CYCLE A 5TH SUNDAY LENT 2011
PICTURE your self at the cemetery, stationed near the grave site and casket of one someone who died. Remember the range of emotions that you went through. If it was someone you loved deeply, you were probably heart-sick. If for someone you really didn’t know, …well, you probably were not as emotionally attach. But by your presence your compassionate support for the grieving is evident.
‘LETTING GO’, is one thing and it’s never easy. But no matter who’s funeral and grave side rites we’ve been at, there always seems to be a deep yearning from with in to know the mystery, both physical and spiritual, of what happens WHEN DEATH TAKES AWAY LIFE?
Our readings today want to give us a PICTURE of God, that can help us to put a POSITIVE SPIN on end life events, because it seems so many times to be a period of emptiness in our lives. And that IMIAGE our Gospel wants us to picture is: GOD…that is JESUS STANDING at the TOMB with you. If Jesus is not standing there with us; then what we will most commonly feel is despair. With out Jesus standing there, we know that MAN in death, is at one of his most vulnerable moments; will have to GIVE IN to thinking, that the GRAVE TRIUMPHANTS over LIFE.
But today in this 5th Sunday of Lent, as we hear the 1st and 3rd readings, they show us that if we believe in God and in Christ, we can come to HOPE for life, for some day, all graves will be EMPTIED. So now we know that while death takes away life…we also can believe that we must go through death to get it back. But only with Jesus does LIFE TRIUMPANT OVER DEATH.
In the 1st reading the PICTURE God we get comes through the Prophet Ezekiel. God is telling the Israelites who are in captivity in Babylon, “…I will put my spirit in you and you will live and I will place you in your own land.” Ezekiel though was not there to console a family or a few friends over the death of a loved one. Ezekiel is speaking to an ENTIRE PEOPLE over the DEATH of their nation and DESTRUCTION of their religious holy places. While in exile, the land of Babylon served as their communal Grave. So STANDING in the area that contained the graves and DRIED BONES of the Israelite people, God through Ezekiel, called all Israelites to again believe and trust in Him. His words indirectly reveal a final ‘Resurrection of the Body’. But for now, Ezekiel gives them ASSURANCE that there SOON would be a ‘Resurrection of their Nation’. The Jewish people, would return to Israel from exile in Babylon and rebuild their cities and temple in Jerusalem.
The reading in Luke gives us more personal picture of God. For in Lazarus, we have A PERSON who gets sick and dies probably at an early age. We understand that the family (Lazarus, Martha and Mary) and Jesus are good friends. The emotions of ANGER and HURT are present. Martha said, “Jesus if only you would have been here, my brother would not have died’. SORROW is apparent as Jesus too, CRIES. Then there is the REALITY of death… Martha affirms it: “Lord, by now there will be a stench, he as been dead four days”.
But the Gospel of Luke shows us an important thing we all must come to know. Jesus is in CONTROL. And He is STANDING at the Grave, right along with the mourners, wanting to do something for the ones He loves. He wants to show us 1 last great Miracle, before He too will be laid in His tomb. He wants to give us the miracle that shows us that… the plan of the Father is to restore people back to Life after death. For the ‘Resurrection of the Body’ was a concept that the people of that time struggled to PUT A FACE ON.
The climax of this great miracle in Luke’s Gospel, comes when Jesus tells the people to “Roll the Stone Away”. And then we hear Jesus loudly call: “Lazarus, Come forth”! (pause) And he did. Then Jesus says, “unbind him and let him go”.
“Unbind him and let him go.” This is a great point of the John’s Gospel and it is twofold. (1st) While PHYSICAL Death does have a grip on us for the time being, Jesus Promises to restore our BODIES back to a glorious New life. Sickness, Death and Decay will be gone on the last day.
But (2ndly) and BEST OF ALL for us right here and now, in Lazarus being raised back to life, the Gospel reminds us that there is SPIRITUAL side to DEATH as well. So while alive here on earth, we can PICTURE Jesus at our side to break the grip of spiritual death for our souls as well. The promise of ‘NEW LIFE’ is given to us at our BAPTISM, ‘NEW LIFE’ is given to when we go to CONFESSION and ‘NEW LIFE’ is given as we receive Jesus in the EUCHARIST.
The Jesus who we PICTURE as being present at each Grave Site, is now present each time we are at any Sacramental Site. Always he ‘Calls us Forth’ and gives us His Spirit to help us to UNBIND, what has us BOUND and TO LET US FO FREE. Now PICTURE that!
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