I'll Sing On
Scripture: John 11:1-45, Ezekiel 37:1-14
There is at least as much drama in today’s reading from the gospel of John as you will find in an episode of America’s next Top Model. Maybe not quite as many fabulous clothes, but at least as much drama.
The story starts like this: Lazarus, Jesus’ much-loved friend, is sick to the point of death. So Mary and Martha, who live in the suburbs of Jerusalem, send out a messenger to Jesus hiding out in the backwoods. “Jesus!” The message pleads, “Come quickly! Your dear friend is about to die!”
And then here’s the first twist: instead of jumping up and getting on the road right away, Jesus stays where he is for two whole days. What is he doing? What is going on here? It seems like a pretty straightforward decision—get moving as soon as you get the news. But there is this one problem: Jesus has recently had a run-in with the authorities in Jerusalem. And they want to kill him. And so the plot thickens—will he go to Bethany, practically under the noses of the people who are looking for him, to save his friend? Or will he stay in the hinterlands, away from the establishment’s watchful eye? One option could lead to his own death, the other will lead to his friend’s certain death.
Jesus opts for a grand entrance. He waits two days to make the day-long journey to Bethany, arriving on the fourth day after Lazarus’ death. This fourth day is significant because it’s the day that Lazarus’ death become most final. You see, in that time and place people believed that the spirit of the person hovered around the body for three days before leaving. So by the fourth day Lazarus was not just dead, he was really dead.
As he arrives, Jesus meets Martha first. Martha is the tough, stand-up, responsible sister. She is upset that her brother has died, but respects Jesus as her teacher and looks to him for meaning even now. In an understated way, she confronts Jesus, and he tests her belief—do you believe that the resurrection comes through me, Martha? And she answers: “I believe that you are the Messiah, the very Son of God.” In the midst of terrific grief, blinking through her tears, Martha stands strong in faith.
Mary is the more expressive sister. When she sees Jesus, all she can do is tell him about her pain: “If you had been here, Jesus, my brother would still be alive!” You can hear the tears of accusation and pain in her voice, saying “Why didn’t you come? How will I live without him?” And in response to her, Jesus starts weeping—deep sobs of grief. Her pain triggers his own. This isn’t some kind of trick to him. Lazarus isn’t a rabbit Jesus is planning to pull out of a hat. Mary, Martha and Lazarus are all people Jesus deeply loves, and the death pains him deeply.
But then it’s time to get down to business. Jesus makes a speech about how this sign is a miracle from God, and how he’s grateful for the chance to demonstrate God’s power. A very confident move, if you ask me. And then he tells the mourners to roll away the stone. Martha, a little too practical, points out that Lazarus’ dead body is going to smell pretty bad. Jesus ignores her, and shouts, “Lazarus, Come Out!”
If Jesus had just been a two-bit healer with some magic tricks up his sleeve, if Jesus had just been an interesting teacher who overreached his grasp, if Jesus had been some kind of a lunatic with a God-complex, nothing would have come out of the cave except the smell of a rotting corpse. The watching crowd holds its breath in suspense.
And then, a little awkwardly, Lazarus comes walking out of the grave. His hands and feet are still bound up but he’s alive. “Unbind him,” Jesus says, “and let him go.”
In many ways a story like this speaks for itself. Tonight I’d like to explore with you just three issues it raises: first the question of belief, second, experiencing resurrection, and third, eternal life.
In the past few months I have been wandering in and out of a few religion and spirituality message boards on the internet. These are places where complete strangers, almost inexplicably, are able to discuss their treasured beliefs and struggles very honestly. Some sites are better than others, of course, and there are always people more interested in provoking arguments than they are in having a real conversation, but this week I read a thread of conversation that gave me a lot to think about.
It started in the atheism section of the board. I’m curious, okay? I want to know what other people are thinking! The original post was written by a Christian who asked why the atheists were atheists, and what would convince them to believe in God. He got quite a few responses, some more thoughtful than others, and several people, when asked said that they would need a personal visit from God or something similar—and in their minds, impossible—before they would believe. Then someone else pointed out that even if they were to have something like that happen, they wouldn’t necessarily believe in God, because maybe what they experienced—what their senses told them—was wrong too. They would doubt their perceptions before believing in God.
And I think this problem is at the heart of what the gospel of John is trying to communicate about Jesus in our reading today. While the whole story is building up to Lazarus’ resurrection, what really gets the attention is Martha’s confession of faith in Jesus. Jesus delays for two days to make the resurrection more miraculous, and before he actually has Lazarus come out of the tomb, he makes a public prayer/slash/speech thanking God for the opportunity to demonstrate that he is the Son of God and to allow the people who witness this sign, this miracle to believe.
