Fifth Sunday in Lent; 26 March 20023; Lent 5A (RCL); Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:6-11; John 11:1-45.
The story of the raising of Lazarus has always puzzled me, and continues to do so. I think that’s partly what John intended. There is no single meaning or interpretation of the story, but it is meant to pose unanswerable questions. At the heart of my puzzlement are the verbs used in v. 33. The NRSV translates, “he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved.” The Greek would be better translated “he was indignant in spirit and agitated,” when he sees the commotion around Lazarus’ tomb.
Translators have tried to tone down Jesus’ response in this verse, and commentators have struggled to make sense of Jesus’ response: what was he angry about, and why so upset? I think, since this occurs in the last of Jesus’ seven signs in John’s Gospel and the most dramatic, that it is the classic example of misdirection and misunderstanding as literary devices in the Gospel. Jesus is pissed because no one, not even Mary and Martha, have understood who he is.
Difficulties, of course, start early in the story. Why does Jesus delay? It almost seems as if he is grandstanding. He wants to make sure Lazarus is dead, so that the glory of God can be revealed (compare to the man born blind — the purpose of the blindness was to reveal the works of God). And then the disciples misunderstand Jesus when he tells them that Lazarus has fallen asleep. If he has fallen asleep, he must be on the mend, so why risk going to Judea, where the Judeans were just trying to kill Jesus? And then, Thomas says, “Let us also go, so that we may die with him.” Die with Jesus, or with Lazarus?
When Jesus arrives, Martha comes out to meet him and says, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” She is scolding him for his delay, as well she should. Of course she goes on to add, “Even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” All throughout the Gospel, we’ve been warned that to believe on the basis of the signs is to misunderstand who Jesus is. Jesus replies, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha says, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” The misunderstanding leaps off the page here. That’s not at all what Jesus is talking about.
Jesus replies with a great I AM statement: I AM the resurrection and the life,” and then adds a very puzzling set of parallel statements: “The one who believes in me, even though he dies will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She responds, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” Here is part of the source of Jesus’ anger. That is not at all what he asked her. She frames her belief in Jesus in terms of an expected Messiah at the end times. Jesus is talking about resurrection and life right now.
Martha gives Jesus no opportunity to correct her misunderstanding, but goes to call Mary, who upbraids Jesus in the same words her sister used. This time, however, the Judeans who were consoling Mary are now in the picture as well. Jesus is pissed because everyone is expecting a sign, which is not the point of the Gospel. Instead, the story is raising the question, “What is life, really, and what is resurrection?” Jesus asks where they have laid Lazarus, and the crowd responds, “Come and see,” exactly the vocabulary Jesus used with the two disciples of John the Baptist who had followed him and asked him where he remained. So we should expect this story to help answer their initial question, “Where do you remain?”
John is very careful to tell us at the end of the story that Lazarus is a “dead man.” Mary is called the sister of the dead man, and when Lazarus emerges from the tomb, we are told that “the dead man came out.” And when he comes out, he is still bound with his grave clothes, in contrast to Jesus’ resurrection, where the grave clothes are neatly folded up. This whole story is set up to contrast the raising of Lazarus with Jesus’ resurrection. Resurrection is not the resuscitation of corpses (what Martha is expecting at the last day). When Mary (perhaps the same Mary?) enters Jesus’ tomb, she sees two angels in the tomb, just like the cherubim over the mercy seat in the inner sanctum of the Temple. Here is the answer to the question, “Where do you remain.” We are invited to come and see an empty tomb.
Jesus tells Mary in the garden that he is embarking on a journey to his God and our God, his Father and our Father. I believe John sees believing in Jesus as embarking on a new journey along the wilderness way. Life and resurrection have something to do with how we navigate that journey. The tomb is empty — it no longer has any power over us, and in fact is like the empty space between the cherubim in the inner sanctum, the very sign of God’s presence.
The Gospel of John doesn’t tell us how to live as if death has no power, as if the tomb is empty, but invites us to come and see. What it does tell us is that this way of living, this resurrection, won’t fit into any of our preexisting categories. We’ll have to make the journey to find out.