Sermon preached 20 September 2026
Reading: Luke 7:11–17
Old Testament: 1 Kings 17:17–24 · Psalm 150 · Epistle: Ephesians 3:13–21
Tr Pastor Lawrence McCatty
In an article on the website of a Christian support group for parents who have lost a child, (called “Grieving Parents Sharing Hope”), it says: “When our child dies, life is forever divided into a “before” and an “after.” That kind of loss is something no parent ever expects or prepares for.”
And in our Gospel text for today we hear of a widow who loses her only son and with it her hope.
The centurion’s servant in Capernaum
In the verses immediately before our Gospel text for today, verses 1-10, we hear how Jesus had miraculously healed a Roman centurion’s servant in Capernaum without even being in the sick servant’s presence. The centurion had sent messengers to Jesus with the message “say the word, and let my servant be healed.”
In verses 9-10, Jesus commended the centurion’s faith by telling the crowd who were following Him “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.”
Jesus approaches the town called Beauty
And now, “soon afterward” as Luke tells us in today’s text, we hear that Jesus, His disciples and a great crowd, are approaching a town called Nain about 25 miles south of Capernaum. The Hebrew word Nain means “beauty”, because from this little town on a hill were beautiful views of the surrounding plains and of Mount Hermon in the distance.
The funeral procession
But there was nothing beautiful about the scene that greeted Jesus as they arrived at the town’s gate. A sad funeral procession carrying the coffin of a dead man to the cemetery for burial met them. This funeral is especially sad because the dead man was an only son, and his mother was already a widow. Both her husband and now her son have been taken away by death.
See and hear the contrast between the procession which is leaving the city, with sad, mournful steps accompanied by the sound of weeping and mourning, and the crowd that is about to enter the town, joyful and hopeful because of the Messiah who is among them.
Many in the town are moved to join her in mourning the death of her son and her lonely and hopeless situation.
God’s care and compassion
And God is especially tender-hearted to the plight of widows and orphans, as David sings in Psalm 68:5:
5 Father of the fatherless and protector of widows
is God in his holy habitation.
And so, Our Lord’s heart is moved by what He sees in Nain:
13 And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.”
Up to this moment she sees no reason to believe that God loves her and cares for her. She is entirely without hope. She is overwhelmed by pain and anguish, so that she thinks God, heaven, earth and all things are against her. She has lost her husband and now her last hope, her son, and that it is impossible for her to be delivered from her great disaster.
He does the impossible
But Jesus saw her, He had compassion on her.
Peter walked beside Jesus that day. Later he wrote in his first letter:
“Cast all your anxieties on [God] because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:7)
All your anxieties. Not just the easy ones. Not just the small ones. All of them. Even the impossible ones.
And Jesus shows us on that day in Nain, that He does the impossible. He touches the coffin, and those carrying it suddenly stood still.
14 Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” 15 And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.
Two crowds met that day: The crowd of death and the crowd of life. One carried a corpse. The other travelled with the one described as “The way, the truth and the life.” When the crowds met, life won, for even death obeys Jesus.
And this woman, who must have thought that God and everything were against her, now has her son restored to her. As Jesus lovingly takes him in his arms and carries him to his mother, she must have believed that everything and everyone was full of joy and happy with her and on her behalf. I’m sure the mothers amongst us can especially appreciate how she must have felt.
Why do bad things happen to good people?
But the widow’s son is not the only dead person in this account. Her husband was already gone. We don’t know how long ago the husband died, whether weeks, years or a decade.
So why did Jesus resurrect the son but not the father? Why not both? Why did death strike this family at all if God loved them?
This is the question that many non-believers, ask again and again, through which they justify their unbelief, their distrust of God: “If God is a loving God, why does He allow bad things to happen to good people?”
Consider for a moment our Old Testament reading today. We hear that a widow’s son becomes ill and dies:
“And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!”
Hang on a minute! Isn’t this the same widow of Zarephath we heard about last week? The one who, during a 3-year famine, had no hope and had said to Elijah:
“I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die.”
But God blessed her through Elijah:
15 And she went and did as Elijah said. And she and he and her household ate for many days. 16 The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the LORD that he spoke by Elijah.
God had blessed and saved her, her son and Elijah from famine, but her son falls ill and she stops trusting in God and forgets what God has done for her.
Because of the abundance of God’s blessings in our lives, how easily we forget them and take them for granted! You only have to hear of someone losing their sight, or a baby being born blind, to realise what a blessing our sight is. Or a person losing a limb to understand the blessing of an arm, hand or leg.
So isn’t the question “why does God allow bad things to happen to people” round the wrong way?
And the question should be, why does God:
“make his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” As Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:45.
Death is the wages of sin, sickness and disease are the consequences of a fallen world and reminders that our physical bodies will soon die.
And when you look around and see this sinful, sad and fallen world, it’s a wonder that we aren’t sick all the time, that we aren’t all already dead.
Two truths that prove God’s love for us
God’s grace and love sustain us, and there are two unshakable truths that prove his love.
First, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians chapter 15:
“If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.”
Jesus died to pay for our failings and faults. He rose so that we might live. His resurrection is our comfort. His resurrection is our hope.
Listen to what Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4:
“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.”
For many of us, like the widow of Nain, the hardest days of our lives involve death. The death of someone close to us, a diagnosis of a terminal illness, the news of a young person with all their life ahead of them tragically killed.
But Jesus’ resurrection changes things. It changes how we see death. It is the help and comfort that comes from God.
The resurrection is the first truth that shows God’s love, His comfort for us.
The second truth that proves God’s love, is found in our adoption as children of God.
In baptism God forgave your sins, washed you clean, clothed you in His Son’s righteousness and gave you eternal salvation. He placed His Holy Spirit in your heart and made you His own.
He adopted you into His family. That’s why we pray “Our Father who art in Heaven.” That’s why we Christians call one another brother and sisters.
This too is our comfort. This too is our hope.
As Paul writes in his letter to the Galatians:
4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.(Galatians 4:4-5)
There will be struggles but comfort comes from God
I don’t know what became of that widow of Nain after her son was given back to her.
But I do know that her life would still be filled with struggle. There would have been more hard days for her and her son to come.
A few hours before Jesus died He knew He would have to submit to death and that hard times were coming for those who were following him. And so, on the day before Jesus was arrested, He ended his final teaching of His disciples with these words:
“I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have troubles, but take heart, I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
So be comforted He has overcome all, even death.
And on the Last Day, when Christ comes again, He will stop the great funeral procession which is sadly taking place all over the world, at His Word He will bring the dead back to life, and reunite all those whom death has separated. And:
4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.
What joy! What comfort!
Amen.