Fifth Sunday in Lent, March 29th, 2020 YR A
On this Sunday in Lent we encounter two stories that are full of hope. We often read Ezekiel’s story of the valley of dry bones at the Easter Vigil, and the raising of Lazarus has been a favorite of artists throughout the centuries. When we hear these stories, we immediately sense that we are a part of the narrative. Those dry bones are our tired lives, and Lazarus represents our longing for new life. Again and again we have heard these stories, but usually from an individual perspective. Within the confines of our contemporary culture, we inevitably think that these stories are about our own personal lives.But if you look carefully and critically at both these stories, you will discover that they are in fact “stories within stories.” Ezekiel’s vision is not about our individual lives, but is a promise directed to the people of Israel who are in exile. John tells us the story of Lazarus not to promise us individual resurrection, but because it is a sign that reveals the glory of God in the person and work of Jesus. These stories within stories direct us to a deeper understanding, a more profound truth: they speak to us, not as individuals, but as God’s people; they are addressed to us as a community of faith.
On this Sunday in Lent we encounter two stories that are full of hope. We often read Ezekiel’s story of the valley of dry bones at the Easter Vigil, and the raising of Lazarus has been a favorite of artists throughout the centuries. When we hear these stories, we immediately sense that we are a part of the narrative. Those dry bones are our tired lives, and Lazarus represents our longing for new life. Again and again we have heard these stories, but usually from an individual perspective. Within the confines of our contemporary culture, we inevitably think that these stories are about our own personal lives.
But if you look carefully and critically at both these stories, you will discover that they are in fact “stories within stories.” Ezekiel’s vision is not about our individual lives, but is a promise directed to the people of Israel who are in exile. John tells us the story of Lazarus not to promise us individual resurrection, but because it is a sign that reveals the glory of God in the person and work of Jesus. These stories within stories direct us to a deeper understanding, a more profound truth: they speak to us, not as individuals, but as God’s people; they are addressed to us as a community of faith.
The valley full of dry bones was most likely a field of soldiers fallen in battle, their bodies bleached by the sun and devoid of life. Following God’s direction, Ezekiel commands them, “O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.” And the bones came together, sinews connected them and flesh covered them. And then the Lord causes breath to enter the bones from the four winds so that those that were slain might live.
God goes on to tell Ezekiel that these bones represent the whole house of Israel—those who had been carried off into exile in Babylon because they had turned their backs on the one true God and chosen to follow other gods. They had become preoccupied with their own prosperity and survival; they had become spiritually dead. They had no more hope of a future together than they had of trying to put flesh on a skeleton and call it back to life.
This season of Lent gives us an opportunity to get in touch with how dry, how lifeless, how fragmented our spiritual lives have become. It is a time to explore all those things that calls us away from wanting God to be the center and focus of our lives. It is a time to recognize those aspects of our selves and our community that are spiritually dead, that seem to us as hopeless as a valley of dry bones. And we do this during a nation-wide health and economic crisis so that, even now, we might realize once again the great love that God has for each of us, both as individuals and as members of God’s family, the Church.
In today’s gospel we hear Martha’s first words to Jesus as filled with both faith and accusation: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Then Jesus says to her, “I am the resurrection and the life,” and assures her that whoever believes in him will never die. And as if in answer to his challenge, Martha makes one of the great statements of faith in John’s Gospel: “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
Two weeks ago in this same Gospel Jesus identified himself with living water—water that miraculously would sustain us so that we would never be thirsty again. Last Sunday the healing of the man blind from birth became a symbol of more than human sight: going from the body’s darkness into God’s light. Today’s Gospel appears to feature a miracle of resuscitation from the dead—but once again, it is that and much more. When Jesus says, “I am the life,” he is not speaking about the restored life of Lazarus, anymore than Ezekiel was speaking of Israel in exile as literally dead and buried. Both employ the symbols of death and life to teach us about deeper realities.
Standing there at the grave of Lazarus, the one who is life itself began to weep. Sharing in Mary and Martha’s anguish, Jesus wept. The one who is the love of God incarnate wept, just as he does now—for us. Because, you see, Jesus loves us just as he loved Mary and Martha and Lazarus. He weeps for us because he knows our pain and suffering, our weakness and fears. And Jesus knows this, not as some disinterested observer of human life, but from his own first-hand experience, because he lived and died as one of us: he truly shared our mortal life.
But it was not only his friend’s death that caused Jesus to weep: he also wept over the power that death still has in the world; he was weeping over the way in which all that separates us from God still holds sway over our lives. These stories within stories are not about dry bones that are brought to life, or Lazarus resuscitated after four days in the tomb. These stories within stories are not even about “the resurrection on the last day” as Martha thought at first.
No, these stories within stories are much deeper. They point us forward to that radical transformation of reality that we celebrate in the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. These stories within stories are to help us recognize that God is working through Jesus in a unique and unprecedented way beyond our individual lives: in Jesus the whole creation is being made new. Restoration and resuscitation are life-giving and faith-building—but it is only resurrection that transforms reality!
These stories within stories point to the heart of life itself, God’s abundant life. They remind us that we are called into a totally new way of being in the world. We forget that in Jesus’ resurrection, reality is transformed, life is changed, and existence now possesses new and different purposes. Resurrection is a radical new beginning, not a continuation of what has already happened.
We know that after this present crisis has passed, life will not be the same. After resurrection, it is not possible to simply pick up life where we left off, because too much of the very heart of reality has changed. When we put our faith in Jesus, we share in his resurrection and our lives are reoriented. We are given the power right now to live our lives in a totally new way.
On Easter, Jesus came out of the tomb with a new and different purpose. On Easter, the disciples were transformed into apostles and took on a new and different purpose. But what about us? What about this congregation? What do you want for Church of the Resurrection? When this is all over, will you be content with a resuscitation and settle for pumping some new life into this fifty year old body? Or do you really long for resurrection?
Are you really ready to be the Body of Christ in this time and place, embracing new and different purposes, discovering new and challenging ministries, meeting new and diverse needs? Are you willing to let God work through you and this congregation to transform our world into a new future?
God knows the secrets of our hearts better than we do ourselves. And God longs to put flesh on our dry bones, to connect us with one another, and to breathe the life of the Spirit into our weary hearts. Even as Jesus called Lazarus forth from the grave, so too, Jesus calls us to come out of the tomb of our fears, to leave behind our false securities and our materialistic idols. “Lord,” we may well ask, “can these bones live?” And Jesus answers: “The hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.” (John 5:25)
Jesus cries out to each of us—to all of us: “Lazarus, come out!”