Read the Homily

The Greatest Message from God: I Will Send Some Help.

Elijah is the prophet God brought to heaven without the pain of death. Before that happened, Elijah was in the desert, asking God to take his life. Why would he want to die? Because Jezebel, the queen, was very mad at him and had sent an army to kill him. So Elijah hid himself in the desert. An angel of God came to him and gave him food and water, and told him to go to Mount Horeb. Mount Horeb is in the middle of the worst desert on the planet. It takes 40 days to get there on foot. That is like walking to St. Louis from Boston with no mini marts, coffee shops, or pizza joints along the way. Why does God want to meet so far away? Because He had a very important message to give Elijah. If you walk for forty days to hear a message, you will be all ears. You really want to hear the message. You will not say, “I am sorry, I was a bit distracted. Can you repeat that again.” No, you will be very attentive. So God met Elijah, and here is the message: “I will send you some help.” That is it? The message does not seem to be very important, but it is. Allow me to explain.

 Copper flashing recently blew off the church roof, and rain was coming into the building. I needed to fix it. I didn’t want to use a ladder because it was too dangerous. So, I decided to go with scaffolding. I called a company, and they told me I could not rent without a contractor’s license. So I asked if they would deliver and set it up. They said it would cost a lot of money, and they had availability issues. So there I am with all of these problems. I had water coming into the building, no scaffolding, a looming bill, and I was afraid of heights. So what did I do? I called my brother. He said he would come and help. We had the job done in three hours. It was fast and enjoyable working with my brother once again.

So when God told Elijah He would send him some help, it meant that all his problems would disappear.

Let me finish telling you the story. So, God sent a chariot to bring Elijah to heaven. Naturally, people complained. “How come Elijah gets to go to heaven in a chariot without dying. What about Moses and Abraham. Why did they have to die?” The prophet Malachi answered their question. He said that Elijah had to come back to finish the job. Luckily, the Bible describes Elijah’s appearance. It says he was a hairy man with a leather belt around his waist, last seen near the Jordan River. So when John the Baptist was described as a hairy man with a leather belt around his waist hanging around the Jordan River, everyone went out to see him. God sent Elijah back to finish the job. But he would now have help.

Remember what God had told Elijah in that meeting, “I will send you some help.” So Elijah returns as John the Baptist with some help–Jesus, the Lord, who takes away all the problems of sin and death.  

The lesson here is this. We all have problems. God does tell us that he would take away the problems. He told us that he would send us some help. Take it, and all your problems will go away.

Back to All Homilies