So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me."
When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go." (John 11:41-44)
When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go." (John 11:41-44)
REFLECTION
Jesus arrives at Lazarus’ grave. “It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance”, John tells us. The whole story looks like a preview of what will happen later, when Jesus himself comes back to life victoriously.
Jesus instructs the people to take away the stone. Martha is worried about the bad odor that will spread as soon as the stone will be removed. But Jesus is not thinking about Lazarus' bad body odor, he is only focused on revealing the glory of God.
There is no hesitation on Jesus’ part. He trusts his Father completely and in his public prayer, in his proclamation of God’s resurrection power, he reveals the reason why God raises Lazarus: “That they may believe that you sent me.”
Horror movies were unknown back in those days, but all the bystanders and witnesses must have been shocked by the sight of a dead man stumbling out of the grave and walking back into their lives again!
PRAYER
Dear Jesus, I don’t know whether we can really visit Lazarus’ empty grave today. To be honest, I am not that interested in tombs, bad odors and grave cloths. I guess that, later in his life, Lazarus died again and went to Heaven to be with you forever. His sisters must have been so grateful for having him back with them for a while. But your deepest motivation was doing the Father’s will and revealing his resurrection power that brought you back to life and that raises all true believers from the death.
I don’t want to think about the bad odor that I was spreading before you called me out of the darkness. I don’t want to visit my empty tomb and neither do I want to keep on walking restricted by the grave clothes from my past. You have set me free from all these things that were once binding and blinding me!
It is your voice that calls out to us: “Come out!” The same voice that called stars and planets into existence, the same voice that told the sun to shine and the earth to flourish, calls out my name. Here I am Lord, take off my grave clothes and let me walk, jump and dance for joy for you!
Dear Jesus, I don’t know whether we can really visit Lazarus’ empty grave today. To be honest, I am not that interested in tombs, bad odors and grave cloths. I guess that, later in his life, Lazarus died again and went to Heaven to be with you forever. His sisters must have been so grateful for having him back with them for a while. But your deepest motivation was doing the Father’s will and revealing his resurrection power that brought you back to life and that raises all true believers from the death.
I don’t want to think about the bad odor that I was spreading before you called me out of the darkness. I don’t want to visit my empty tomb and neither do I want to keep on walking restricted by the grave clothes from my past. You have set me free from all these things that were once binding and blinding me!
It is your voice that calls out to us: “Come out!” The same voice that called stars and planets into existence, the same voice that told the sun to shine and the earth to flourish, calls out my name. Here I am Lord, take off my grave clothes and let me walk, jump and dance for joy for you!
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8 comments:
Yesterday was the feast day of Mary Magdalene and I attended morning service at the chapel of Martin of Tours at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. The priest said that Mary Magdalene is revered by the Orthodox Church because of her role as the proclaimer of the Resurrection. And that as we have each experienced the Resurrection, we all have something to proclaim. Ain’t that the truth!
Despite its many qualities, New York is a very smelly city. It’s lavish, elegant and beautiful, but there’s also a pervasive whiff of garbage and putrefaction in the air, and vermin everywhere.
I suppose that is because putrefaction is the normal state of fallen man. We in the hinterlands never notice it because we aren’t living so close to each other.
BTW, where did you find that peculiar photo? Did you notice the broken beer bottles on top of the wall?
Thanks for your comment, Carol. I like what the priest said: "...as we have each experienced the Resurrection we all have something to proclaim!" - that is really a confirmation of what I am trying to do: telling people about Christ's resurectoin power that can liberate us from decay and darkness and lift us up to walk in his glorious light.
The source of the pic can be found by clicking on the little link at the bottom of this posting: source pic. Yes, I've noticed the broken bottles - barbed wire classic style... :-) It is also a funny sign - it looks a bit clumsy and improvised (like they've used a second hand sign and painted these words over the old message)
It is ironic how we keep coming to the empty tombs (church) in order to find Christ, yet he is not there. The resurrected Christ is not bound by tombs, grave clothes, churches, buildings or anything else. If we truly want to encounter Christ, we need to go out into the world and do just what Carol's priest said; "Proclaim the resurrection."
Paul, you are an awesome proclaimer of the resurrection. I wish I could be half as powerful.
I have mixed feelings about church as an “empty tomb”. The Cathedral is part of the (very liberal) Episcopal diocese of New York. Sometimes it seems like it’s just a music venue or a tourist site, but at other times it’s a deeply moving place.
(I wrote about the Cathedral here: http://watchmepaint.blogspot.com/2007/07/cathedral-of-st-john-divine-new-york.html.)
I was an Episcopalian for two decades. There was something in the stillness of that place, the austerity of both the priest and the setting that spoke to my soul like my current evangelical, charismatic church does not.
Wherever the faithful meet, Jesus is there—“For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.” (Matthew 18:20)
BTW, check out this prophetic verse, Proverbs 30:4:
Who has gone up to heaven and come down?
