A sermon by Robin Hudson, Director of Family Ministries 5th Sunday of Lent March 9. 2008

(First, read the text for this sermon: John 11:1-45)

This may be a very unusual question to pose to you this morning, but how do you view death? I dare say that I could go around to each of you here, and depending on your age, where you’re from, how you were raised or because of experiences you’ve encountered in life, there would be many different views. Some would say that they fear death, maybe because they are young and see so much of life ahead of them still. Some may say that they don’t want to think about it, therefore they don’t. Some may say that they don’t fear death because they have lived a rich life and trust in God for the hereafter.

I must admit up until seven months ago when my mother passed away I didn’t think much about death. Even though my father had passed six years earlier, and certainly that changed things in my life, I had not given it much thought outside of death being a part of life. But by virtue of my relationship with my mother, the fact that I am now considered middle aged, and by having children of my own, recently I’ve been thinking, reading, and reflecting on this thing we call death, AND life.
What do you suppose it would be like if a person could lose his or her fear of death? What if that dark at the end of the tunnel that awaits every one of us ceased to be something that we dreaded and avoided and was looked on as a portal, or birthing, of the beginning of a new adventure?

Years ago there was a little known play by Eugene O’Neill entitled “Lazarus Laughed.” It was by no means a commercial success. In fact, it closed just a week after it opened on Broadway. But I wonder after hearing about this play if O’Neill put his finger on the functional significance of this miracle story we read today about Lazarus being raised from the dead.

We see here from the scripture passage this morning that Lazarus had been dead for four days when Jesus came to the village of Bethany, risking his own life to give life to Lazarus because the Jews were about to stone Jesus on his last trip to that region, and Jesus escaped. But now Jesus had come back because of his love for Lazarus and his sisters, Mary and Martha. When they lead Jesus to the tomb, he told them to roll the stone back, and then he called out “Lazarus come forth”, and Lazarus walked out of the tomb, thus Jesus gave him back the gift of life.
The play begins where the Biblical story leaves off. As the curtain goes up, Lazarus is seen stumbling out of the dark, into the bright sunlight. Then after the grave clothes are taken off of him he begins to laugh a gentle, soft laugh; nothing bitter, but an embracing, astonishing, welcoming sound. The very first thing he does is to embrace Jesus with gratitude. Then he begins to embrace his sisters and the other people who were gathered there.

Then he begins to look at everything around him as if experiencing it for the first time. And the very first words he utters is, “Yes, yes, yes” as if to embrace reality as it is being discovered all over again.

At this point in the play, Lazarus makes his way back to his house, and then finally someone finds the courage to ask him, “Lazarus, tell us what it’s like to die. What lies on the other side of this boundary that none of us have crossed?”

Lazarus begins to laugh even more intensely and then says, “There is no death, really. There is only life. There is only God. There is only incredible joy. Death is not the way it appears from this side. Death is not an abyss into which we go into chaos. It is, rather, a portal through which we move into everlasting growth and everlasting life.” He then says, “The One that meets us there is the same generosity that gave us our lives in the beginning, the One who gave us our birth. Not because we deserved it but because that generous One wanted us to be and therefore there is nothing to fear in the next realm. The grave is as empty as a doorway is empty. It is a portal through which we move into greater and finer life. Therefore, there is nothing to fear. Our great agenda is to learn to accept, to learn to trust. We are put here to learn to love more fully. There is only life. There is no death.”

Though this is a play, and only one person’s interpretation of what could have possibly happened after the raising of Lazarus, my thoughts go to what Jesus told Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

My reflections on this scripture is that Jesus, the Son of God, is the God that is with us through death, as well as through life. Certainly God never intended for us to die. It was by sin that death entered into the world. But just because humanity brought death into this world doesn’t mean that God forsakes us in death. To me, death is a birthing process, the going from one sense of life into another. So this does not only mean death in a physical bodily sense, but deaths in other ways, such as, the death or loss of a job, the dying of a way of life maybe from financial loss, or as a child goes to college for the first time, the birth of a baby to a couple is certainly the death of a familiar lifestyle and the beginning of a new, the starting of a new school, new relationships, teenagers getting their drivers license, going from a dependant lifestyle to a more independent lifestyle, new circumstances in any respect. There is certainly fear in the new endeavors whether we cause them or not. Is there a fear of the unknown? Yes, if we look to the unknown from our limited understanding, trying to make sense of it without God. But as we allow God to be in every part of our lives, God will be there in our living and in our dying. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection” that life that comes after a dying process, “and I am the life”, he is there in all of our daily living, and therefore, we have nothing to fear. In Psalm 23 the psalmist writes, “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for you are with me.” I don’t see death as a stop sign, but more as a green light to enter into the presence of God in a whole new way, to experience God is a deeper way, whether it be through a literal, physical death, or through “deaths” we face in of our lives. Are we not to die to ourselves daily so that God is in control of our lives? Jesus says, I will go with you through the birthing process and through life itself because I am both. I am in both. I am God and I will not leave you nor forsake you.

So what happens to Lazarus at the end of the play? Well, not everyone was pleased that Lazarus was alive and laughing. The Roman authorities were quick to sense that he had lost his fear of death, because fear was the kind of control they used on people to maintain their desires. So the Roman authorities move in on Lazarus and tell him to quit laughing. They tell him to stop the merriment and partying in his house. This causes Lazarus to laugh even more. He tells them, “The truth is there is nothing you can do to me. There is no death. There is only life.” The Romans become even more frustrated, so they arrest him, they take him to Caesarea to appear before the higher official, then on to face the Roman emperor, and the whole time he is laughing because he has no fear of death. And so shouldn’t it be the same for us? Jesus tells each of us today, “I am the resurrection, I am the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” The question that Jesus asked Martha was and us today is “Do you believe this?” Martha responded by saying, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God.” If we truly believe that Jesus is who is says he is, then should we fear death, or life? The scriptures say that perfect love cast out all fear, and God is that perfect love. So how will you answer this question?

In the name of Him who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, AMEN.