| Resurrection is Now! |
|
|
|
| Written by Bill Weisenbach | |
| Saturday, 08 March 2008 | |
|
Resurrection is Now Text John 11:1-45 We're deep in Lent, the season of the cross, moving steadily, somberly, week by week, toward the inevitable death of Jesus. We know how the story ends. Which makes it a bit surprising that here, on the fifth Sunday in Lent, the church should place this story, the raising of Lazarus. Shouldn’t we wait until after Easter for this one, sometime after the resurrection? Not here in Lent, the season of death? Why would John put the Lazarus story right before Palm Sunday? It's the wrong time, the wrong place for an Easter sort of story. What’s John trying to teach us? Never-the-less, John goes out of his way to show what good friends Jesus and Lazarus were. When Jesus saw the tomb where Lazarus was buried, he wept (11:36), and the bystanders know what Jesus' tears mean, they comment, "See how he loved him!" (11:38). But the beginning of the story finds Jesus out somewhere teaching. Mary and Martha send him the bad news: "Lord, he whom you love is ill" (v.3). Jesus downplays the news. He says, "This illness dose not lead to death; rather it is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it" (v.4). Now, we don't know if that made Lazarus feel better to know that his sickness was going to provide a sermon illustration for Jesus, but I doubt it. We do know that, upon receiving the news of Lazarus' illness, Jesus stays where he was for two more days. He doesn't rush to Lazarus' bedside, no matter how close a friend he was. Don't you find that odd? Well, after some confusion, off they go. But not before his disciples remind Jesus that, if they go back to Judea, Lazarus might not be the only corpse. "Rabbi,” they ask, “the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?" (v.8). And Jesus replies, “Those who walk at night stumble” (v.10), whatever that means. Death and darkness be damned - off they go. When Jesus finally gets to Bethany, Martha runs out to meet him and lets him have it. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died” (V. 21). So he reassures her, "Your brother will rise again" (v.23). "I know all that. I know he'll be raised on the last day." (She's just repeating the phrase from the creed, something she had to memorize in confirmation class.) There will be, someday, a resurrec¬tion of the dead. But that doesn't give Martha much help right now. She wants her brother alive today, not someday. Jesus says to her, "No Martha! Your brother will rise now, because I am the resurrection and the life, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die." Then Jesus puts it to her, “Do you believe this?” He is challenging Martha to put her trust (faith) in him rather than in a bunch of theological propositions somebody else has told her. Martha comes through, “Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world" (v.27). Up till then Martha believed, like most of us, that resurrection is some time in the future, in the sweet by-and-by. But that day, in the middle of grief, Jesus got Martha to the stunning recognition that resurrec¬tion is now, present, in the flesh, in front of her. And it's not just some wild theological idea concocted by the Gospel of John. Jesus raised a widow's son in Luke 7. (:11-17). He raised Jairus' daughter in Luke 8. (:41-56). Now we have Lazarus. Of course I know that these are not really "resurrections" in the sense of what happened to Jesus. After Lazarus was brought back to life from his death, Lazarus still eventually died. But it’s important to hear this as an Easter story, as a stunning testimonial to the life-giving power of Jesus. Lazarus rises because Jesus has that effect on the dead. Jesus is the in-the-flesh presence of a kingdom in which everybody rises. No matter whether they meet him in Lent or in Easter, whenever Jesus gets to the cemetery, the dead rise. Having missed all this, Mary comes out and says bitterly, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died" (v.32). Jesus doesn't reply. He is just as upset about Lazarus' death as Mary. Being Jesus doesn't keep him from being angry about death and he lets Mary vent her anger because he understands, he shares her anger. Jesus hates death as much as anybody. But Jesus moves on because he isn't here to wring his hands or blame, or deny, or resign¬edly accept it. He goes out to the cemetery and orders that the stone at the door of the tomb be rolled away. Ever practical Martha reminds Jesus that Lazarus has been in there for a good four days now and, in the words of elegant King James English, "he stinketh." Jesus simply reminds Martha of what he had said, lifts his eyes, thanks God, then in a voice loud enough to wake the dead says, "Lazarus, come out."' (v.43). "The dead man comes out, more likely hops out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth." Jesus says, "Unbind him and let him go" (v.44). So much for dead Lazarus. But true to human natures impulse to never let a good deed go unpunished, it was, for Jesus, the beginning of the end. After he raised Lazarus, the powers that be, the authorities, the death dealers get their act together, and, says John, "...from that 'day on they planned to put him to death" (v.53). Too much resurrection going on, too much Easter set loose. It is all downhill now, down toward darkness, toward Palm Sunday, on to the cross which is also where we're headed in that like Lazarus, none of us will make it out of this world alive. But in the meantime, on the way to the cross, to his death, deep in Lent, I want you to ponder what Jesus told Martha: Resurrection is not something you wait for until Easter, not some forthcoming day in a still undetermined future. Resur¬rection is now. It is a present reality, more than just a coming one. Anytime Jesus arrives, the dead are set loose. The resurrection of the dead is not confined to Easter; it is here, at all times and places, not just an isolated event in the distant past or the distant future. What God did to Jesus on Easter was what God is busy doing all the time - bringing the dead back to life. The same God who brought creation out of nothing, brings life out of death. Now, death is death. Lazarus wasn't "asleep." He was dead as dead could be. When we say "resurrec¬tion," we Christians aren't talking about some Eastern notion about "the immortality of the soul," some eternal flame within a person that just goes on and on forever. When you're dead, you're dead. But it's the dead whom Jesus loves to raise. He is most glorious, most alive where things are most deadly. So, they can call out the National Guard, they can throw you in prison and lose the key, they can sew you back up and tell you that "they’ve done all that medical science can do;” they can send in their tanks and seal the borders; they can throw you in a grave and cover you with the dirt of race, color, gender, or class; they can tell you that the game's over, the jig is up, you can't fight city hall. But let me tell you, God longs to prove them wrong. The powers of death that trap us in defeat are little more than a good excuse for Jesus to show off God’s glory. Hallelujah, Amen. |
| < Previous | Next > |
|---|
