two blocks from the clinic is a half-way house for troubled adolescents. Along Market Street there is a transition house for adults. Down on Central Avenue there is a housing facility for the elderly.
Up on Main Street the Good Shepherd Episcopal Church offers a free meal on Sundays. Down on Waialae Road the Ka Hale O Ke Ola Homeless Resource Center provides housing for families in need and on Mahalani Street are located the offices of The ARC of Maui that provides home and community-based services for individuals with mental retardation and/or developmental disabilities. Down on lower Market Street there is a low-income housing project and located on Lower Main Street is Hale Makua, a facility that provides long-term health care for adults. Lili’uokalani Children’s Center whose work is primarily with orphans and poor children is located in the Wailuku Industrial Park on Wili Pā Loop.
Wailuku is also home to many non-profit organizations and government agencies including the American Red Cross, Easter Seals, Child Protective & Welfare Services, Legal Aid Society of Maui, Maui Coastal Land Trust, Imua Family Services, Lokahi Pacific, Maui Family Support Services, Mental Health Kōkua, Parents & Children Together, Alu Like, Maui Aids Foundation, Hui No Ke Ola Pono, Hospice Maui, Ka Lima O Maui, St. Joseph Church Outreach Program, Alcoholics Anonymous, Al-Anon, and Alateen and many others. Several hostels provide accommodations for visitors.
There are now so many non-profit organizations and agencies, a recent front page article in The Maui News reported that some in the surrounding neighborhoods have been struck with the “nimby” bug – the acronym for “not in my backyard.”
There is worry about the homeless, about the mentally ill, about the poor, about those addicted to drugs and alcohol. Some say it is bad for the economic revitalization of the town.
I am not sure if folks are so preoccupied with their own economic well being that they feel their property values may in jeopardy or if they fear for their safety and well-being. I am not sure if some feel threatened by those whom they have come to perceive as “strangers” or “outsiders.”
What I am sure of is that many have become worn down by the enormous need of so many not only in Wailuku but in other communities throughout Maui County. Many years ago someone coined the phrase “compassion fatigue.”
I suppose in other times and in other places other phrases may have been used. Our reading from The First Book of Kings is a story not about “compassion fatigue” but about “courageous compassion.” The reading is a part of a larger narrative that tells of the confrontation between King Ahab of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and Elijah the prophet.
Ahab, under the influence of his wife Jezebel, introduced into Israel the worship of the Canaanite god Baal. Among the attributes ascribed to Baal was his ability to give rain to nurture the crops. (1 Kings 18:20-39)
At the beginning of Chapter 17 Elijah has just announced that a drought will come upon the land. “The fact that Baal was responsible for rain makes this announcement a direct challenge to Baal’s power and a judgment against Ahab’s support of Baal. Having confronted Ahab with this word of Yahweh, Elijah is forced to flee.” (Feasting on the Word, Year C, Volume 3, Bartlett & Taylor, Westminster/John Knox Press, Louisville, Kentucky, 2010, page 99)
Our reading includes two of three stories about Elijah as he seeks refuge from Ahab during the drought. At first Elijah goes and lives in an area east of the Jordan. There he is fed by ravens and is able to drink from the river.
But in time the water dries up. It is at this point that the first of our two stories occurs. Elijah is commanded to go to Zarephath where a widow will provide him with food and drink. Elijah obeys and there he finds a woman gathering sticks. He asks that she bring him water to drink and she does. Then he asks that she bring him food.
This time she tells Elijah that she has barely enough for herself and her son and that once what she prepares is consumed, it is likely they will die. Her life as a widow with a child is made all the more desperate by the drought-induced famine.
Despite her protests Elijah reassures her that all will be well. She accepts Elijah’s word and through her obedience and trust we are told that “he and her household ate for many days.” (1 Kings 17:15)
The second story is a cause of great anguish for the widow. Her son becomes ill. She blames Elijah for his illness (1 Kings 17:18) convinced that it is God’s punishment for some sin of hers, and that the presence of Elijah as a man of God, in her house has brought her and her sinfulness to God’s attention. (Ibid., page 103)
Elijah offers a prayer of lament to God. He is courageous in his confrontation with God. The boy’s illness is “so severed that there was no breath left in him.” (1 Kings 17:17) The text does not explicitly indicate that the child is dead but the illness is serious enough that it seems he is at least on the verge of death.
God hears Elijah’s prayer and the child is revived and brought back to his mother. It is then that the widow offers her confession of faith not directly to God, but about Elijah’s identity as a prophet. With the context of the entire chapter, her confession of faith is an affirmation not only to her son’s revival and the unfailing supply of meal and oil, but also to Elijah’s announcement of the drought to Ahab.
What makes Elijah’s encounter with the widow and her son significant for me is not that she becomes the source for confirming Elijah’s vocation and power as a prophet but that he had the courage and compassion to give voice to her plight. The widow, the orphan, the stranger were among the voiceless in Elijah’s day and in many, many ways that is true for us today. They were the poorest of the poor and they remain so today.
When Elijah declared that a drought was about to fall over the nation he did so as a proclamation against the nation’s idolatry and injustice. Elijah was courageous in standing before Ahab to declare that the nation would be stricken by a drought. He was equally courageous in standing before God to plead for the revival of the widow’s son.
Elijah knew well the plight of widows and orphans and strangers. He knew well of the injustices that caused women and children and strangers to remain poor and powerless.
For us today there are laws protecting those who are vulnerable and yet it would seem we grow weary of our care for the least of our brothers and sisters among us. (Matthew 25:31-46) As a nation and sometimes as individuals we seem more interested in “doing charity” and enabling justice for all.
Eventually, our “doing charity” leads to “compassion fatigue.” But “enabling justice” requires “courageous compassion.” That was Elijah’s calling as a prophet; that is our calling as disciples of Jesus Christ. Like Elijah we must have the courage and compassion to seek what is just for all and like Elijah we may find the journey difficult.
Jan Sutch Pickard writes in This Is the Day (Wild Goose Publications, Glasgow, Scotland, 2002) about the encounter between Elijah and the widow:
Here is a man
on a journey – needing somewhere to lay his head,
thirsty, hungry.
Here is a woman
on her home ground –
picking up sticks
wary of strangers.
Both of them are living in a dry land
where a little water, a handful of meal
need to go a long way.
One has a household to feed,
the other only himself to keep
going
through the wilderness,
until God lets him know why.
He is traveling in faith,
she has given up hope.
A coping woman
she has now come to the end
of her resources –
just this last ration of meal,
just this trickle of oil –
not much more water,
sticks for the last fire –
just these embers of courage –
she is burnt out.
He is not sure why he is here,
Except that God pointed him this way –
to take food out of the mouths
of this hungry family?
To walk away? Or to watch him die?
What can he do that will change anything?
But she offers him welcome
and he offers encouragement –
and they go on from there . . .
As we gather to share the bread and the cup this day, we are mindful of God’s abundance. Here at this table, there is food and drink enough for all. Here there is welcome. Here there is encouragement.
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