If
we can trust Google Search -or Bing – it’s Benjamin Franklin who gets
the credit for the familiar saying, “In this world, nothing is certain
except death and taxes.” There’s no arguing the point, but for all their
certainty, we avoid dealing with death and taxes as much as we can.
April 15 gets in the way, of course, and when it comes to death, many
people don’t even like to use the word, preferring euphemisms like
“passed” and “passed away.” But no matter how much we may avoid the
word, we can’t escape the reality, can we? Nor will we!
As a priest, I
deal a lot with death and, to be honest, I can get overwhelmed by it.
I’m not talking about the thought of my own death. I think I’ve come to
a place of peace there - most of the time! No, I’m overwhelmed not so
much by that as by how often I have to deal with death and by the awful
toll it takes - on the person dying and on family and loved ones. It’s a
daunting and difficult thing to accompany the dying, and to walk with
people in grief at the loss of a loved one. I find myself wishing I had
a magic wand to wave and take it all away but, of course, there is no
magic wand, and there really aren’t any words, either. Sometimes all I
can do is to be silently and lovingly and prayerfully present, and leave
the rest to God.
In today’s
story of the death and raising of Lazarus, we get a window onto what
Jesus did in the face of death. But before I get into that, let me
remind you that we are in John’s gospel and, as with all the great
stories in John’s gospel, there is more than one layer of meaning. That
was true of the story of the woman at the well two weeks ago, and of the
story of the man born blind last week, and it’s true of this story. This
is a story not only about Lazarus’ untimely death and Jesus raising him
from the dead, it’s also a story about Jesus’ desire to bring people to
faith. This is clear from the rather surprising little detail in the
story where, after hearing that Lazarus was ill, Jesus waited for two
whole days before going to him. The reason for this becomes clear from
the words that Jesus prayed before he called Lazarus forth from the
tomb. “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I know that you always
hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd that they may
believe that you sent me.” So, this is not only a story of Jesus
miraculously bringing his friend back from the dead, John also presents
it as a sign, a sign that manifests the glory of God, a sign that has
the power to bring people to faith. In him. (People like our Elect
preparing for Baptism; people like ourselves!)
Now, back to the
window we get onto what Jesus did in the face of death. It’s best seen
in the different ways Jesus dealt with Martha and Mary, the sisters of
Lazarus. You may have noticed that both of them, when they met Jesus,
said the same thing to him: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother
would never have died.” But with Martha, Jesus seems almost removed,
content to stay at the level of faith, telling her, “Your brother will
rise again,” and “I am the resurrection and the life.” But when Mary,
the more outwardly emotional of the two, falls at Jesus’ feet weeping,
we are told that he was “troubled in spirit, moved by the deepest
emotions.” And not only that, when he asked where the tomb was, we are
told – in what must be the shortest verse in all the gospels – that
“Jesus wept.” There is a lot packed into those two words, and you can
see what I mean about getting a window onto Jesus. It’s easy to picture
the scene, isn’t it? Jesus is very human there, touchingly so. He is
clearly one of us. Vulnerable. Moved by very deep emotions.
My friends, the
Jesus we meet here is one I can easily relate to and I trust you can,
too. I often think of that scene when I’m dealing with a dying
parishioner or with the family of someone who has died, or with someone
in my own family, as I did just yesterday. As with Jesus, tears do come
– to my eyes often enough. Other times the tears overflow in my heart.
There is one other
little window onto Jesus in the story. It’s in the words Jesus speaks
after he calls Lazarus forth from the tomb. “Untie him,” he says, “and
let him go free.” It’s one thing for Jesus to want his friend to live;
it’s another for him to want him to be free, free from the things that
get in the way of living life to the full, things that lessen a person’s
lease on life: crippling things like sin, fear, doubt, worry, anxiety.
My friends, I believe that
Jesus speaks those same words to us: “Untie him, untie her. Let him go
free. Let her go free.” (He speaks those words in a special way to our
Elect who will soon be baptized.) He wants us (and he wants them) to be
‘untied,’ unbound, free - free to walk in the light of day, the light of
faith, the light of life. There are so many things that can get in the
way of this. Jesus wants us to be free of every one of them.
My friends, this freedom
we will fully possess only when we come to terms with death – the fact
that it’s final, yes, but also the fact that it’s finite. For even
though death is inevitable and inescapable, it does not get the last
word. Life does. It always does. That is our firm belief. It is the very
foundation of our faith. We are Easter people, and we will be
re-discovering that and celebrating that in the coming days. And it is
what we celebrate now, and every time we gather together to break the
Bread of the Eucharist, the Bread of Life. We who eat this Bread will
live forever!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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