When Mary came where Jesus was and
saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, "Lord, if you had been
here, my brother would not have died." When Jesus saw her weeping, and the
Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and
deeply moved. He said, "Where have you laid him?" They said to him,
"Lord, come and see." Jesus began to weep. 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, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone
was lying against it. Jesus said, "Take away the stone." Martha, the
sister of the dead man, said to him, "Lord, already there is a stench
because he has been dead four days." Jesus said to her, "Did I not
tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?" So they
took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, "Father, I thank
you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this
for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent
me." When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, "Lazarus,
come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of
cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him,
and let him go." ~ John 11:32-44
In her book Accidental Saints,
Nadia Bolz-Weber shares the story of discovering a new saint out on a walk with
a friend in Denver. They noticed a small memorial plaque next to a Pentecostal
Church called Pillar of Fire. The inscription read, “Alma White, founder of the
Pillar Church, 1901.” Excited by the thought of a female church planter, Nadia
quickly googled her name and came across a Wikipedia article which she read
with growing excitement and admiration: “Alma Bridwell White (June 16, 1862 –
June 26, 1946) . . . founder and bishop of Pillar of Fire Church . . . first female
bishop in the United States . . . and noted
for her feminism . . .” Her heart fell, however, as the article continued “and her association with the Klu Klux Klan,
her anti-Catholicism, anti-Semitism, racism, and hostility to immigrants.”
The next day Nadia called her friend Sara, an Episcopal priest, to tell
her the story of how she thought she had a hero only to find out she was a
despicable racist. Sara’s response, however, was equally surprising and troubling
to Nadia, “E-mail me her name. I’ll add her to the Litany of the Saints along
with all the other broken people of God.”
Is that right? Should we light a candle, speak the name, of a racist on
All Saints’ Day? Doesn’t this beg the question, “what or who is a saint?” How
are saints made? Who is it we celebrate on All Saints’ Day and why would it
matter? Well, I imagine this morning that Lazarus might have something to say to
us about that in what I am calling the Gospel according to Lazarus. The Gospel
according to Lazarus is that . . .
1.
Saints
stink – they also cry, complain, doubt, and do stupid things!
What or who is a saint? We often imagine that a
saint is a good example, a special person, one who has persevered against
incredible odds to live a holy life, a dramatic life of sacrifice for God and
others, and that’s not altogether a bad definition. Where would be without
Martin Luther King, Jr.’s activism, Mother Theresa’s charity, Martin Luther’s
theological insights? But that’s not the
definition of the NT and often not a reflection of real life. According to the
NT, a saint, is anyone following Jesus – badly, with a limp, distracted,
depressed, whatever. Paul captures the point perfectly in about every epistle when
he greets churches with the statement, “To all the saints in Christ Jesus at .
. . Corinth . . . Philippi . . . ,” etc. Now, he doesn’t say, “To all the
saints in Christ Jesus except Bob, Mary, Jon?!, – no, not that guy, that guy is
not a saint, a great example of a screw up, but not a saint.” In fact, Paul
says this of churches with people who are doing some despicable stuff – drunk,
promiscuous, bad theology – stinky stuff.
In our story, Martha is that typical church member like
you and me who’s worried about that. She doesn’t want Jesus to have to smell
that. “Wait, Jesus, you don’t know what you’re doing. Don’t open that! He
stinks!” And Jesus responds, “Don’t worry, Martha, did I not tell you that what
stinks can become the glory of God!” Jesus’ preoccupation with people who stink
points us in a particular direction. It’s why I’m not a fan of the typical memorial
service type of funeral – it often forces us to speak about the dead as if they
were Jesus. On more than one occasion, I have attended a memorial service for a
beautiful individual who was made to sound perfect – that they smelled
wonderful. I don’t know how other people felt but my heart was broken because
what the pastor conveyed was not good news for sinners but heroic
do-it-yourself thinking by which the ill, the broken, supposedly never
questioned their circumstances, never questioned God, never wept over lost
opportunities because Saints, their praise suggest, never do those things. It
grieved me because in their over-the-top praise of the dead there was no place
for truth telling. Friends, if there is no stench, then often there can be no
glory for God because deodorized people often only bring glory to themselves. Churches,
in other words, should stink. And we can best do that when we confess who we
truly are. That’s why we have confession. And why if there were saints here
among us – they would confess not their accomplishments but their sins to you.
If Martin Luther King, Jr., the saint, stood here among us he would confess
that he had multiple extra-marital affairs. If Mother Theresa, the saint, stood
here among us she would confess that she had bone crushing doubt about God’s
own existence. If Martin Luther, the saint, stood here among us he would
confess writing horrific anti-Jewish statements and calling on political
leaders to slaughter poor peasants. If Lazarus, the saint, stood here among us,
he would say, “Wow, I stank!” If the Lazarus story has any meaning for us as a
church it is that our job is to tell Jesus, “Come and see” and lead him not to
our charity, our growing programs, our beautiful sanctuary, our well-crafted
worship – it’s to lead him to the stinky places, to the tombs, so that we can
witness the glory of God. And what’s that glory – that you can stink and still
be a saint. You can smell and still dwell in the presence of Jesus. That though you
are dead – Jesus will still call your name.
Lazarus story reminds us that Jesus loves 4th
day problems. Fourth day problems are “no hope” kinds of difficulties. The soul
according to Jewish belief lingered in the vicinity of the body three days
after death. According to Jewish conviction, a resuscitation of one who had
died was impossible on the fourth day, since the soul would not enter again
into the body that had been altered or decomposed. But Jesus isn’t bothered by
the smell – so you shouldn’t be either – he will look at the carcass of your
life and say, “Bob, Mary, Howard . . . I love you. Now, get up, stinky ones . .
