The Third Sunday of Easter [Year A] - April 30, 2017 (Luke 24:13-35)

I am unable to read or hear this story where Jesus appears as a stranger to his disciples as they make their way to Emmaus without thinking of that TV show “Undercover Boss.” In case you haven’t seen it, “Undercover Boss” is a reality show on CBS prime time wherein a CEO or some other high-level corporate exec leaves the office for a few days and secretly takes some low-level job within his or her company to see how things are really being run and, more importantly, what their employees really think of them. What’s critical to the show’s concept is that the executives who go undercover not be recognized by those employees that they encounter. A make-up and costume crew comes in to totally transform the boss and then hidden cameras follow him or her around as they do everyday things like make tacos or run amusement park rides.

I’m not a big watcher of television, but I’ve seen the program a few times, and it’ll draw you in. It’s won a few Emmy’s, and it’s in its seventh season. It’ll also make a grown man cry. Each episode culminates with the revealing of the boss’ identity, and it almost always catches the employees off-guard. They’re surprised they were able to work alongside the person who runs their company, the person who is responsible for the direction and ethos of the whole company without ever knowing it. What makes the show especially touching is that the executive is often moved to tears when he or she sees how successfully the people at the bottom actually carry the company through their dedication and work ethic.

I haven’t watched too many episodes of “Undercover Boss,” but I’ve never seen one where the boss is disappointed in how his rank and file are doing. But if the risen Jesus is an undercover boss this morning, coming unrecognized into the presence of his followers as they make their way to the village of Emmaus, we might catch a scene of disappointment. The disciples don’t seem to know what their purpose is anymore. Maybe they’re too grief-stricken to concentrate. They don’t believe the news they’ve heard. Maybe they’re suspicious of the preposterous message that the women have brought them from the tomb. Furthermore, even with all the help from the prophets and scripture, the disciples can’t understand how the crucifixion and death of Jesus fits into any kind of saving plan of God’s. Why is that? Maybe they’re still too convinced of the merits typical worldly power which is enamored with violence and domination and threats and fear. Suffering and dying doesn’t seem like the way a decent divine CEO would run things. They were looking for their Messiah to start a fight. All in all, if the business of the disciples is to have faith— if the business of Jesus’s followers is to proclaim that Jesus is risen Lord of all—then they’re not up to snuff.

The main puzzler, of course, is that they don’t immediately recognize Jesus, their boss. It’s not clear why this is, but we can assume that might have something to do with their mental state. They are obviously upset; things didn’t go the way they’d expected. At one point when the undercover Jesus asks them what they’ve been talking about, it says they actually stop walking for a minute, looking sad.

Road to Emmaus (Robert Zund)

The question is: are our eyes bound to be any more open to the presence of Christ in our midst? It’s easy to look at these guys thousands of years later and call things into question, scratching our heads and wondering how they couldn’t have noticed their very leader but are we any more observant? If it’s not sorrow or grief that preoccupies us these days it could be ambition, work, busy-ness. It’s so easy to get overcommitted these days. Sometimes I even fear that church adds to that busy-ness factor, if we’re not careful. There was a report and interviewon NPR this week about how busy-ness has become the new status symbol in the United States. It used to be people bought things in order to show off their wealth and status, but now we’re showing off how packed our schedules are, how many different things we’re doing. The report said that celebrities, for example, post on social media, and whereas they used to show off things they had, now they’re tending to boast about their lack of time.

I heard about an interesting conversation a few weeks ago in our office between a high school student and a mother who was in there taking care of a baby. The student looked at the mother and said without any prompting, “I have some advice as your child gets older. Don’t let him do too many things in high school. We’re all involved in too many things these days and we’re all exhausted.” Exhausted by our busy-ness, consumed with calendars—it’s easy to see how it would distract us from possibly noticing special things like Christ in our midst.