Who has gathered up the wind in the hollow of his hands?
Who has wrapped up the waters in his cloak?
Who has established all the ends of the earth?
What is his name, and the name of his son?
Tell me if you know!
(Don’t know if it was on your earlier list or not, but it is cool.)
Hi David,
Thanks for leaving a comment!
Yes! The Lord is not hiding in a tomb or a church... He is present through his Holy Spirit in his people - we are the temple of the living Christ! And He is all around us - nobody is able to stop Him!
"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.' Acts 17:24-28
Let's proclaim that message!
@ Carol,
Yes, as a matter of fact I wrote about this beautiful text about a year ago (22 July 2006):
http://mondayboosters.blogspot.com/2006/07/good-questions-right-answers.html
My heart jumps up when I read these words. Yes, I KNOW THE NAME OF HIS SON! Wonderful words indeed.
My middle-aged brain can just about retain what I read yesterday.
I agree totally with you and David that the church is the Body of Christ and the buildings are only as meaningful as that Body.
Hope you are enjoying your vacation.
I am reading a fascinating philosophical work by Edith Stein, the controversial once-Jewish nun who was made a saint for her death at Auschwitz. The book is called the “Science of the Cross”, and the work does not mean what the title implies to a 21st century audience – the title refers not to “CSI: Golgotha,” but rather to forming an authentic intellectual discipline to frame Christian mysticism with.
I am not far into it, but she is already challenging me in some fascinating ways. One of those ways is a bold new phrase that turns my conceptions on their ear – what she calls “Holy Objectivity”, which she describes as “the original receptivity of a soul re-born by the Holy Spirit. Such a soul reacts to all events in the proper way and at the right depth; it has in itself a living, moving power joyfully ready to let itself be formed, unhampered by false inhibitions and rigidity.”
She calls this objectivity, because she truly and genuinely believes the natural state of our interaction with God (and also our environment) is emphatic. We are not naturally indifferent – it is the cares of life that wear away at our hearts, making us feel joyless, or unmoved. And where God is concerned, our benchmark is that first joyful moment of conversion – that moment when God says, “And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh.” (Ezekiel 11:19) That is who, as Christians, we naturally are – the freshly born soul with a heart that can feel terrible grief, incredible joy, but never the grey middle.
I so often hear of people who search longingly to regain the vaguely remembered feeling of unity with God – trying to find the spark of the Holy Spirit. They will switch churches, switch denominations, even switch religions if necessary, to regain the feeling they once felt. Mother Theresa herself was such a person – after a beatific year surrounded by the presence of God, she felt an emptiness for many of the years of her work that she struggled to keep in check. It is certainly not unusual to not only feel without the Holy Spirit, but to be on a quest to reignite it within.
The problem we have, however, if Edith Stein is right, is that we’re often looking in the wrong place. “Holy Objectivity” suggests that the “heart of flesh” is our natural state – our benchmark. Instead of asking where the Holy Spirit is, what we really need to ask is rather what is impeding it?
Think back to your last certain experience of the Holy Spirit. What has come since? Doubt? Have you looked back and attempted to rationalize a scientific way that might explain it away – neuro-chemical reactions? Anxiety? Worry that God has left you? Despair? Something you’ve done that you are sure precludes God’s mercy? Distraction? Things in your worship environment that have taken the focus off the divine and onto people, church activities, or even the church itself?
If you look carefully, the Holy Spirit never left you, and God certainly never lost the capacity to forgive you. You took your own road work, stop signs, traffic jams and inserted them directly into the path of the Holy Spirit. God’s spirit is gentle and uninsistent enough that yes, it may seem like it has even left you. But it never did.
St. John of the cross, in the Spiritual Canticle, writes of this affliction of the senses:
Where have You hidden Yourself,
And abandoned me to my sorrow, O my Beloved!
You have fled like the hart,
Having wounded me.
I ran after You, crying; but You were gone.
He tells us that we cannot look outside for the resolution of this sensual deprivation. No building can fix this for us. Only contemplation opens up the fruits of the church for us, “God is therefore hidden within the soul, and the true contemplative will seek Him there in love, saying, ‘Where have you hidden yourself?’”
As Jesus himself said, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” When you were baptized, you joined God, and God joined you, to dwell within. He has never left.
If you don’t see him, you don’t need to go looking – just remove the obstruction.
@ Lane - Hi Lane, sorry for the delay in answering you! I highly appreciate your friendly and thoughtful comment - lots of interesting ideas and that book sounds intriguing too. I especially recognize this: "I so often hear of people who search longingly to regain the vaguely remembered feeling of unity with God – trying to find the spark of the Holy Spirit." We are living in a broken world and - in a way - I am happy that even such a saint as Mother Teresa was struggling with her faith / emotions / thoughts. In a world so full of injustice and suffering, there are many things that we can wrestle with. It is an encouragement to know that we are not alone in this spiritual journey.
Thank you very much for your contribution and keep coming back!
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