Lent 5, Year A – March 9, 2008 “Jazz Eucharist” @ 10:15
Ezekiel 37:1-14; John 11:1-45
St. Giles Church, Northbrook IL – The Rev. Cynthia J. Hallas
If I had to name the top ten richest weeks in the three-year lectionary, the Fifth Sunday in Lent, Year A (that’s today!) would be right up there at the top of that list. The prophet Ezekiel in the valley of dry bones, the raising of Lazarus – wonderful stories, rich in imagery and meaning. We’re so close to Palm Sunday and Holy Week but here, just before we begin that journey, are the reminders that God can and does raise us up from our experiences of death and make our lives new and vibrant and meaningful again.
These stories from Ezekiel and from John’s gospel aren’t related and were never meant to be connected. It would be irresponsible to try, and we preachers are cautioned about stuff like that. But even with that caveat, paired together as the lectionary editors have seen fit to do, I think we can see them as companion illustrations not only of the power of God to overcome death and the grave, but of God’s love and presence, God’s continuing involvement in the spiritual, psychological, and emotional deaths that we, like our ancestors in faith, encounter. They speak to us eloquently of instances where those ancestors experienced loss – loss of life, loss of hope, loss of identity and stability – and mourn that loss. They’re also stories with a hitch – I’ll get to that later.
God brings the prophet Ezekiel to the killings fields of Babylon, a valley filled with nothing but very dry bones. It was a grim and ghastly reminder for Ezekiel and for all the people of Israel of the battle in which these members of Israel’s army had fallen; but it’s also a reminder of the situation that the people of Israel now found themselves in. Conquered, defeated, the Temple destroyed, they lived in exile in Babylon. With that exile had come a loss of hope; with that loss of hope had come resignation; with that resignation had come assimilation into the dominant culture and the loss – the death - of their sense of identity as God’s people.
“Our bones are dried up and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.”
God’s hand and God’s spirit bring Ezekiel to this valley of death and destruction, but it isn’t just to show Ezekiel what he already knows. Ezekiel becomes God’s instrument in resurrecting and giving life to those bones which have come represent so much more. “Prophesy to the bones,” God tells Ezekiel; and those bones become living beings once again. You can imagine the noise, the confusion, as each skeletal piece looks for its companions and comes together and then gets fleshed out and there, right before the prophet’s eyes, stands ‘the whole house of Israel’.
Martha and Mary are distraught over the death of their brother Lazarus and understandably so; we can hear it in the cry uttered separately by each of them:
“Lord, if you’d been here my brother would not have died.”
We can hear the pain, the sorrow, maybe even some resentment; surely Jesus could have put aside whatever he was doing to rush to the aid of his dying friend and work the kinds of miracles he had become known for; healing the blind man is mentioned. We ourselves might echo their sorrow, their confusion – why in the world would Jesus choose to heal perfect strangers but let his best friends experience such grief? But Lazarus not dying isn’t the point. His death serves the painful but necessary purpose of illustrating resurrection – those who believe in Jesus as the resurrection, even though they die, will live again. This doesn’t mean that Jesus didn’t mourn the death of Lazarus or share the grief of his family and friends – he was ‘deeply moved’ and ‘greatly disturbed’. He ‘began to weep’. But even while dealing with his own grief, Jesus commands that the stone be removed from the entrance so that the miracle he came to effect can occur. At his command the dead man comes out of the tomb, and we can only imagine the wholesale amazement and rejoicing.
But remember, I told you there’s a hitch. You see, the stories don’t end with a simple return to life. The stories end in resurrection. It wasn’t enough for the toe bone to get connected to the foot bone and the foot bone to get connected to the ankle bone and the ankle bone get connected to the leg bone and so on, up by half steps. God asks Ezekiel to prophesy a second time, this time he says, “Prophesy to the breath!” And the spirit of God, the breath of God, ruah, comes from the four winds and enlivens this ‘whole house of Israel’ so that it’s people can see that they still belong to God and God will save them and restore them. But without that spirit, they are nothing.
And it wasn’t enough for Lazarus just to be raised up and come out of the tomb. Remember, he was still bound hand and foot, and his face was covered. We can imagine him struggling to get up, struggling to get out through that opening, unable to see, barely able to move, hopping, running into the wall, bumping into the people; if his family and friends hadn’t been so thrilled to see him there probably would have been some serious giggling going on. But then Jesus says, “Unbind him, and let him go!” And that’s the key to resurrection. Being released, being unbound from the baggage and the fetters of the past, free to live as a new creation.
Resurrection didn’t occur for those dried-up bones when they assumed flesh, blood, vital organs and skin. It happened when they were infused with the breath (spirit) of God. Jesus didn’t just raise Lazarus. He freed him. That you and I and anyone else who lives in the light of resurrection might continue in the same old life is not the point. The point is that God gives us new life.
That’s the hitch about resurrection. It causes transformation. It causes us to experience the presence of God in new ways. It allows God’s spirit to enter us, to renew us. It doesn’t solve all of our problems. The house of Israel wasn’t finished suffering. Lazarus would live to die another day. Sometimes it even produces new challenges, as we who have been raised into new life discover what that means and what it calls out of us because if we have truly be raised we cannot live according to the same old rules.
And here’s another thing about resurrection. Resurrection doesn’t happen in spite of, or alongside of. It doesn’t happen just because things have gotten a little bit bad and then we solve a problem for ourselves and call it ‘resurrection’. Resurrection is not about avoiding death; resurrection can only happen when death has actually occurred, finally and totally. Only then can we be reborn. Those dry bones were really dead – they’d been dead for a long time. Lazarus wasn’t in a coma. As the ever-practical Martha reminds Jesus: “He’s been in there four days, Lord – it’s gonna smell really bad when you take that stone away!” Lazarus was dead.
But people of faith know that death is not the end. The same spirit of God that breathed life into creation breathed life back into those dead, dry bones and raised and unbound Lazarus. That’s the strength of perfect love – the love God has for all of us. And the God who created us and loves us that much has a hold on us, and will not – WIL NOT - let us go. Amen.