Road to Emmaus (John Dunne)

The extremely gracious thing about Jesus on this walk to Emmaus, however, is that he doesn’t give up on them. Jesus is not going to give up on us, even when we miss him or are too preoccupied to receive him right away. He walks right along with us. Just as he does throughout his life, he will present himself over and over again, offering his grace and mercy over and over again, so that God’s foolish, stiff-necked people will have the opportunity to receive him. As he continues on their way,  he begins with Moses and the prophets and illuminates for them how Jesus’ suffering and death had already been revealed in the Scriptures. There’s no telling how many times he had done that before, but now he does it again, patiently but still secretly giving himself in the Word.

Later we find out that as Jesus was talking with them about the Scriptures, their hearts were burning within them. When I hear that phrase I often think of embers in a campfire that have grown black and cold over the course of the night. They look lifeless and useless in the morning, but really there is still a spark of life deep within them and all they need is a bit of air to coax the warmth out of them. How often have we had that happen in worship or in prayer? We feel that we’re just a shell of ourselves, our faith has died out, but then we hear the line of a hymn or a verse from Scripture and something within us begins to burn again?

What’s interesting is that conversation alone does not reveal the undercover Savior alone. It isn’t until they share a meal and Jesus breaks the bread that their eyes are opened. Depending upon how you break it down, we have about five or six different stories involving the resurrected Jesus in the four gospels. Three of those accounts—at least half, that is—involve food. The last time the disciples had been together with Jesus as a group had also involved a meal. There is something about the basic human act of eating and sharing table fellowship with one another that tells us something about God’s nature. There is something about breaking bread as a community that makes it a way through which God chooses to reveal and share himself.

Around this table in Emmaus, once the day is ending, is where the reveal happens and the undercover Savior lets his disciples in on the secret. He does not evaluate their performance or give them a rating. He does not make any judgment on the worth and success of this resurrection enterprise as if it all rides on their shoulders. He simply offers himself to them again. That’s is where this community is going to be nurtured and re-energized for its life together and its mission in the world. As he eats in their midst and takes the bread, their eyes are opened to who he really is.

A few months ago we gathered at my grandmother’s house in North Carolina for what would be our last Sunday meal with her. At the age of 98 she was moving into an assisted living facility where she would not be able to host her family for their weekly after-church southern dinner like she had for maybe sixty or seventy years. She used to live for Sunday afternoons when her family could gather and she could feed them. As I went through the buffet line that last time, getting a dab from each dish and placing it on my plate, it suddenly dawned on me that not once had I brought something to contribute to this meal. For 43 years I’d been a guest at that table and not one time had I even thought to add something I’d made or purchased. To know my Maw Maw is to know that Sunday dinner that she loved to provide. It is to know the chocolate cake and macaroni and cheese that only she can make—because we’ve asked her for the recipe a dozen times and no one can replicate it—will be there no matter what, and that you are welcome to help yourself.

The Supper at Emmaus (Carravaggio, 1602)

Such is the meal of bread and wine for our merciful Savior Jesus Christ. Eating here is to know him, to understand what his mission is all about. Here he offers himself each Sunday, each time this community gathers around this table. Our altar care volunteers grab some bread from the grocery store on the way to church, set the table with the chalice and wine, and Jesus shows up to let us know just what he’s made of. His body is once again broken so that we each may be made whole in forgiveness. His blood is poured out so that we can be restored. To share this meal is to know who Jesus is for us and for the whole world, as the community gathered around this table grows and grows.

Martin Luther had a very unique way of explaining just how Jesus is present for us in the meal of Holy Communion. It is not because the pastor has some special ability to transform the bread and the wine. Neither is Holy Communion just a symbol of Jesus’ body and blood, as if the only way Jesus is present is through the power of our own thoughts and memories. No, Luther said that the true body and blood of Jesus is “in, with, and under” the bread and wine. There you have it: Jesus, the risen Lord, who has conquered death for us, is our “In, With, and Under”-cover Savior.

With the ordinary acts of pouring wine and breaking bread, Jesus is the “In, With, and Under”-cover host who today comes to offer you his life once again. And he says, “Come. Don’t worry about bringing anything with you. No need to contribute to this banquet. Only the offering of your own brokenness and need is all I will take.”

