'Social Distance?' (Luke 7:11-17)

Backstory: Jesus, was announced by John, anointed by God’s Spirit and confirmed to be the ‘Son of God’ by the voice from heaven. He was led into the desert where he fasted 40 days and overcame the temptations of Satan. He returned in the power of the Spirit and went around proclaiming the kingdom of God in the towns and villages. He gathered a new twelve around himself (common people, fishermen, a zealot and eve a tax-collector) and he went around teaching and exercising authority, over evil spirits, and over sin and death. There also developed a growing conflict between Jesus’ concept of God’s kingdom and with that of the Pharisees which escalated when he claimed to have authority on earth to forgive sins and by claiming to be the ‘Lord of the Sabbath’. In Luke 7, Jesus has re-entered Capernaum and he heals the ‘servant’ of a Roman centurion who he has recognized before those following him to be a shining example of ‘great faith’.                                                                                                              

Here in this story, we find two crowds. One crowd is following Jesus and another that is following a widow and her ‘young son’ who has just passed away. We don't find anyone in this story demonstrating faith. Jesus sees the woman and his heart went out to her. We then find Jesus stopping a funeral procession and telling this mother whose only son has died "not to cry". We also find Jesus touching a coffin and then of all things he speaks to a dead person and tells him to "get up!" Evidently, Jesus is so sure the ‘young man’ will actually do this that he wants the grieving woman not to cry. Jesus sees the woman and is moved by compassion. 

Nain City Gate

The large funeral procession would have been mourning with the woman over the loss of her son. They would be making plenty of noise to help this poor mother grieve and feel her pain. So as the mourning crowd moves through the city gate towards the grave site the funeral procession is suddenly stopped by another crowd. This crowd has been following Jesus all day as they have followed him from Capernaum. Moved by compassion, Jesus speaks directly to the woman and tells her "not to cry". But she is a widow who has now lost both her husband and now her only son!. Then Jesus surprises everyone by touching the coffin and stopping the procession. Touching a 'dead body' or even in 'a coffin' would normally make someone unclean (Numbers 19:11-21). Jesus would have known to keep his ‘social distance’ for appropriate cultural and religious reasons! So Jesus tells a grieving mother of a dead young man not to cry. He stops a funeral procession by touching a coffin and making himself unclean. What is even more strange is that Jesus speaks to a dead person and tell him to ‘get up’ (7:14-16). 

What is the most astonishing thing of all in this story is that ‘dead man’ evidently hears Jesus and ‘gets up’! Now the whole combined crowd erupts in astonishment and praise! Moreover, the people conclude that God has come to help his people. They say that God has come to rescue them for God has obviously sent a prophet who does 'miracles' that are like the miracles of the great old prophets, Elijah and Elisha. This story is clearly similar to the healings of Elijah and Elisha in 1 Kings 17 and 2 Kings 4. Like Elijah and Elisha, Jesus is moved with compassion and in this story, Jesus steps right into the sorrow, grieve, frustration, the bitterness and anger of this tragic scene and says and does what no one expected. In fact, none of what Jesus does is either expected or is ‘socially acceptable’. Jesus does something greater than Elijah and Elisha did, for Jesus merely speaks to this 'dead young man' and by the power of his word he is restored to life.  

Jesus breaks the traditions and he doesn't keep his appropriate 'social distance'. What Jesus does is to break into the 'grief and sorry' of these painful lives in this tragic world and he changes everything (2 Cor.5:17). Note that this boy is 'restored back to life' and we should refer to this as a 'resuscitation'. He isn't restored to a 'resurrected body' as Jesus clearly is at the end of Luke's gospel (Luke 24). This 'young man' is restored to life and to his mother, but he would go on to eventually taste death again. But what the story depicts that Jesus is ushering in God's restorative reign and that Jesus is beginning to make all things new (Rev.21:5). This story of the widow’s son, like the previous story of the centurion’s servant (Luke 7), demonstrates that the redemptive love of God is at work through Jesus in unexpected ways. These stories should move us to ask just who does Jesus think he is and then to ask ourselves if we believe him?