Day of the Church Year: All Saints Sunday
Scripture Passage: John 11:32-44
They all gather for the funeral. Weeping, consoling, present. Mary, Martha, and all who knew and loved Lazarus. Jesus loved Lazarus too, and he weeps for him. Or perhaps Jesus weeps because the community is sad and grieving, and he too is part of the community. By the time Jesus arrives, Lazarus is good and dead. Four days dead. Long enough that, at least according to the custom of the time, the body had finally released the spirit on the third day. At that point, there is no miracle, no magical cure, no mistaken assessment of Lazarus’ condition. Lazarus is dead. His body is in the tomb—and has been for four days. He is wrapped up in cloth as was done, and the stench of his body fills the cave. Lazarus is dead.
Two thousand years later, we are more sure than ever when people we love have died. Quite often at the time of death, the loved one’s blood pressure, heart rate, and oxygen level are all clinically measured. Quite often, the person we love is surrounded by us, family and friends and community, listening for each breath as it comes, slower, even more slowly, yet more slowly still. Sometimes, death comes suddenly, violently, with the full force of a gut punch, certain and devastating. The one we love is dead.
Two thousand years ago and today, when someone we love dies, we are shocked, sad, angry, grateful for the beautiful life of the person we love. Turning to God, we may echo the words of Mary: Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Lord, if you have been here, my father, my mother, my sister, my partner, my child would not have died. We understand Mary’s words. We get it. We want miracles too. But death comes to all who live. We will all die, really and truly. Death is not a mirage even for those claimed and loved by God. Even when Jesus is crucified, he dies, really and truly, and is dead until the third day, long enough even to release his spirit as the ancient custom dictated.
When Jesus comes to weep with the community at the death of Lazarus on day four, no one expects a miracle. No one gets their hopes up. No one pleads for Jesus to raise Lazarus from the dead. Mary and Martha see only a dead end at this point, only an acceptance of what comes to all people. ...but that’s not what Jesus sees. Jesus comes to show people the glory of God, the power of God to bring life in the midst of death, the ridiculous hope we have in God.
I don’t know why God raised Lazarus but doesn’t raise others. But what I learn from this story is that what appear to be dead ends to us are not necessarily dead ends to God. And there are so many dead ends we face. Not just death but ends of marriages, friendships, family relationships. Ends of jobs and educational programs. Bankruptcy and desperate measures of all kinds. So-called dead-end jobs and dead ends in solutions to our health problems. We may feel unredeemable, lost, at our wit’s end. We may have come not only to the end of our rope but to the end of our hope.
When Jesus tells the community gathered with Mary and Martha to take away the stone from the entrance to Lazarus’ tomb, how ridiculous he must have sounded. Martha tells him: He has been dead four days. Or in other words: It’s over, Jesus.
I wonder how often we say those words in prayer, in exasperation, in hopelessness. It’s over, Jesus. Not that this deters Jesus. He goes on to cry with a loud voice: Lazarus, come out! And Lazarus does.
This week, when Sheila and I were discussing All Saints Sunday, Sheila summed it up best: “Nothing is the end until I say so.” Nothing is the end until God says so. In our relationships, in all manner of personal struggles, in the ways we contribute to the common good, in our community here at Grace, in a nation polarized, in life and death, nothing is the end until God says so. Until that point, hope abounds for even when Lazarus was dead four days, he still came out when Jesus called. Thanks be to God! Amen.