The Life vs. Death

Hello everyone.

I'm continuing my exegesis of Luke 7 today, looking at verses 11-17, the story Jesus raising the widow's son from the dead. According to verse 11, Jesus left Capernaum and went to a nearby town called Nain.  As he was entering the town, Jesus met a funeral procession of a young man who had died.  This young man was the only son of a widow.  

This widow was now left with nothing.  Her husband was dead. Her only son was dead.  Who was going to care for her?  Jesus, as always, is full of compassion, raised the young man from the dead and gave him back to his mother.  The Greek word used here to describe Jesus compasion is Ἐσπλαγχνίσθη (Esplangknisthay). I have translated as ‘felt compassion.' The TNIV translates it as 'his heart went out to her.'  The word involves the feelings that come from deep within us. In his compassion, Jesus reaches out to her and says, “Don’t cry.”  He first gives her comfort verbally, but then he takes action, raising her son from the dead.  Obviously, Jesus has a power that the rest of us do not possess, the ability to bring life back into a dead body.  But, what we see in Jesus is that comfort comes in both words and in actions. 

Jesus had exercised authority over many things in Luke, to this point, including fish, different illnesses and infirmities and evil spirits. Now, he, the Son of Man, shows that he has authority even over death. That is a lot of authority. In John 14:6, Jesus says “I am the way and the truth and the life.”  In this story, The Life faces off against death and The Life wins. 

The witnesses to this miracle were seized with fear and began to praise God.  Both responses are understandable.  Jesus simply spoke this man back to life.  I would be afraid of him too.  And it should be obvious to all present that God was there. Who else could perform such incredible miracles? Healing blindness, disease and other infirmities is one thing.  Healing death is quite another.  So naturally, the news of this incredible miracle spread all over the region quickly. 

According to Darrell Bock, this is the first time that Luke refers to Jesus as Κύριος (Kyrios) or “Lord.” (Bock, 650-651). But after this, Luke uses the term often.  Luke has presented the all-encompassing authority of Jesus in many different ways, and now begins to refer to him as Lord. 

In verse 14, Jesus reached out and touched the funeral bier.  This action would make Jesus ceremonially unclean.  He did it anyway.  But Jesus, being the Son of Man, undid the uncleanness of the dead body, and brought cleanness to it.  Jesus addresses the dead body directly.  How ridiculous would Jesus appear, if he told a dead body to get up and it didn’t.  Jesus had no doubt that this man would be raised from the dead.  Jesus knew and understood that all-encompassing nature of power and authority that he carried.  

In verse 16, Jesus is rightly recognized by the witnesses, as a great prophet, along the lines of Elijah and Elisha, two OT prophets who had raised someone from the dead. (Elijah in 1 Kings 17 and Elisha 2 Kings 4).  As we have through our study of Luke Jesus is certainly a prophet, but so much than that as well. 

Tom