And his hope is that deep within you is that smoldering ember. And as you eat and drink and hear his word your hearts will once more burn within you—that once more you realize your Lord is with you—and as you get up to go back on your way and work alongside of him you will share with the world what you really think of him.

Thanks be to God!


The Reverend Phillip W. Martin, Jr.

The Resurrection of Our Lord (Easter 1A) - April 16, 2017 (John 20:1-18)

"Peter and John running to the tomb" (Eugene Burnand, 1898)

Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord.”

On one evening a couple of years ago, Pastor Joseph and I went out for a beer after a long Wednesday at work. We drove down to Scott’s Addition to one of those breweries there, and I parked the car along the curb. It was already dark, and things were kind of winding down. As I stepped onto the sidewalk and shut my door, I looked into the window of the brewery to see if it was actually still open, and to my surprise, I saw what looked to be my Lord.

I turned around to Joseph, who was a little bit behind me, and said, “It looks like they’re still open. But Jesus is in there.” Thinking that I must be making some silly theological comment about the fact that Jesus liked to hang out where the people were, Joseph just chuckled and said, “I know. Jesus is everywhere!” So I peered into the window again, craning my neck, as Joseph came around the corner of the car. I knew my eyes weren’t lying: there was a guy dressed up like Jesus in the brewery. I had no idea what the guy was doing, but it was clearly the man from Nazareth.

Again, I said to Joseph, “No, really. Jesus in in the bar.” So we opened the door and walked up into the brewery, and sure enough, there was a guy wearing a crown of thorns, and a white tunic with a scarlet robe draped over it, with sandals on his feet. It appeared that he was leading the people of the brewery in a game or some group activity. Joseph about fell down the stairs when we saw him. But you should have seen the color that Jesus turned when he saw what looked like two priests, in their collars, coming toward him! He did look like a ghost!

Several minutes later, after he finished his game-leading duties, he immediately stripped off his crown and costume and sheepishly came over to where we were sitting to apologize to us. Imagine his surprise when we insisted he put his costume back on so we could have our photo taken with him. We had seen the Lord!

All in all, that experience reminds me of what is happening as the disciples first come to the tomb on the second morning after Jesus’ death. We have Mary Magdalene and the disciples, all reaching the tomb at different times, peering inside, seeing different things, peering into the tomb again, coming to different conclusions, ending up in different locations, and being surprised with what they learn. And the first Easter message is not “Christ is risen!” or “Death has been defeated!” but “I have seen the Lord.”

John the gospel-writer does not tell us why Mary Magdalene went to the tomb. It could have been to anoint his body with spices, but it could have just as easily been because she just wanted to be near him, the man who had inspired her and given her hope. She travels back and forth that morning, shocked and dismayed that Jesus’ tomb has not just been tampered with, but that they may have a garden-variety case of tomb-robbing on their hands. After that Peter and the anonymous other disciple take off, almost in some kind of race. But then, strangely, the one who gets there first—who parks the car along the curb and steps onto the sidewalk first—stops and just looks inside. His buddy Peter, still rounding the corner, barrels right on in there, wondering what is going on. Then they’re both in there. They take turns understanding, on their own level, why the linen wrappings were rolled up without a body. Only one of them believes what’s happened, but then neither of them fully understand. They return home, as if nothing is really strange there.

(Cerezo Berado)

It’s Mary who is left to put the pieces together, but it all comes very slowly for her too, and only through the blur of her tears and sorrow. Distraught, she even carries on a conversation with Jesus at one point, thinking he’s the gardener.

That the resurrection of Christ begins with such confusion and lack of clarity probably perplexes us on some level. The strange sequence of events, the wide range of differing reactions, are not exactly what we might expect from the first account of someone rising from the dead. After all, we are more accustomed with the news of death and terror coming this way. In broken-apart bits and puzzling pieces the bad news comes out—whether it’s from the doctor over the phone, or worse yet, the coroner, despite their best intentions to keep it straightforward, or whether it’s through the media as we filter (often on our own) fact from fiction.

