Jesus prayed, and lived, Our Father …, and he demonstrated a life of total reliance on his heavenly Father. During the past three weeks we have been examining different passages from the scriptures that relate to the themes of Faith, Hope and Love, and these come together in our readings today. The story of Lazarus is long, but gives John the opportunity to enthral us with characters and ideas that combine richly.
The first thing to note is that is John concerned to reveal God’s glory: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, full of grace and truth.” How do we do this? “… to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” At the end of his Gospel, John records that “these (things) are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”
When the terrible news reaches Jesus that Lazarus is sick, and it appears that Jesus knows that the sickness will result in death, he is glad that his disciples are not there to witness it, because of the negative impact it will have on their faith. How does faith grow? By observing God at work in the world, and becoming accustomed to the fact that we can rely on our Father God to help us. The implication is that even if Jesus had travelled earlier and got there in time, he and his disciples would have been subjected to the faith sapping ordeal of seeing Lazarus die.
How are we meant to comprehend this?
We are faced with the paradox of a God who is all powerful, and yet allows bad things to happen. What are we to make of it?
First, there is a powerful, almost inescapable urge to trust. Thomas (the doubting one?) announces that if Jesus is going into danger and probable death in Judea, they must go too, and die with him if necessary. Martha does not rant and rave at Jesus; she expresses a calm, dignified, disappointed certainty that Jesus could have averted her brother’s death, if he had been there. Jesus speaks those eternal words that have been read at countless funerals: “I am the resurrection and the life …”, and Martha believes him. Strictly speaking, she is expressing her hope that Lazarus would be resurrected one day. She is also affirming her faith that Jesus is the one, present with her, who will bring that future hope to pass.
I am frequently humbled by the persistent, humble faith of people who face great tragedies and hardships. Some folk find the most trivial things distract them from following after a life of discipleship, while others struggle though great life events to be closer to God. C.S. Lewis wrote “reflect for five minutes on the fact that all the great religions were first preached, and long practised, in a world without chloroform.”
Second, there is love. The bedrock of our faith is the conviction that God, as he is revealed to us in Jesus, is love, through and through. We see this demonstrated in the way that Jesus shares in the grief of Mary and the others at the grave. He was “deeply moved” – literally he groaned within himself. Was this not a bit extreme, given that he apparently expected a happy ending? The shortest verse in the bible, “Jesus wept”, is not about a dignified tear rolling down the cheek, but about an outburst of sobbing. Jesus appears to have been touched to the very core.
And earlier, it is noted for us clearly that Jesus loved Lazarus and his sisters, and yet he delayed coming to them. The biggest challenge to our faith can be to believe that God is all loving, all knowing, all powerful, and yet allows us to go through terrible times. Our only consolation is that Jesus does not sail through them unaffected, and uncaring. The evidence is that when it is necessary for us to suffer, God in some mysterious way is suffering too. Jesus taught us to pray that we might not come to the time of trial, because he knew from bitter experience what that would mean. When we remember Gethsemane and Calvary in the coming weeks, we will seek to follow him; the truth is that in every experience he walks with us.
It actually appears that Lazarus must be allowed to die, and we are called to accept that God’s purposes are good in the midst of every human longing to see this averted. As we trust in God, we see his glory expressed in our lives, sometimes in healing and resurrection, and sometimes in hidden ways that only he knows.
What is going on here? Lazarus comes forth, and it is a triumph. In the next chapter we see him hosting a feast for Jesus, at which his sister Mary washes Jesus’ feet with her hair and scandalises Judas. So great is the fame of Lazarus, that the temple authorities are alarmed and start to plot his death alongside that of Jesus.
How does faith grow? By observing God at work in the world, and becoming accustomed to the fact that we can rely on our Father God to help us. Even when, especially when, we go through times of hardship and trial, we sink our roots deeper into him. Even if we call for him, and he apparently delays coming, yet we know he loves us and wants and will do the best for us.
We are given no hint about Lazarus’ final end, but imagine he led a normal life and died in the normal way. A major point of telling the story is that it is one of seven great signs of the glory of Jesus that are recounted in the Gospel. It gives a foretaste of the grand climax to come, which we will celebrate on Easter Day and for the six weeks after. I wonder if there was a different quality to the way that Lazarus lived? As Paul writes in our reading from Romans, a work of the Holy Spirit is to build the conviction within us that we will each be resurrected one day, because Jesus himself already has been, and therefore we live better lives now. Lazarus still had a finite time of earth, but perhaps greater faith in the Jesus who said: “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
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