Text: 2 Kings 4:38-44
Several years ago Dana thought it would be fun if few
of the family and friends ran a 5k race together. So, she got a group to commit to a St.
Patrick's Day race race in Burlington. It
was cold and snowy and everybody was running in green leprechaun hats. Needless to say, we were of various levels of
fitness and natural talent when it came to running. Our team was Dana and her friend Janine. This would be Dana's first race and so she trained
a bit for it. Janine had raced a time or
two, but was not in shape for this event.
For the men, there was Dana's brother Mark who is shortish and carries a
lot of muscle and body hair; not exactly the runners build unless there are
hobbits who run. He trained a bit for
this event. There was me. I ran regularly in those days and was not the
portly charmer I am today. I was in the
best shape of us all. If it were about
winning I could have smoked Clan Clarkson easily, mercilessly. But, then there was also Dana's
brother-in-law Scott, he's a bit of a beanpole.
Though His dad ran marathons, Scott didn't care much for running. To train for this event he ran only one time
and that was only around the block.
So race day came, we decided that we would all run
together. When it comes to running
events these days for most people it's more about participating in the event
than it is the winning or personal bests or so I thought. The race started and we were doing well. As a group you're only as fast as your
slowest runner and we were passing people.
Then just passed the 3k point Scott, the once-around-the-blocker decides
he's had enough. Instead of packing it
in and walking, he takes off. I'm
looking at Mark and Mark's looking at me.
We're figuring that we'd reel him in along the way. A minute or two goes by and no Scott dogged
out in the ditch. So, I decide to leave
Mark and go after him. Like I said, I
was in pretty good shape, but I never even caught sight of Scott. True to my word, when I got to the finish
line I didn't cross. I turned and went
back for the rest of the group which had begun to stagger. So, I got Dana and finished with her. Needless to say, we were all pretty
gobsmacked by Scott's race.
I'm fairly convinced that when it comes to running,
you get out of it what you put into it.
If you train hard for a race, you will most likely do well. If you train just enough, you will do
mediocre. If you don't train at all,
don't expect to finish and if you do, expect considerable pain for the next
week or so from all the damage you've done to yourself. This is especially true the longer the
race. If you do not train, you won't
perform well and you will hurt yourself.
Though Scott appeared to have proven me wrong that day, all he had done
was exchange genetic giftedness for training and truth be told he hurt for the
next two weeks.
You get out of it what you put into to it. I know that works as a basic principle for
running, yet does it work for life in general?
Do we automatically get out of life what we put into it? We'd like to think that’s the way life
is. We want to believe that hard work,
honesty, generosity, compassion, and being an over-all positive and upbeat
camper pays off. Yet, the wicked prosper
is a familiar lament. Tragedy strikes. Left field does exist and things do come flying out of it. It is good to be honest, to work hard, and to
finish the day with a good conscience knowing that you've played fair, but
there's no guarantee that life will be full and fulfilling and that you we will get out of it according to what we put in to it.
And that
brings us to an obscure moment in the life of an obscure Hebrew prophet named
Elisha and a glimpse of the Kingdom of God blossoming within this world showing
the blessed way. A man from an obscure place
called Baal-Shalishah (Lord of Three) in the high levels of central
Israel brings his offering of
firstfruits to Gilgal where Elisha the prophet was located. In Elisha’s day Gigal was the religious
center for the Northern Kingdom of Israel just as Jerusalem was in Judah. That this man was bringing the offering of
the firstfruits signifies that he was a
faithful Jew in a land of idol worshippers.
The Law of Moses stated that every Jew should bring the first ten
percent of his harvest to the temple to give thanks and for the support of the
priests and their families. This man
realizing that the priests in Gilgal were corrupt, they claimed to be priests
of the Lord yet served many gods, took his offering to Elisha, the true prophet
of the Lord. Elisha didn’t hoard the
offering to himself. He orders it to be
given to the school of prophets, the band of men who followed him. There were one hundred of them. Elisha’s servant was quick to point out that
this little bit was not going to far.
Elisha sternly commands him again adding “thus says the LORD,
'They shall eat and have some left.’” So, he did and as the Lord said they had some
left. Twenty loaves of barley bread and
a sack of fresh grain ears more than satisfied one hundred men. They had some left.
I guess at this point I could give examples of how a
$100 gift to Presbyterian World Services and Development can do the same for
victims of disaster and oppression throughout the world. Yet, things like that are not really
miracles. What would really be a miracle
would be fixing global economics to be faitr and just for all people. There are still villages throughout the world
where people don’t even have a well and have to walk miles daily to get their
water while we kick back and theo-philosophically concider the truth of the
maxim that you get out of life what you put into it. That’s the sort of maxim wealth leaves us
pondering. If we take wealth out of the
equation, that maxim disappears because it really deals with trying to blame
the poor for being poor. It’s very easy
to tell someone that the reason they don’t have what they should is that they
don’t work hard enough and their attitude is atrocious. The maxim particularly falls apart in economies based on agriculture. It doesn’t matter how
hard you work or what your attitude is, the ground will only yield what the
ground is going to yield.
Elisha and the man from Baal-Shalishah show us a
different way. Life in God’s Kingdom is
not about me getting what I think I deserve out of life. It is about gratitude, generosity, and
others rather than ourselves having something left over. The man from Baal-Shalishah came at the end
of his harvest in what was a time of famine.
His work for the year completed for the year completed. His boat had come in for the year so to speak
and it wasn’t much. What if ten percent
of your annual income was twenty barley loaves and a sack of grain ears? It was as much back then as it is today. That might last a person a little over a
week. Yet, in gratitude to the Lord who
had provided he generously brought his measly offering as a gift to support
Elijah and the prophets and at the end of the day he went home having seen the
impossible come about at the word of the Lord.
At the end of the day he knew the Lord is faithful in the midst of
famine. Sometimes it is better to know
without a doubt that the Lord is faithful, tangibly faithful in the midst of
famine rather than to know you’ve got food for the next seven days. Ponder that.
Amen.