It was ten years ago this day, for example, when people of this nation and even moreso of this congregation were beginning to hear the horrific news out of Blacksburg and not knowing what was real and what was false. Details were difficult to come by no matter how long we stared at the news. Everyone was wondering and guessing: How many were injured or dead? How many shooters? And, sadly, who was to blame for such an evil?

Yes, it is as precious life is shattered and enters its tomb that we often encounter confusion and fear, grief and despair, not when it bursts back from it. Interestingly, though, not one of the gospel accounts of Jesus resurrection has a witness at the tomb as he comes out of it. Instead, we hear bits and pieces like today, first this person’s account, then that person’s understanding. Some might find this to be evidence that the resurrection of Christ stands on shaky historical footing, but for me and others, it only amplifies its truthfulness. These are humans without agendas encountering something totally unprecedented and left with nothing but their real, human emotions and doubt to figure it all out.

Furthermore, it is not Jesus’ closest disciples, the men he hand-picked to learn his new way of embodying God’s law and love, who get a handle on this miracle and marshal this message to its first hearers. It is Mary Magdalene, who stands by the tomb in her grief, who is too timid or maybe too respectful to go inside it like they did, who first begins to understand what God has done. It is Mary Magdalene, whose honest response of sorrow honors all our grief at what death has done to us. All those who have ever stood at a graveside weeping, who have struggled to carry on like normal after the death of a loved one, who have felt so isolated by grief are there with Mary, seemingly alone.

Loneliness and despair is not how Mary’s story ends. Easter puts a twist ending on all the grief we bear, all the sorrow we carry with us through this life. As she stands there she is approached by the very Lord himself, and she only recognizes him when he says her name. She doesn’t piece together a theological mystery. She doesn’t recall the prophecies in the Scripture. She doesn’t dazzle anyone with her grasp on the Apostles’ Creed. She simply hears him speak her name…and she knows Jesus has returned. She knows God has triumphed over death and the grave. She hears and knows the best news, the Mother of all Balms.

Easter is God’s appearing first not to the disciples who run the fastest, or who believe the quickest, but to the ones who are weeping, questioning, stuck in their confusion. Easter is God’s surprise that we never know exactly where we might bump into the Lord next, but it’s probably best to look around the dark corners of life. The earliest Christians, in fact, built their first churches not on city squares or in the middle of some beautiful flower-bedecked valley, but basically underground, right next to the tombs and burial chambers of their loved ones. They worshiped the Lord right in the presence in the places where they had wept. They were prepared to greet the Lord, to see those bones rise up in the new creation God was bringing forth in his Son Jesus Christ.

This is what Mary’s first Easter message, “I have seen the Lord,” has done to people. It provides the courage to look death in the eye, to peer into the open tomb, to gather at the drillfield at Virginia Tech where today they will speak the names of the 32 who died because we have faith Christ is out and about. The transformation from pain and grief to joy may not be so quick for all of us, but the joy will come. Christ is risen, and we have faith that those who have cried, those who have died, will some day hear him call their name.

The other evening, as we were getting ready for worship on Maundy Thursday, a young man in our choir was complaining that he didn’t feel well. He had a headache and felt yucky and was wondering whether it might be better for him to go home and get in bed. His mother lovingly urged him to do what felt best, but suggested he might start feeling better in a few minutes and go on with the worship service. His younger sister, however, who was to be receiving her first Holy Communion that night, felt selfless compassion for him and said,  “Just go on home if you feel bad. It’s OK to miss worship. You already know how the story ends.”

Yes, now we do. We know how the story ends. Mary has seen the Lord. So, Joseph, you, me, all of us: you never know where we might bump into him again.

Thanks be to God!


The Reverend Phillip W. Martin, Jr.

Maundy Thursday - April 13, 2017 (Exodus 12:1-14, John 13:1-17, 31b-35)

“The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: this month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you” (Exodus 12:1-2)

It must take a lot to start time over. It must take an event so big, so significant, so meaningful to begin an entirely new and different calendar.

