The Fifth Sunday in Lent – March 29, 2020
The story of the raising of Lazarus is the final one of the Lenten gospels that opens the minds of the baptismal candidates to the meaning of baptism (and it reminds us of the resurrection life we have already received by water and the Holy Spirit). We hear in this story the growing awareness of the disciples of Jesus as the Christ and as the source of resurrection and life.
The Old Testament reading looks forward to resurrection as the final conclusion of God’s plan of salvation. In the prophet’s vision of the valley of dry bones, note that it is God’s Word who raises them up, and God’s Spirit who gives them flesh and life. So it is with us who are baptized. Christ, the Word of God, and God’s Spirit have given us a share in the resurrection life of God’s Kingdom.
The second reading contrasts those who live in the flesh, that is, the unredeemed world, with those who live in the Spirit of Christ. All baptized persons live in that Spirit and, says Paul, God gives life to our mortal bodies through the Spirit.
The resurrection of Christ becomes our resurrection as we engage in the Eucharistic feast and meet the one who is the Resurrection and the Life.
From The Rite Light: Reflections on the Sunday Readings and Seasons of the Church Year. Copyright © 2007 by Michael W. Merriman. Church Publishing Incorporated, New York.
The First Reading Ezekiel 37:1-14
Reader A reading from the book of Ezekiel.
The Lord’s power overcame me, and while I was in the Lord’s spirit, he led me out and set me down in the middle of a certain valley. It was full of bones. He led me through them all around, and I saw that there were a great many of them on the valley floor, and they were very dry.
He asked me, “Human one, can these bones live again?”
I said, “Lord God, only you know.”
He said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, Dry bones, hear the Lord’s word! The Lord God proclaims to these bones: I am about to put breath in you, and you will live again. I will put sinews on you, place flesh on you, and cover you with skin. When I put breath in you, and you come to life, you will know that I am the Lord.”
I prophesied just as I was commanded. There was a great noise as I was prophesying, then a great quaking, and the bones came together, bone by bone. When I looked, suddenly there were sinews on them. The flesh appeared, and then they were covered over with skin. But there was still no breath in them.
He said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, human one! Say to the breath, The Lord God proclaims: Come from the four winds, breath! Breathe into these dead bodies and let them live.”
I prophesied just as he commanded me. When the breath entered them, they came to life and stood on their feet, an extraordinarily large company.
He said to me, “Human one, these bones are the entire house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope has perished. We are completely finished.’ So now, prophesy and say to them, The Lord God proclaims: I’m opening your graves! I will raise you up from your graves, my people, and I will bring you to Israel’s fertile land. You will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and raise you up from your graves, my people. I will put my breath in you, and you will live. I will plant you on your fertile land, and you will know that I am the Lord. I’ve spoken, and I will do it. This is what the Lord says.”
Reader Hear what the Spirit is saying to God’s people.
All Thanks be to God.
All Psalm 130
1 Out of the depths have I called to you:
O God, hear my voice; *
let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication.
2 If you were to note what is done amiss, *
O God, who could stand?
3 For there is forgiveness with you; *
therefore you shall be feared.
4 I wait for you, O God; my soul waits for you; *
in your word is my hope.
5 My soul waits for you,
more than sentries for the morning, *
more than sentries for the morning.
6 O Israel, wait upon God, *
for with God there is mercy;
7 With God there is plenteous redemption; *
God shall redeem Israel from all their sins.
The Second Reading Romans 8:6-11
Reader A Reading from the letter of Paul to the Romans.
The attitude that comes from selfishness leads to death, but the attitude that comes from the Spirit leads to life and peace. So the attitude that comes from selfishness is hostile to God. It doesn’t submit to God’s Law, because it can’t. People who are self-centered aren’t able to please God.
But you aren’t self-centered. Instead you are in the Spirit, if in fact God’s Spirit lives in you. If anyone doesn’t have the Spirit of Christ, they don’t belong to him. If Christ is in you, the Spirit is your life because of God’s righteousness, but the body is dead because of sin. If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your human bodies also, through his Spirit that lives in you.
Reader Hear what the Spirit is saying to God’s people.
All Thanks be to God
The Holy Gospel John 11:1-45
Deacon The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to John.
All Glory be to thee, O Lord.
A certain man, Lazarus, was ill. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. (This was the Mary who anointed the Lord with fragrant oil and wiped his feet with her hair. Her brother Lazarus was ill.) So the sisters sent word to Jesus, saying, “Lord, the one whom you love is ill.”