With this focus on belief, John is trying to tell people who Jesus really was, and what he really meant, to help them believe it too. But belief is a funny thing. A lot of my fellow internet posters like to wage long arguments with each other over who is right and who is wrong—to prove through logic or sheer force of rhetoric that Jesus is the person Martha believes him to be—the resurrection and the life, the way and the truth. But that’s not how belief works. Belief develops over time, not all at once, and doubt and uncertainty are valuable tools for developing a strong foundation of belief.
Learning to believe is like putting a puzzle together to see what fits. We try a piece, see if it fits with the others, see if it fits in with the whole, and then when it seems to work, leave the piece there and move on to the next one, knowing we may have to move it again later. Belief develops over time as what we experience and what we learn affects how we see the world.
This brings me to my second point and the first piece of good news in today’s story: Experiencing resurrection. There are two types of resurrection that creep into our earthly lives. One is what I might call an everyday resurrection: it’s an event that heals us, and breathes new life into us. An encounter with God’s presence that leaves us changed. A small movement of growth inspired by divine love and made possible through divine courage.
For example, I know I’m probably taking this a little too literally, but I love it that Jesus heals Lazarus by shouting “Come out, Lazarus!” How many of us have heard that call on our lives? A few weeks ago, after many years of not being out to my older brother, I finally came out, and it was a small moment of grace for me. I wrote him an e-mail that said, “my PARTNER Heather and I moved to Maryland, SHE has a great job she loves…” and so on. He wrote a simple reply catching me up on his family, with a blessing at the end. No words of condemnation, just a wish for my good guidance. I felt freed, like a final bit of cloth had been unwound from a sore and shaking hand.
There are moments in our lives that constitute larger and more dramatic resurrections. When we realize that the puzzle we’ve been putting together has different borders than we expected. When God reaches into the deadness of our hearts, whether the deadness comes from grief, old wounds, or our own hurtful mistakes, and transforms the whole thing into something beautiful and unexpected. When, like in the story of Lazarus, the death of a friend becomes an occasion for wide-eyed celebration. It might happen only once or twice in a lifetime, but when it does the world changes completely. These are the events that our baptism or its reaffirmation commemorates—our death in the water, and our rising to new life in Christ.
The dry bones in our story from Ezekiel receive the promise of a community-wide resurrection. I mentioned before that Lazarus in John’s story is not just dead, but really dead, right? Well, the people in Ezekiel’s vision are not just dead, not just really dead, but all that is left of them is an undifferentiated field of dead dry bones. But Ezekiel preaches to them, and they are built again from scratch. New muscles, new sinews, new skins, new hearts, new minds, new eyes. They are completely redone and made new, given new life at God’s word.
This, Ezekiel promises, is what will come true for the people of Israel who have been worn down to the bones by their occupation and exile at the hands of greater powers. New life, new strength and new hope given to them by God.
Finally, with all this talk of rising from the dead my second piece of good news is about eternal life. Because while our experiences of healing and resurrection make a difference in this life, the question remains, Will life continue in the face of death? Will what is real persist?
Lazarus’ resurrection is the final healing that Jesus does in the book of John before he goes to Jerusalem to die. And this is not a healing like any other—this healing demonstrates God’s power to give life through Jesus even when death appears to have the last word. The answer the story gives us to that question of eternal life is yes. Yes, God is stronger than death. Yes, eternal life is real and available to us. Yes, we will be free from death.
What can we do to accept this reality--to believe it--and to thank God for it and enjoy it? First, by paying attention to all the signs of God’s healing work in our lives. The resurrection of baptism, the moments that change our lives on a grand scale as well as on a small scale are each puzzle pieces in a larger picture of eternal life. We can find the larger meaning in the events of our lives.
Second, we can take from this message God’s promise to bring us new life in this lifetime. We may feel as if we are huddled in the grave on the third day, dead and alone, but God is able and willing to make our lives new again—whole and clean and pure. And so today’s story is not only one about death and resurrection, but also about our lives lived today.
During communion tonight, we’ll be singing the song What Wondrous Love is This. And I’d like to close by singing for you the last verse of the hymn:
And, when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing on
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing and joyful be,
and through eternity I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on,
And through eternity I’ll sing on.
The good news is this: today we are freed from death, and today is the day our singing begins. Thanks be to God, Amen.