I know that each year in about July, our office administrator, Hanne, orders new daily planners for all the staff. It’s a little strange and yet invigorating to be thinking about what might happen past January of the next year when we’re still in the middle of the current one, to look ahead and see all of those blank white squares advancing into the future, ready for action, but that’s not even what’s happening here for the people of Israel. God isn’t just ordering them next year’s daily planner. God is marking a brand new set of months for them. This is a new beginning of time itself, like they’re starting over at zero.

And it was new in both of the ways people counted time back then—the movement of the moon and the movement of the sun. The sun was the way yearly time was marked and the moon, with its easily discernible phases each night, was how monthly time was marked. Therefore this moment they find themselves in is not just the beginning of a new month, but a whole new year. Everything, therefore, is starting anew. All that came before is a different era, and this is the moment that begins it all.

It is certainly is significant, by all accounts. They are being set free from a life of slavery in Egypt. They are being released from a life as no people at all, a life at the bottom of society, which is all that they had every known. God has heard their cry and, in his grace, God is going to make a way for them to live a new life. God is going to give them a name and a home and restore them to their proper place as his holy people, shining in the world. From now on, no matter how many new daily planners they buy, the progress of time will be marked from this point, the moment they were freed.

unleavened bread, a Passover staple

And each year when the anniversary of this event is remembered, the people of God and their descendants will gather like they did that first time when they were commanded by Moses and Aaron. They will slaughter a lamb like they did back then and they will eat bread made without any yeast because there was no time for it to rise. They will remember how they ate with their traveling clothes on and sandals on their feet because they were in a hurry. Time was starting over. Is was the Passover of the Lord. In fact, Rabbi Gamaliel, a teacher of great authority who was alive at the time of Jesus, is reported to have said about celebrating the Passover, “In every generation a man must so regard himself as if he himself came forth out of Egypt.”^[1]

This was the meal that Jesus gathered his disciples for on his last evening. We have come to call it the Last Supper, his last time with his disciples for teaching and sharing fellowship. Even Jesus was certainly aware that time for him was winding down. And tonight, once we celebrate this supper, we will conclude with the stripping of the altar, a powerful ritual that certainly feels like a bitter end.

"The Last Supper" (El Greco, 1568)

To some degree, all of this is true, all of these “lasts.” Jesus is about to hand over his life and there is an air of finality hanging in around tonight. However, it is important to remember that this was still mainly a meal about beginnings, about time starting over again, about countless blank white squares laid out into the future before the people of God.

On some level, that’s what would have been going through the disciples’ minds as they sat around that table with Jesus. They would have been thinking about the bread baked quickly, the blood spread over the door. And they would have been thinking about those sandaled feet, ready to run out the door and into that new freedom.

So when in the middle of all this Jesus gets up and begins washing feet, they realize something profound must be going on. Those are feet that should be dirty—and that’s OK! They are supposed to be ready to travel! As he takes those feet in his hands, maybe even untying the sandals, Jesus slows them down, and prepares them for a new kind of freedom, a new kind of life. In washing their feet that evening during the Passover celebration, Jesus gives his disciples a new vision for what following God will entail and a bold new definition for what freedom in his name will look like. It will entail acts of humility and servanthood in ways that build up community. It will look like stooping down at the feet of others, tending with kindness and care to the lowlier, more neglected aspects of their lives. And perhaps the part that shocks us most: those who normally have authority and who are in positions of control and expertise take on thankless tasks of love.

So, in the middle of a meal that is all about remembering who they are Jesus sets this lesson about how they relate to each other will be their true identifying marker. In the midst of an event that is about new beginnings, Jesus hands them a new commandment. And in the middle of a celebration that is based on people from the very bottom of society finally being lifted up, Jesus goes from the place of authority down to the floor.

What he’s doing is starting time over. He’s giving them a brand new beginning. And he’s going to do it by offering his body and shedding his own blood.

