March 13, 2005 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK
Exodus 17:3-7 + Romans 5:1-2,5-8 + John 4:5-42
We all have places we would rather not go back to. Times and places in our past, in our childhood; relationships that have gone sour and broken; topics of conversation we would rather avoid,
and things we have left unresolved. The disciples remember that rock-throwing crowd with blood in their eyes. They don’t want to go back there, but Jesus does, and he’s going. In the mind of the disciples, what’s the use? Lazarus is already dead. It’s too late for that. Those disciples are thinking: “You want to risk our lives to look at a dead man?”
It is a good idea to tell the story of Lazarus coming from the grave
two weeks before we tell the story of Jesus coming from the grave,
because they are not the same, and the difference is important.
One is resuscitation. The other is resurrection. We know which one we need. The resuscitated Lazarus will die again. That’s not for us. The resurrected will rise to new life never to die again. That is a much better option, and the option we have in Jesus Christ.
“Let’s go to Judea again”, Jesus says. Not because he wants us to die for a good cause or because he wants to suffer, but because he wants us to be part of what God is doing in the world. He wants us to be there when he comes to Bethany, and says,
“Take away the stone.” It is no insignificant detail that Lazarus comes out tied hand and foot. The voice of the Lord is that powerful! Those bindings could never hold him back.
But I have wondered about the scene of this gospel for a long time. I have wondered about Lazarus and what it was like for him.
It is easy to imagine Martha and Mary with their prayers answered,
their brother restored to them, their friend finally coming to their rescue. At last they get to benefit from one of the great powerful signs they have seen and heard of time and again. But what about Lazarus? What if he didn’t want to come out? What if he liked it in there, preferring the tomb to the reality of his life? It hardly seems fair. Now he will have to die a second time. The first time was bad enough. He’d lingered and suffered for several days. Who would want to do that twice? I have even thought that when he heard that voice cry: “Come Out.” He said, “No, I don’t want to.” “I like it in here.” I wonder if he thought: “I don’t want to go back to those bickering women who are always courting your favor while arguing about who helps in the kitchen?” For many of us, a quiet place away from demands, work, schedules, expectations, the needs of others who might depend upon us is a very tempting option. In some ways, Lazarus and the disciples were both in hiding: one in the tomb, the others outside of Judea – hiding from the rock throwing crowd and the consequences of choosing life with Jesus.
They wanted it safe and easy, but it was not to be so.
Jesus confronts them both with their inclination to withdraw from people, from pain and effort, and from anything that might shatter their comfortable existence. There is something in us all that makes us want to hide, to withdraw into out busy calendars and schedules, but that is not life, and Jesus came to call us to COME OUT of that and have life.
The tomb cannot be our final resting place. The command of Jesus is loud and clear today. To those of us who might be hiding
or tempted to slip into a tomb somewhere he says: “COME OUT.”
To those who have made the journey to Bethany with him, there is even more of a message. We are either Lazarus called to come out and get on with living, or we are commanded to untie those who have no life because they are bound by poverty, by ignorance, by race, culture, or anything that keeps them from really living.
We are commanded to set them free — to loosen their bindings,
to untie them, so that together we may, go with Jesus to participate in the work God is doing in this world.
So, the fifth and last figure of the Old Testament rises up today with his image of dried bones — an image that too often describes the way we feel or the way we look. He offers the promise of a time when it will not be so, when this world will not be a desolate place of suffering, death, violence and fear, and in Lent’s last week, this is our promise as Jesus invites us to get up and go with him to a place that might look like death; but really holds the promise of Life for those who want to join him in doing the work of God. To do so, we must come out of our little tombs and be about the work of unbinding and setting those free who do not have Life.