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New Life in God's Time

Well, here we are, the month of April has begun and we have only two weeks left in the season of Lent. As I have shared with you before, April is a month filled with mixed emotions for me. It is the month of my birthday. It's the month that I first asked my wife out 41 years ago. It is the month that my son and daughter-in-law were married 10 years ago. It is the month that my grandfather died, 45 years ago on my 13th birthday. It is also the month in which I had to attend my niece, Julianne’s, funeral. Yes, for me, April is a month filled all kinds of memories, with feelings of excitement, fear, anger, sorrow, grief and with great joy.

Our texts for today are also filled with all of these emotions. Ezekiel was a prophet that was called to issue a doom-filled warning to a rebellious people. But, he was also a prophet that was called to proclaim a sense of hope that all was not lost for those who would hear God’s words and repent. When Ezekiel entered the valley of dry bones he witnessed a horrific scene of death. And in the midst of this horrific scene God said to Ezekiel, “Mortal, can these bones live?” In the midst of death, God asks about life. Personally, if I were Ezekiel, I think my answer would have been filled with anger. Lord, you know they are dead, you know they cannot live anymore. But instead, Ezekiel says, “O Lord God, you know” (Ezekiel 37:3).

As Ezekiel looked upon the scene, he knew the bones represented the people of Israel. He knew it meant that his people were as good as dead. The Israelites were dead to God’s ways, but in the midst of this death God says, Ezekiel, my word never dies. My word is the word of life. My word can give life even when death has seemly won. Ezekiel, God says, “Prophesy to these bones…” In other words, let them once again hear my word. Through my word, my breath, or in Hebrew, a word I love to say, my “ruah”, which means spirit, breath, wind, will enter the dead and life will come again. Even in death, God promises the he can bring new life.

In our New Testament story, we are told about Lazarus, a man that we are told Jesus loved. Lazarus was so sick that his family and friends knew he is going to die and, so, they sent word to his good friend. Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, knew Jesus had healed the sick and they wanted him to heal Lazarus. I know that feeling, don’t you? Personally, for the past year and half, between my sister and my mom, I have called upon Jesus for healing constantly. But when Mary, Lazarus’ sister, told Jesus, he didn’t rush to his friend’s side; instead, he continued his work. I know that feeling, too, don’t you? Jesus, I have been praying, when are you going to do something for my family? But, it was not until after Lazarus died, that Jesus went to see him and by the time Jesus arrived, his beloved friend has been dead four days. The family was in mourning. Another feeling we all know, too, well, don’t we? As I said, I feel it every April when I remember my grandpa and my niece. I feel it every July when I remember my father. Death is ugly and it hurts. Mary and Martha wept, as do their friends and when Jesus sees their pain, he, too, felt the loss, and he, too, wept.

Death is never easy. In fact, I think the best description of death is in this story. Experiencing the pain of loosing a loved one, Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha was shocked, and as we read already, she says to Jesus, “Lord already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Did you know death has a smell to it? I don’t think most of us know that, because in our culture, we keep death cold. We put the dead on ice, literally, so that we don’t have to experience the bad smell. But for the ancient world, they did not know of such things and so, when they placed a body in a tomb, after a while the smell permeated the area and they knew all to well that had a bad smell. In fact, to best describe how bad it smelled, I prefer the King James Version of this story. After Jesus tells them to take the stone away, in the King James Version it says, “Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto to him, Lord, by this time he stinkith…” (KJV, 11:39). Martha was so right; death stinks!

But, as we know, although it stinks, it is not the end! Oh, it hurts, it causes pain, it leaves an empty feeling in us, and most often it causes feelings in us that we cannot explain, but, in death, God says to us, “Mortal, can these bones live?” and our grief stricken response can only be, O Lord, you know… To which God responds to us prophecy my word, or know my word for in my word I promise you my ruah, my breath of life. Out of death God promises new life.

But, here is the thing about this new life; it is never on our time. We want to avoid the hurt and the pain, so when we have to deal with death we get sacred, frustrated, and even angry. We wonder why Jesus doesn’t bring the healing we desperately pray for. When Jesus finally shows up, both Mary and Martha, at different times, say to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died” (John 11:21 and 11:32). They believed Jesus was the Messiah. They believed he had the power to heal, but they wanted it on their time. They would have preferred to forgo the pain of loss, the pain of mourning and the pain of death. Death stinks ands they would have preferred to not have to have that stench around them. But, life doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes we need to go through the pain of loss to understand or to be able to move forward.

Like Mary and Martha, I would prefer Jesus did his thing whenever I wanted him to. I would prefer his healing spirit in my time, but it isn’t about me is it? Yes, death stinks, but whether figurative, or literal, we are people of the Resurrection, which means we know death is not the end. I am not saying we should want our loved ones to die. I am not saying we should want our faith communities to die, or we should want some of our practices or traditions to die, but when they do, as people of the Resurrection, we ought to have the hope that new life awaits and we are invited to participate in it.

When Jesus finally called Lazarus back to life, he didn’t just leave him alone. He said to the others, “Unbind him and let him go” (11:44). In death, we are called to partake in the new life God is creating. As, I have said before, I think that those of us in the church seem to fear death the most. In the lifer of the church, we fight to hang on to our worship styles, our languages, our programs, our traditions… And most often we hang on to these ways, even when they are killing us. We would rather do something that we know how to do and complain about it when it doesn’t work, than let it die and try something new.

We are in the midst of such times, not only here at Salem, but in our culture, as well. We keep praying for Jesus to come and “fix” us, but maybe we need to let death take its course, so that God, in God’s time, can do what God does, bring new life. Can you hear Jesus calling us into new life? He is calling us out and I believe Jesus is calling us to new life. A new life that is filled with the unknown. A new life we might even fear, but it is a life in which Jesus promises to be present.

Brothers and sisters, as we journey to the cross of renewal over these next 14 days, I pray that we might ask God to help us be patient and be willing to work on God’s time, not ours as we seek to allow death to be part of our lives and as we wait for that new life to be breathed into us. Amen.

Tags: Sermons