The Sunday Project
Do You Believe?
Fifth Sunday of Lent |
By John
Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I will open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you home into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land; then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken, and I have done it, says the LORD."
And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Any one who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although your bodies are dead because of sin, your spirits are alive because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit which dwells in you.
So the sisters sent to him, saying, "Lord, he whom you love is ill." But when Jesus heard it he said, "This illness is not unto death; it is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by means of it." Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Laz'arus. So when he heard that he was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. Then after this he said to the disciples, "Let us go into Judea again." Now when Jesus came, he found that Laz'arus had already been in the tomb four days. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary sat in the house. Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. And even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you." Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again." Martha said to him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day." Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?" She said to him, "Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, he who is coming into the world." When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled; and he said, "Where have you laid him?" They said to him, "Lord, come and see." Jesus wept. So the Jews said, "See how he loved him!" But some of them said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?" Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb; it was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. Jesus said, "Take away the stone." Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, "Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days." Jesus said to her, "Did I not tell you that if you would believe you would see the glory of God?" So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. I knew that thou hearest me always, but I have said this on account of the people standing by, that they may believe that thou didst send me." When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, "Laz'arus, come out." The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with bandages, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go." Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him;
This week’s Scripture readings were like a slap in the face to me. Amid all of our anxieties and worries about the virus -- getting sick, paying bills, keeping children entertained, and even death – we hear the familiar story of Lazarus being raised from the dead. Yet hearing it now, I think I understand more fully the message that Jesus is giving us.
In this Gospel, Jesus says to Martha, “Do you believe?” It is the same question that he asks us today.
Do you believe that I am present in the midst of your anxieties?
Do you believe that I can somehow bring new life from this situation?
Do you believe that my light can conquer your inner darkness and the darkness that surrounds you?
Do you believe that I can bring you out of the tombs of shame and hurt?
Do you believe that death is not the end of the story?
Do you believe that I am the resurrection and the life?
I believe that in this unusual time, the Lord is inviting us to deepen our faith in the resurrection. Yes, we may feel that we are in darkness; we may even picture ourselves as being like Lazarus in a dark tomb. We may feel that we are helpless and unable to find peace with our own self or with the church. We may be grieving like Martha and Mary. Yet in all this, we are reminded of the basic truth of Christianity: Jesus rose from the dead and we have new life offered to us because of that. There could not have been Easter Sunday without Good Friday. In the same way, the new life that Christ is creating in us can only come about if parts of the old life die.
I think we are seeing some of this new life begin to take hold. Neighbors reaching out. Friends connecting by phone or online options. People donating time and money to keep meeting the needs of the poor. This community that supports and lifts up one another. In all these things, our selfishness and pride are slowly being purged from us.
What will this new world and new life look like once we pass through this crisis? Only God knows that for sure. But as Ezekiel the prophet writes, “I have promised, and I will do it, says the Lord.” God offers this new life to each one of his beloved children, a life full of love, hope and joy. We pray today that we may trust in the promises of God, which culminated in the Resurrection and will eventually come to be in our own resurrection.