There is at least as much drama in today’s reading from the gospel of John as you will find in an episode of America’s next Top Model. Maybe not quite as many fabulous clothes, but at least as much drama.
The story starts like this: Lazarus, Jesus’ much-loved friend, is sick to the point of death. So Mary and Martha, who live in the suburbs of Jerusalem, send out a messenger to Jesus hiding out in the backwoods. “Jesus!” The message pleads, “Come quickly! Your dear friend is about to die!”
And then here’s the first twist: instead of jumping up and getting on the road right away, Jesus stays where he is for two whole days. What is he doing? What is going on here? It seems like a pretty straightforward decision—get moving as soon as you get the news. But there is this one problem: Jesus has recently had a run-in with the authorities in Jerusalem. And they want to kill him. And so the plot thickens—will he go to Bethany, practically under the noses of the people who are looking for him, to save his friend? Or will he stay in the hinterlands, away from the establishment’s watchful eye? One option could lead to his own death, the other will lead to his friend’s certain death.
Jesus opts for a grand entrance. He waits two days to make the day-long journey to Bethany, arriving on the fourth day after Lazarus’ death. This fourth day is significant because it’s the day that Lazarus’ death become most final. You see, in that time and place people believed that the spirit of the person hovered around the body for three days before leaving. So by the fourth day Lazarus was not just dead, he was really dead.
As he arrives, Jesus meets Martha first. Martha is the tough, stand-up, responsible sister. She is upset that her brother has died, but respects Jesus as her teacher and looks to him for meaning even now. In an understated way, she confronts Jesus, and he tests her belief—do you believe that the resurrection comes through me, Martha? And she answers: “I believe that you are the Messiah, the very Son of God.” In the midst of terrific grief, blinking through her tears, Martha stands strong in faith.
Mary is the more expressive sister. When she sees Jesus, all she can do is tell him about her pain: “If you had been here, Jesus, my brother would still be alive!” You can hear the tears of accusation and pain in her voice, saying “Why didn’t you come? How will I live without him?” And in response to her, Jesus starts weeping—deep sobs of grief. Her pain triggers his own. This isn’t some kind of trick to him. Lazarus isn’t a rabbit Jesus is planning to pull out of a hat. Mary, Martha and Lazarus are all people Jesus deeply loves, and the death pains him deeply.
But then it’s time to get down to business. Jesus makes a speech about how this sign is a miracle from God, and how he’s grateful for the chance to demonstrate God’s power. A very confident move, if you ask me. And then he tells the mourners to roll away the stone. Martha, a little too practical, points out that Lazarus’ dead body is going to smell pretty bad. Jesus ignores her, and shouts, “Lazarus, Come Out!”
If Jesus had just been a two-bit healer with some magic tricks up his sleeve, if Jesus had just been an interesting teacher who overreached his grasp, if Jesus had been some kind of a lunatic with a God-complex, nothing would have come out of the cave except the smell of a rotting corpse. The watching crowd holds its breath in suspense.
And then, a little awkwardly, Lazarus comes walking out of the grave. His hands and feet are still bound up but he’s alive. “Unbind him,” Jesus says, “and let him go.”
In many ways a story like this speaks for itself. Tonight I’d like to explore with you just three issues it raises: first the question of belief, second, experiencing resurrection, and third, eternal life.
In the past few months I have been wandering in and out of a few religion and spirituality message boards on the internet. These are places where complete strangers, almost inexplicably, are able to discuss their treasured beliefs and struggles very honestly. Some sites are better than others, of course, and there are always people more interested in provoking arguments than they are in having a real conversation, but this week I read a thread of conversation that gave me a lot to think about.
It started in the atheism section of the board. I’m curious, okay? I want to know what other people are thinking! The original post was written by a Christian who asked why the atheists were atheists, and what would convince them to believe in God. He got quite a few responses, some more thoughtful than others, and several people, when asked said that they would need a personal visit from God or something similar—and in their minds, impossible—before they would believe. Then someone else pointed out that even if they were to have something like that happen, they wouldn’t necessarily believe in God, because maybe what they experienced—what their senses told them—was wrong too. They would doubt their perceptions before believing in God.
And I think this problem is at the heart of what the gospel of John is trying to communicate about Jesus in our reading today. While the whole story is building up to Lazarus’ resurrection, what really gets the attention is Martha’s confession of faith in Jesus. Jesus delays for two days to make the resurrection more miraculous, and before he actually has Lazarus come out of the tomb, he makes a public prayer/slash/speech thanking God for the opportunity to demonstrate that he is the Son of God and to allow the people who witness this sign, this miracle to believe.