When he heard this, Jesus said, “This illness isn’t fatal. It’s for the glory of God so that God’s Son can be glorified through it.” Jesus loved Martha, her sister, and Lazarus. When he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed where he was. After two days, he said to his disciples, “Let’s return to Judea again.”
The disciples replied, “Rabbi, the Jewish opposition wants to stone you, but you want to go back?”
Jesus answered, “Aren’t there twelve hours in the day? Whoever walks in the day doesn’t stumble because they see the light of the world. But whoever walks in the night does stumble because the light isn’t in them.”
He continued, “Our friend Lazarus is sleeping, but I am going in order to wake him up.”
The disciples said, “Lord, if he’s sleeping, he will get well.” They thought Jesus meant that Lazarus was in a deep sleep, but Jesus had spoken about Lazarus’ death.
Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died. For your sakes, I’m glad I wasn’t there so that you can believe. Let’s go to him.”
Then Thomas (the one called Didymus) said to the other disciples, “Let us go too so that we may die with Jesus.”
When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Bethany was a little less than two miles from Jerusalem. Many Jews had come to comfort Martha and Mary after their brother’s death. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him, while Mary remained in the house. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. Even now I know that whatever you ask God, God will give you.”
Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.”
Martha replied, “I know that he will rise in the resurrection on the last day.”
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
She replied, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, God’s Son, the one who is coming into the world.”
After she said this, she went and spoke privately to her sister Mary, “The teacher is here and he’s calling for you.” When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to Jesus. He hadn’t entered the village but was still in the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were comforting Mary in the house saw her get up quickly and leave, they followed her. They assumed she was going to mourn at the tomb.
When Mary arrived where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.”
When Jesus saw her crying and the Jews who had come with her crying also, he was deeply disturbed and troubled. He asked, “Where have you laid him?”
They replied, “Lord, come and see.”
Jesus began to cry. The Jews said, “See how much he loved him!” But some of them said, “He healed the eyes of the man born blind. Couldn’t he have kept Lazarus from dying?”
Jesus was deeply disturbed again when he came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone covered the entrance. Jesus said, “Remove the stone.”
Martha, the sister of the dead man, said, “Lord, the smell will be awful! He’s been dead four days.”
Jesus replied, “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you will see God’s glory?” So they removed the stone. Jesus looked up and said, “Father, thank you for hearing me. I know you always hear me. I say this for the benefit of the crowd standing here so that they will believe that you sent me.” Having said this, Jesus shouted with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his feet bound and his hands tied, and his face covered with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go.”
Therefore, many of the Jews who came with Mary and saw what Jesus did believed in him.
Deacon The Gospel of the Lord.
All Praise be to thee, O Christ.
Sermon – The Rev. Dr. Keith Hearnsberger Lent V, Year A, 3/29/2020, John 11: 1-45,
Video link Here.
In the name of our loving and life giving God, +Father, Son, and Holy Spirit+, Amen.
In The Midst of the Unknown
It is a very strange story, one of the strangest stories in John’s Gospel – this story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. What is this story really about? What does it mean for us today, beginning the 5th week of Lent in times of great uncertainty; living in the midst of the global pandemic that COVID-19 has become. What does it mean when we are going through uncertainty in a way many of us have never gone through: the unknown. An urgent message is sent to Jesus, “Lazarus, whom you love, is ill.” Two desperate, frightened sisters – Mary and Martha – send the message to Jesus, expecting that Jesus will rush back to Bethany to heal his sick friend.
As usual, Jesus thwarts expectation. Jesus does not rush to the bedside of Lazarus in Bethany. In fact, the gospel recounts that Jesus lingered where he was for a couple more days. He stayed there for a few days? What was he doing? John doesn’t say. John doesn’t say that he was in the middle of preaching a revival and couldn’t leave. John doesn’t say that he was healing dozens of sick people who were sicker than Lazarus. John just says that Jesus stayed where he was for a couple of days.
Of course, by the time that Jesus makes his way to Bethany it’s all over. Martha comes out to tell Jesus the news. No rush now. Lazarus is dead. The question is stuck in my mind – why did Jesus stay where he was for a few more days before rousing himself and going to Bethany at the request of Mary and Martha?
