5^th Sunday of Lent (A); March 26, 2023

Ez 37:12-14.  Ps 130.  Rom 8:8-11.  Jn 11:1-45

Deacon Jim McFadden

       In today’s Gospel reading we have a stark contrast between Jesus, who is the Lord of Life, and the ruins of death.  Let us pause and stand before the last of the miraculous signs which Jesus performs just before Easter, at the tomb of his friend, Lazarus.  Keep in mind, what Jesus did for Lazarus, he wants to do for us.

            In the Gospel story everything seems to have ended: the tomb is sealed by a great stone: there’s only weeping and desolation here.  Lazarus has been dead for four days.  Put yourself into the story: what parts of you are a little dead?  How many dead places find a home which inhibits the movement of grace in your heart?  You don’t like your current situation—whether it be at work or something personal—and you just feel stuck: you can’t get out.  It’s like being at the first stage of AA: our spiritual dysfunction is beyond self-help.  Only the power of Jesus can help us emerge from these “dead zones” of the heart, these tombs of sin, which we all have and keep us trapped behind their walls.

            Before the sealed tomb of his friend, before our tomb, Jesus who is our friend and brother, “cried out in a loud voice: Lazarus, come out!”  And the dead man came out, tied hand and foot with the burial  bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth.  So, Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go” (Jn 11:43-44).

            This is an imperative for all of us because we are marked by death.  As Oscar Wilde lamented, “I know we all have to die; but, in my case, I thought and exception could be made.”  Sorry, Oscar: no such luck, as all of us have to die, but at the same time Jesus reassures us that “I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly” (10:10).  Jesus is confronting the tomb we have built for ourselves with our misguided choices that lead to death, with our errors, with our ignorance.  But, Jesus is not resigned to this!  He tells Lazarus, he tells us, he almost orders us, to come out of the tomb in which our sins have buried us.  He calls us insistently to come out of the darkness of that prison in which we are enclosed content with a false, selfish, and mediocre life.

            Brothers and sisters, what we have here is a great “encounter-clash” that is occurring at the sepulcher.  On the one hand, there is the disappointment that life as we knew it has irretrievably come to an end.  We yearn for life and we feel frustrated when this thirst for eternal life is oppressed by the ubiquitous and ancient dark evil of Death.  The sepulcher represents defeat.  On the other hand, there is hope in the person of Jesus, who asserts that he is LIFE itself!

            People of God, our resurrection begins here and now: when we decide to obey Jesus’ command by coming out into the light, into life; when the mask falls from our face—our myriad false personas—our True Self emerges—the face created in the image and likeness of God.

            The Raising of Lazarus pinpoints the belief in eternal life.  We just don’t want to live for 70-80 years, what we really want is the fulness of Life, infinite Being, which Jesus promised to the Woman at the Well.  This is the great breakthrough that will lead the followers of Jesus into Christianity.  Jesus is promising us immortality! And,  taking to heart what God said, “What is promised, I will do” (Ez 37:14c).  We stake our lives on that promise because we believe that Jesus is Lord because we experience him right here, right now especially in the Eucharist, the “fount and summit of our worship.”  We know that being made in the image and likeness of the Triune, communitarian God, we are meant to be in relationship, to share life with God and each other NOW AND FOREVER!  And, we do so by abiding in Jesus who is the source of Life.  Jesus will not let us go because he loves us unconditionally.

            That’s the Great Consolation: we realize that love is stronger than death.  We hear in the Song of Songs that “Deep waters cannot quench love, no floods sweep it away” (8:7).  This is not an easy realization to embrace,  As Martha knew, the stench of death is strong.  Sometimes our mind focuses on the unyielding face that death brings permanent separation in chronological time and physical space.  We become vulnerable to doubt.

            We don’t give into doubt because through faith we know that Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life!”  To know Jesus, to dwell within his Mind, Heart, and Soul is to participate in that Life that is everlasting.  The more we contemplate the story of the Raising of Lazarus, the more we will integrate it into our ordinary experience (Martha).  And, as we do so, we will realize its gentleness is an enduring strength.  Sustained by his presence, we can grieve greatly and deeply the physical loss of our loved ones and hope greatly in their continued life in God.  Love generates both grief and consolation.  As St. Paul said to the Thessalonians, “Do not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thes 4:13).  Remember, it is the weeping Jesus who cries out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!  Amen.