With this focus on belief, John is trying to tell people who Jesus really was, and what he really meant, to help them believe it too. But belief is a funny thing. A lot of my fellow internet posters like to wage long arguments with each other over who is right and who is wrong—to prove through logic or sheer force of rhetoric that Jesus is the person Martha believes him to be—the resurrection and the life, the way and the truth. But that’s not how belief works. Belief develops over time, not all at once, and doubt and uncertainty are valuable tools for developing a strong foundation of belief.
Learning to believe is like putting a puzzle together to see what fits. We try a piece, see if it fits with the others, see if it fits in with the whole, and then when it seems to work, leave the piece there and move on to the next one, knowing we may have to move it again later. Belief develops over time as what we experience and what we learn affects how we see the world.
This brings me to my second point and the first piece of good news in today’s story: Experiencing resurrection. There are two types of resurrection that creep into our earthly lives. One is what I might call an everyday resurrection: it’s an event that heals us, and breathes new life into us. An encounter with God’s presence that leaves us changed. A small movement of growth inspired by divine love and made possible through divine courage.
For example, I know I’m probably taking this a little too literally, but I love it that Jesus heals Lazarus by shouting “Come out, Lazarus!” How many of us have heard that call on our lives? A few weeks ago, after many years of not being out to my older brother, I finally came out, and it was a small moment of grace for me. I wrote him an e-mail that said, “my PARTNER Heather and I moved to Maryland, SHE has a great job she loves…” and so on. He wrote a simple reply catching me up on his family, with a blessing at the end. No words of condemnation, just a wish for my good guidance. I felt freed, like a final bit of cloth had been unwound from a sore and shaking hand.
There are moments in our lives that constitute larger and more dramatic resurrections. When we realize that the puzzle we’ve been putting together has different borders than we expected. When God reaches into the deadness of our hearts, whether the deadness comes from grief, old wounds, or our own hurtful mistakes, and transforms the whole thing into something beautiful and unexpected. When, like in the story of Lazarus, the death of a friend becomes an occasion for wide-eyed celebration. It might happen only once or twice in a lifetime, but when it does the world changes completely. These are the events that our baptism or its reaffirmation commemorates—our death in the water, and our rising to new life in Christ.
The dry bones in our story from Ezekiel receive the promise of a community-wide resurrection. I mentioned before that Lazarus in John’s story is not just dead, but really dead, right? Well, the people in Ezekiel’s vision are not just dead, not just really dead, but all that is left of them is an undifferentiated field of dead dry bones. But Ezekiel preaches to them, and they are built again from scratch. New muscles, new sinews, new skins, new hearts, new minds, new eyes. They are completely redone and made new, given new life at God’s word.
This, Ezekiel promises, is what will come true for the people of Israel who have been worn down to the bones by their occupation and exile at the hands of greater powers. New life, new strength and new hope given to them by God.
Finally, with all this talk of rising from the dead my second piece of good news is about eternal life. Because while our experiences of healing and resurrection make a difference in this life, the question remains, Will life continue in the face of death? Will what is real persist?
Lazarus’ resurrection is the final healing that Jesus does in the book of John before he goes to Jerusalem to die. And this is not a healing like any other—this healing demonstrates God’s power to give life through Jesus even when death appears to have the last word. The answer the story gives us to that question of eternal life is yes. Yes, God is stronger than death. Yes, eternal life is real and available to us. Yes, we will be free from death.
What can we do to accept this reality--to believe it--and to thank God for it and enjoy it? First, by paying attention to all the signs of God’s healing work in our lives. The resurrection of baptism, the moments that change our lives on a grand scale as well as on a small scale are each puzzle pieces in a larger picture of eternal life. We can find the larger meaning in the events of our lives.
Second, we can take from this message God’s promise to bring us new life in this lifetime. We may feel as if we are huddled in the grave on the third day, dead and alone, but God is able and willing to make our lives new again—whole and clean and pure. And so today’s story is not only one about death and resurrection, but also about our lives lived today.
During communion tonight, we’ll be singing the song What Wondrous Love is This. And I’d like to close by singing for you the last verse of the hymn:
And, when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing on
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing and joyful be,
and through eternity I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on,
And through eternity I’ll sing on.
The good news is this: today we are freed from death, and today is the day our singing begins. Thanks be to God, Amen.
posted by Amy Sens at 5:05 PM
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