Biblical Text: 1 Kings 19:9-21

Our lectionary tends to skip texts with a bent to violence or martial images, like Elijah and the Prophets of Baal. It feeds us the sad sack Elijah in the aftermath. Now, there is a defendable reason for this, but you can’t really get to it by skipping. Because we all want the fire from heaven. And when the fire from heaven doesn’t come, or when Jesus rebukes you for asking for it as he did in the associated Gospel lesson for the day, we lament, we ask “why?”

The why’s largely remain God’s. He doesn’t really answer why. He redirects us to what. He will listen to the lament. He asks Elijah twice for his litany of lament. Why does it always work this way? And then God turns him to the What. Elijah, the question is not why God does something, the question is What is God doing. And in ask What we also get our invite to see it and participate. The Kingdom of God certainly comes without our prayers, but we pray that it comes to us also.

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