March 26, 2023 Sermon
Sermon title: "Jesus Raises Lazarus"
Scripture: LONG John(!) 11:1-45
(Other lectionary choices include Ezekiel 37:1-14, Psalm 130, and Romans 8:6-11.)
John 11:1-45
The Death of Lazarus
1Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. 3So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, "Lord, he whom you love is ill." 4But when Jesus heard it, he said, "This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it." 5Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, 6after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. 7Then after this he said to the disciples, "Let us go to Judea again." 8The disciples said to him, "Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?" 9Jesus answered, "Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. 10But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them." 11After saying this, he told them, "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him." 12The disciples said to him, "Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right." 13Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. 14Then Jesus told them plainly, "Lazarus is dead. 15For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him." 16Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, "Let us also go, that we may die with him."
Jesus the Resurrection and the Life
17When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him." 23Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again." 24Martha said to him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day." 25Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?" 27She said to him, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world."
Jesus Weeps
28When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, "The Teacher is here and is calling for you." 29And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. 30Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." 33When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34He said, "Where have you laid him?" They said to him, "Lord, come and see." 35Jesus began to weep. 36So the Jews said, "See how he loved him!" 37But some of them said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?"
Jesus Raises Lazarus to Life
38Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39Jesus said, "Take away the stone." Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, "Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days." 40Jesus said to her, "Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?" 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, "Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me." 43When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" 44The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go." 45Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.
The story of the raising of Lazarus is found in John's Gospel, and nowhere else. That's okay: lots of other famous stories are found in only one Gospel and nowhere else. Luke, for example, is the only Gospel that has the stories of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son. And in the birth of Jesus, Matthew has the Wise Men coming to see the baby Jesus, and nobody else does - and Luke has the shepherds abiding in the fields, which nobody else has. So, I just note the raising of Lazarus story only in John in passing.
There is a lot here to "unpack", as I've heard other preachers say, and in no way will be able to get to every significant point. But one thing I'll say is that Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, and HIS OWN DEATH - so the raising of his friend Lazarus could be a precursor to the story of JESUS's Resurrection. Also, note that Lazarus has been dead for four days, and we are even told there is a STENCH in the tomb! I think the point here that we're supposed to get is that Lazarus - just like Jesus - was DEAD! There is no question that both were DEAD! They weren't play-acting! They were DEAD, and the point is made in no uncertain terms!
You have heard before that the four Gospel writers have been called the Four Evangelists, and today's passage has its share of points to make you believe. One example: before Jesus raises Lazarus, he asks Martha, still grieving over her dead brother, if she believes that Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life. I mean, even before Jesus brings new life to her brother, he's quizzing her on a theological matter! That seems strange to me, and maybe just a little bit heartless on Jesus's part! My feeling is, Raise Lazarus FIRST, Jesus, and then we'll talk theology! But perhaps the point here is just who Jesus is. We're sorry about Lazarus, but the main point is....who is Jesus. And we are told: He is the Resurrection and the Life. Whoever believes in him will not die but have Everlasting Life. Does that sound familiar to you? It does to me. What does John 3:16 say? "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life." Ah, ha! The point made here in chapter 11 was also made earlier in chapter 3! Everlasting Life! Eternal Life! Elsewhere in John we find the phrase, "I come that you may have Life, and have it more abundantly." That's what Jesus is about: LIFE! Right here and right now! Yes, we believe we'll have life when we die in the sweet by and by, but we can also have LIFE with Jesus RIGHT NOW! That's the point, or at least one of the points.
Do you wonder, as I do, why Jesus didn't go sooner to help Lazarus? It just could be that he was thinking and praying about what GOD wanted him to do. Jesus loved Lazarus, yes, but he (Jesus) felt called to do something in this world, and it was more than doing what Mary and Martha - and Lazarus - wanted him to do. Also, the disciples were right: the authorities WERE looking for an excuse to kill Jesus, and he knew that. So maybe Jesus was wrestling in his mind about the right time to go to Bethany, which is only a couple of miles from Jerusalem. Bethany, by the way, means "the house of the poor". Were Mary and Martha and Lazarus poor? Very likely, and maybe Lazarus was even in some sort of hospice care. Not that that matters in today's sermon. But Jesus had certainly been there before, and maybe more than once. As we know, Jesus cared about the poor and the powerless. Maybe what he saw at the Bethany poorhouse informed what he had to say about the marginalized in his society.
Another aspect of this story is that Jesus surprises us and does NOT always live up to OUR expectations. Mary and Martha both play "If only" with Jesus: IF ONLY you had been here, IF ONLY you had acted as I had hoped you would act. We need to keep in mind that it's GOD's world, not ours. GOD is running things, not you or I. People die, wars rage, we pray and don't get the answers we want, or at least WHEN we want. God and Jesus eventually act in this story, but only after a lot of tears. That's life, isn't it? I'm sure you've heard the world described as "this vale of tears". Whoever wrote that was right. There seems to be a lot of unrelieved sadness, and this passage in John's Gospel affirms that point.
And Jesus is not immune to the sorrows we all share in "this vale of tears". He weeps openly at the death of his friend Lazarus. He may also be weeping because he knows what's going to happen to HIM in a matter of weeks. Jesus weeps because he feels our pain, because he was one of us. You have heard me say before that the Church has always insisted that he was fully man as well as fully God. His tears show that he really understood the human condition, and part of that human condition is that we all must die.
But we also know that the sadness and tears aren't the end of the story. In fact, he tries to get Mary and Martha to understand that there is more to this existence than a smelly grave at the end. There is New Life beyond that grave, and he wants Mary and Martha to believe that. He also wants them - and us - to believe that that New Life begins in him and with him.
I really like the way this Scripture ends. When Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead, he says, "Untie him - or unbind him - and let him go." Untie him or unbind him from WHAT, exactly? Maybe unbind him from the notion that death is the end. It is NOT the end, Jesus is saying, by raising Lazarus from the dead. And let him go from OLD notions about time and space. Yes, we all must die.... but is that really the END? NO, says Jesus, because HE is the Resurrection and the Life, and whoever believes in him, even though he were dead, YET SHALL HE LIVE, proclaims Jesus.
I wish I could end this sermon on a musical note, but obviously I can't. I have sung in various choirs, and I have sung in various Requiems. The Frenchman Gabriel Faure wrote a Requiem, and so too did the contemporary British composer John Rutter. In one of those - I can't remember which, but I think it's Rutter's - these words of Jesus are put to music, and they are sung very softly: "I am the Resurrection and the Life." It's almost spooky, but also very exciting! And that's what the raising of Lazarus and later of Jesus himself must have been like: a little spooky, a little scary, even, and also VERY exciting. Believe the Good News, friends. Death is NOT the end, because Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life. Amen.
Pastor Skip