This is the meal that he shares with his disciples, the meal that Christ shares with us tonight. It may be his last Supper, but for us it is a time to start anew, just as it is every time we eat of his body and drink of his blood. He makes it his end so that we can have new beginnings. Each time we share this meal, each time we digest his words, we know his forgiveness for us. We are set free, we begin anew, as if time starts over for our soul, for our feet, for our life. We get a new calendar, full of blank squares to live. But because it is also a time for us to remember our identity as servants of the Servant Lord, it means we don’t just run out into the world, filling those blank squares with whatever we want. We now have a freedom to serve others, to love one another like Christ has loved us.

As you know, the world will always present us with plenty of opportunities to practice this new covenant and live this new freedom these days. It seems like the stakes are being raised these days, though. Many of you may have heard of the bombings in Coptic Churches in Egypt this past weekend as worshippers were gathered for Palm Sunday. Terrorists made their way into the congregation and detonated bombs while the Christians were worshipping. Nearly 50 died and many more were wounded in what would be their last worship service on earth. I’ve read that several of the congregations in middle Egypt, where there are higher percentages of Christians amidst the predominantly Muslim population, are still going to gather for Easter services this weekend, but they are scaling them back out of respect for the dead.

Mar Girgis (St. George) Coptic Church in Tanta, Egypt,
site of one of the Palm Sunday 2017 bombings

I’m sure it must be unbelievably difficult to know how to forge ahead in the wake of such despicable tragedy and evil. I do not purport to be an expert in it. I think it would be easy to give into hatred and anger and violence, or, better yet, apathy and denial of that Christian identity. Yet the Copts are coming out in droves to show their love and support for each other, surely a strong witness of this new commandment Jesus gives. In a sermon called, “A Message to Those Who Killed us,” delivered earlier this week, one Coptic priest, Father Boules George, took the opportunity to preach directly to those who carried out the bombings and to those who might be planning more. Instead of anger or despair, he preached thanksgiving and love. He says at one point to the murderers, “thanks for refilling our churches for us.” Normally on the Monday of Holy week the attendance is very low, but this week they were there by the thousands. He says every nook and cranny of the churches were filled with worshippers. People they’ve begged for years to come to church were there. He also preached about love. He says at one point, “I want to explain to you about our Christ. I want to tell you about how wonderful He is.”^[2]

As I read the sermon I realized these must be words from someone who has shared supper with a Lord who has set him free. It is the witness of someone with washed feet—washed and sandaled—cleansed, ready to go out into the world and live this new beginning of love. Since the first time this meal was celebrated with Jesus, the enemies of God have circled around with crosses, spears, and suicide bombing jackets with the intent to intimidate and eradicate his followers. However, all those different enemies have come and gone, appearing and then eventually disappearing into the shadows of history without ever altering our message.

That is life in our new calendar. The community of this meal and its Host remains, growing, beating with the heartbeat of forgiveness, through all eras of time—through countless blank, open squares of countless calendars. Today, he beckons you and me…and Samuel, and Krista and Clare and Patrick and Fiona…again to take the bread and the cup, to begin again the journey of freedom and service.

With broken body and blood that is shed, he wants to explain to you about himself.

Taste and see how wonderful he is.

 

icon of Jesus washing feet

Amen.

The Reverend Phillip W. Martin, Jr.

---

[1] The Spirit of Early Christian Thought, Robert Louis Wilken. Yale University Press, 2003. P 34

[2] http://www.copticdadandmom.com/fr-boules-george/

The Fifth Sunday in Lent - April 2, 2017 (John 1:1-45)

One of the lessons our seminary worship and music professor, Dr. Hawkins, hammered into our brains in class was the importance of being ready to receive a funeral procession as it arrived at the church on the day of a funeral. Dr. Hawkins was not ordained, and he understood deeply that the sight of the pastor at the front of the church to a grieving family making their way into the sanctuary with the casket of their loved one was an important gesture of pastoral care. Perhaps because he wasn’t ordained is why he understood this so deeply. He had always been on the receiving end of things like this. It’s why he wanted us, budding young pastors, to take this seriously. When death was involved, when real grief was involved, we needed to be on point. We needed to bring our A-game. If at all possible, he thought, we shouldn’t just be standing at the door of the church, but already in our vestments. The sight of the pastor dressed and ready to face death and people’s brokenness, to Dr. Hawkins’, at least, communicated comfort, communicated compassion right from the outset.