When Jesus received the urgent plea of the sisters, Jesus said to the disciples, “This illness does not lead to death; rather, it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of Man may be glorified through it.” Though the sisters suggest that their brother is near death, Jesus refuses to stop everything, to drop everything, and run to the bedside of Lazarus just because of a little thing like death. How often have we waited – and waited for the signs of tangible grace that would sustain our lives? How often have we, like the Psalmist today, cried from the depths for mercy? Like Mary and Martha, we have made our requests and supplications, but we did, have, or will not see the tangible grace that is needed and we’ve all asked “Why are you waiting Lord?”
This story occurs when Jesus is on his final trip to Jerusalem. That is, he is on his way to his death. In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ death is spoken of as his “hour of glory.” In Jesus’ strange, upside-down way of looking at things, death and glory are linked. Jesus refuses to be jerked around by death, by sickness, by those matters that so totally consume us. He does not drop what he is doing and rush right over to Bethany, just on the basis of a little thing like a mortal illness.
Jesus goes out to the cemetery and stands before the tomb and says, “Lazarus, come out!” And Lazarus, bound up in the grave clothes, comes out. And then Jesus heads on up to Jerusalem where he shall die on the cross and be wrapped in grave clothes himself. So in saying, “Lazarus, come out,” Jesus is also saying, “Lazarus, come with me.” He is inviting Lazarus to come with him down that path that leads to the cross.
Methodist Bishop Will Willimon interprets Jesus’ actions with this powerful statement: “Come with me, lay your life into the hands of the living and loving God, let God give you the life that you cannot earn for yourself. In walking the way of the cross that I walk, you shall have eternal life, and that life abundantly.”
Sickness is a great challenge in life. Our world now is basically in a temporary existence because of sickness and the urgent need to avoid sickness. As of Friday, March 27, 2020 at 10 am, our nation has 81,321 people KNOWN infected with the novel coronavirus and more than 1,000 people in the US have died from COVID-19 related causes. This figure, according to medical professionals will do nothing but continue to grow until the ‘apex’ is reached in 4-7 weeks. These numbers will increase, and more sickness and death are on the horizon. Maybe not for us individually, but for our fellow members of creation, this is a scientific certainty. Death is one of the most important challenges that each of us must face. But perhaps, by lingering where he was for a few days and not rushing right over to the bedside of his friend Lazarus in Bethany, Jesus was trying to teach us that there are some things that are much more important in the reign of God than sickness, our dying. Namely, what’s more important is the ministry, the service, whatever Jesus was doing that kept him from rushing over to Bethany to the bedside of Lazarus.
In my own life, I have endured times of the ‘unknown’ and the fear surrounding the unknown. As I experienced what it means to desperately cry out to God for strength, mercy, and peace; yet to not see these things immediately. As I dwelled in the depths, God came to me through signs of tangible grace. Many times, these signs were a letter, a call, a hug, or other sign of care and affection that many of the people of St. Michael’s and others in my life expressed to me in my time of unknown. These signs of tangible grace are what made my faith life experience a Lazarus experience. A new life, a new peace, and a new hope.
As Paul wrote to the Romans in our Epistle lesson today, to set your mind on the Spirit is life and peace, and I want to remind all of you that in these times, set your mind on the Spirit. Set your mind on helping a member of our parish, or another member of creation outside our walls. Call someone; let them know you’re thinking about them. Be the church with them. We clergy are learning exactly what it means, in ways we never imagined, to be the church outside a physical structure. By doing this, I believe that we are beginning to experience a Lazarus experience in these times of the unknown.
Disconnected or discouraged, we hear God say to us, My Spirit is within you and you shall live.” — God has put the spirit within us with the promise of a share of power –that you may know that God is able. In times of the ‘unkowingness’, let’s remember the old spiritual: Precious Lord, Take My Hand, Lead me on and let me stand… These words are reminding us of the tangible grace and power that our communal lives, no matter how evolving they are becoming, are what God’s is giving us for these times. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead, the same mighty power that will give us all signs of tangible grace in the weeks ahead, and as we look towards Holy Week and Easter, let us linger with this power and coming to terms with it, we can experience the Lazarus experience in these times of the unknown.
In the name of God+, AMEN
Resources:
Will Willimon’s Lectionary Sermon Resource © 2019 Abingdon Press
What did I hear? What got my attention?
What one word or phrase or image stands out to me?
Why did I hear what I heard?
What is going on in my life that might have focused my awareness?
How is God (Life, Truth, Wholeness, etc.) present in my awareness?
You may share your responses in the Comments section below.