. for the glory of God.”
This is not a spirituality of anything goes but one
that says, “When it comes. I can let it go. I don’t have to hide my stink from
anyone, especially Jesus." It begins when we open our tombs to his inspection. In
AA they have a truthful phrase and that’s truth with a capital “T” – “You’re
only as sick as the secrets you keep.” In church we say it this way, “The most spiritual
thing we can do in the presence of the Great Physician is to show him our
wounds.”
Do parts of your life smell like the stench of four
days dead? Lead Jesus there – and the
Lazarus story clues us into how he will respond - weeping, frustrated by anyone
who thinks he can do nothing with the dead. Frustrated? That's right! Most English translations have the
Bible saying that Jesus was “greatly disturbed”
- but English scholars have whitewashed the Greek here. The weight of
exegetical, historical and textual evidence renders this plainly in vs. 33 “he
became angry in spirit and very agitated,” and in vs. 38, “Jesus therefore,
again in a state of anger within, comes to the tomb.” But even in his
agitation, make no mistake, in the end people will say, “See how he loved him
or her.”
2.
Second,
the Gospel of Lazarus wants us to know that Jesus loves dead people.
Two interesting things about Lazarus in this
passage. 1) First, in more than one verse in chapter 11, the writer John wants
us to know that Jesus loved Lazarus (vs. 2, 36). “See how he loved him,” the
people remarked as they observe Jesus weeping. And yet this point is made all
the more astounding when placed alongside the second point. 2) Lazarus never
does anything in the Gospels other than die and stink – he isn’t spoken of as
following Jesus, sacrificing for him or facing hardship. He doesn’t do some
extraordinary act like climb a tree to see Jesus, give all his money to the poor,
anoint Jesus’ feet with costly oil, touch the hem of Jesus’ garment, or make
some bold claim about Jesus’ identity. No, his Gospel witness is being the “dead
guy” who Jesus loved and woke up.
Speaking of the dead, last week was Reformation
Sunday – and if there is a Reformed message for us this week in the Gospel
according to Lazarus it is expressed by these words from the dead Christian
Martin Luther “simul iustus et peccator,”
that the Christian is [simultaneously righteous and a sinner].” This was
possibly Martin Luther’s finest theological point and worthy of our attention. Luther
argued that being a Christian does not mean that one always acts righteously –
that salvation is God implanting righteousness within a person. If this were
the case, he pondered, how can we make sense of so many Christians who continue
to do sinful things – big and small. How do we make sense of so many fallen
saints? Luther argues, instead, that righteousness is external to us. He refers
to it as “alien righteousness.” He means that we are righteousness not because
of what we do or don’t do - but because God treats, or reckons, us as righteous
as if it were a part of us. Martin Luther said, “The saints are always
conscious of their sin, and seek righteousness from God in accordance with his
mercy, they are always reckoned as righteous by God.” That declaration of
righteousness by God, in other words, is what allows us to announce our sin and
frees us from trying to earn God’s love. We can’t earn anything – we’re dead. This
side of heaven, in other words, holiness is imputed not imparted to us. This
side of Jesus’ return, the book of Revelation tells us, we are saints who weep
(Rev. 21:4). It means that despite our vast capacity for self-centeredness,
self-deception, sinfulness, or outright cruelty – our salvation and healing are
not dependent upon cleaning things up or even responding heroically. What I am
trying to do this morning is to read the raising of Lazarus as a “parable of
grace”, an analogy for all of us zombie Christians who are trying to live the
Christian life but continually stinking it up. Our salvation is simply
dependent upon Jesus.
So our success in the Christian life, our ability to
follow, our desire for godly things are always secondary to the
all-encompassing work of Jesus who declares us to be righteous by simply
screaming our name and calling us to “Wake up!” And Lazarus, doesn’t come out
and say, “Did you see how I walked out of that tomb? Pretty impressive huh?”
As one picture of the Christian life (and there are
many), it’s interesting to be reminded that the following that Lazarus does is
not by some courageous choice or thoughtful, reasoned argument but a lot more
like waking up. The older of gotten that is also the picture that has resonated
with me. If you asked me what I’ve done in my life that has gotten me closer to
God, or more spiritual, I often have to admit that I’m unsure. If I’ve learned
anything about Christianity it’s probably the same thing that Lazarus learned–
that following Jesus is not so much about what you do but what is done to you, maybe
even while you were sleeping.
The Gospel according to Lazarus reminds us that what
we celebrate in the saints is not their piety or perfection but the fact that
we believe in a God who gets redemptive and holy things done in this world
through flawed human beings – even smelly, dead ones. What makes us saintly,
what connects us to Jesus, in other words, is not our ability to be good but
rather God’s desire to work through sinners. The Gospel of Lazarus is that God loves
and calls us while we were yet stinky and while we could do nothing – we were
dead at the time. The title “saint” is always conferred, never earned. All
saints, in the end, are like Lazarus. I’ve never heard one – particularly the
ones we tend to admire – say, “I did this myself.” And if our righteousness is
not determined by our success – then it’s not hampered by our failure.
So what is our response? What’s our job? It’s to
unbind one another from the grave clothes. We can’t bring back the dead but we
can make it easier for them to get around. We are to help those made alive by
Jesus begin to walk in the light - to remove the things that hamper their walk, that cover their face. And if that’s the case, then why do people
think we are so cemetery-like and why do so many Christians try and strangle
one another or outsiders with these pieces of cloth? If Jesus is all about
going into stinky places to bring people to life why are we so adamant that
society better clean itself up? As you go today, you have one mission - to unbind those who Jesus loves, those stinky people that Jesus is making alive.
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