it's sunny here, but in my mind it is rainy

And so every time he brought this up, which seemed like every class session, I imagined myself the only place I could—standing in robes at the tippy-top of the front stairs at my home congregation, in the rain, as a long, slow procession of black cars with their headlights on pulled up to the church. There I was, in the right spot at the right time, filling my utmost role as a pastor and someone who was called to speak life into death. It wasn’t until I became a pastor when I realized death and funerals are almost never that choreographed. There is often no procession arriving from the funeral home, people don’t always come through the front door of the church, and nowadays, especially, the time frame for when viewings occur and when all the family arrive is so fluid. It’s almost impossible to know exactly when a worship leader is supposed to be where.

In any case, Dr. Hawkins would have been extremely displeased with Jesus in this morning’s gospel lesson, which tells the last and most dramatic story of Jesus’ ministry before he heads into Jerusalem to die. I mean, talk about not having a clue! Lazarus gets gravely ill, then he dies, then they have a funeral and a procession, and then place him in the tomb, and Jesus is nowhere to be found for any of it! He’s not in Bethany, where Lazarus and his sister’s live, even though he’s told to go there. He’s not at the tomb to be a presence of compassion and caring     for the grief-stricken. He’s certainly not in his holy vestments, standing at the top of the staircase in the rain ready to speak hope into the darkness of death. There’s even a point in the story when it sounds like Jesus dilly-dallies a bit. Maybe it’s because he fears for his life as he travels into Judea but he waits two days longer before he starts on his way.

Martha’s and Mary’s searing question to Jesus highlights his absence. She speaks for all of us—doesn’t she?—who have ever found ourselves shocked by sudden loss, who have found ourselves stunned by the cruel timing of death, or the unexpected hospitalization, or the scary diagnosis, and wondering how it all might have gone differently. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

The Raising of Lazarus (Giotto, 14th century)

And just look at the scene by Lazarus’ tomb when he does finally arrive: things are out of control!! A whole crowd has gathered, and they’re following Martha and Mary around, weeping as they go. Even Jesus himself seems to get caught up in the emotions of the day. First, we’re told two different times that he becomes disturbed and moved, and then we’re told that he, too, starts to cry. It makes you wonder: perhaps this all could have been prevented—if not Lazarus’ death, then at least the sobbing and open weeping—if Jesus had just made good timing his priority, or if he had been more concerned about communicating his compassion.

The raising of Lazarus, which is what this event is often called, isn’t primarily about Jesus’ timing and preparedness to deal with human tragedy. It’s not about the magical effect brought about by being in the right time and the right place. In fact, it sounds as if Jesus casual approach to Bethany is part of his plan. It’s like he’s late to the scene just so that he can show God’s glory doesn’t work on a time schedule. God is not bossed around by time, as if it’s something he has to deal with or work against, which is how we often feel. Jesus’ raising of Lazarus is a moment when we are given the chance to see that in Christ, God has power over death and sin. It is a point where we are shown that God in Christ is able to overcome the decay and the destruction that confronts every one of us, even after we die!

When Jesus arrives on the scene and Lazarus has already been dead four days, Jesus does not say, “I am the treatment and the cure,” or “I am the prevention and the medicine.” Or, “I am the compassion at the right time.” His words are “I am the resurrection and the life.” Jesus isn’t going to just deal with death, hold it off, or stand at the top of the concrete stairs and comfort people in the rain. He’s going to conquer it. And while to us things so much of the time often look like “all is lost,” while we still deal with the grief and the sorrow Jesus has yet given his own life to make sure that grief and sorrow don’t have the final word.

Raising of Lazarus (Rembrandt, 1620s)

Lazarus’ tomb is actually getting the disciples ready for what will happen in Jerusalem. That’s why Jesus begins to talk about his own death before he heads there. The world is increasingly hostile to him, but Jesus is going to head into it anyway, and just as he stands at the edge of the tomb after Lazarus has been dead four days, Jesus will go straight into his own death on the cross. He will go straight into his own death to reveal that God is done once and for all with the things that separate us from him and send the living into disarray.

Jesus is the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in this, those who grasp this by faith, understand that death will not be their final destination. Those who trust in Jesus come to know that our deaths, no matter how sad or tragic, are not the end of us. Jesus will stand on the brink of death and shout, “Come out!” and one day our bones will join together and walk right out.

The news these days reminds us that the world is filled with valleys of dry bones, places where despair and hopelessness reign. And yet we can still trust that God is raising up new life, undoing the decay of the tomb to remind us of the day to come. This week there was the news of the loss of Michael Sharp, a 34-year-old American aid worker who whose body was found in a shallow grave in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Sharp devoted his life to trying to attain peace in one of the worlds longest and bloodiest conflicts, which has been waged for years in the remotest regions of Africa. He started out as part of a Christian missionary team, but his bold an unorthodox way of bringing about peace among the rebels was so successful that he was eventually appointed by the United Nations to lead some of their teams. Like Jesus at Lazarus’ tomb, so confident that dealing openly and honestly with long-festering feelings of decay and anger was the best way forward, Sharp would walk into the dark jungle with each attempt, armed with nothing but his desire to listen and have dialogue with the fighters’ feelings. Before he died, it is estimated that Sharp’s tactics persuaded over 1600 fighters to lay down their weapons and come back out of the jungle, like Lazaruses released from the tomb, unbound from the ways of hatred and violence. Michael Sharp’s death was felt by the international peacekeeping community, but even now we know that God will raise him up in the eternal kingdom he worked so hard to tell others about during his life.

Emily and other YAGM personnel at Robben Island

I also heard from our own missionary in Africa this week, Emily Dietrick. Emily grew up as a child of this congregation, and now she is serving as an ELCA Young Adult in Global Mission in a much more serene and peaceful part of Africa, South Africa, but nevertheless a country with its own history of conflict and violence, a history it is still dealing coming to terms with. Last week she visited Robben Island, the notorious tomb-like prison that housed the blacks who spoke out against that country’s racist policies of apartheid prior to 1991. Robben Island’s most famous inmate was Nelson Mandela.

Emily received her tour from a man who served seven years there, a man who was subjected to repeated rounds of torture and interrogation. His crime was leaving and re-entering the country without a valid passport. Emily said that he ended their tour by saying, “There is power in forgiveness.” This man walks even now, out from his tomb of oppression, because he has been summoned forth by the hope of reconciliation even with his enemies, the power of life triumphing over death. There is hope, too, in the presence of congregations who form young people to have faith in the power of Jesus' life so that they can seek out experiences like Emily.

“I am the resurrection and the life,” Jesus says. And it appears that through lives like that former prisoner, and those like Michael Sharp, there is faith in Jesus’ power to conquer darkness, evidence that sacrificial love ultimately wins and the world is made new. This resurrection is promised in our baptism, and this life is offered for us now in the bread and the wine.

We often weep, too, like the people at Lazarus’ tomb, our vision of a bright future blurred by our tears, our frustration with the timing of it all, the multitude of dry bones around us. And yet we are also called forth to live in the hope of that future, to know that by the strength of his grace we, too, have the ability to stand in the midst of the world’s suffering…at the edge of the jungle…in the rain, at the top of whatever staircase we can imagine, and announce to those who are just pulling up and don’t know what comes next in their heartbreak: “But even now the Lord is here. Even now he brings new life. Yes, Lord, you know. These bones will live.”

It wouldn’t just make Dr. Hawkins happy. Jesus would be proud.

Thanks be to God!


The Reverend Phillip W. Martin, Jr.