Dearest e-votees-
Blessings to you on this All Saints Day.
You are not working on your own. God has set aside a great cloud of witnesses for God’s purposes. You are seeded into that great cloud of witnesses.
There are promises attached to you that are coming true and that will come true. God has set you and all of the saints that have preceded us and will come after us aside to bear fruit and to be resurrected.
In this interim time be free and be about God’s purposes.
Peace,
Karl
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32 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.” 33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34 He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus began to weep. 36 So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” 37 But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” 38 Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39 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.” 40 Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” 41 So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42 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.” 43 When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 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.”
God enters into our pain-stained world. God comes close. Jesus came to Martha (before this lesson) and Jesus comes to Mary above. Both offer the same response-“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” (Martha in verse 21; Mary in verse 32). It is a statement of faith laced in an accusation. Where were you Jesus? Don’t you care? How could you let this happen?
Jesus draws near the tomb. Martha warns Jesus about the stench of death. Jesus does what he does—he gives life. Lazarus is restored to life. He is made free. He is sent out to be about God’s purposes.
The truth of the matter is that we are like Lazarus. We have been made free and unbound. We are let go and let loose to do God’s work. As the gospel continues to plots against Jesus expand to include Lazarus too (see 12:10). Jesus’ work of giving life threatens many. In the end they dispatch Jesus to put down this perceived nonsense. But the wisdom of the cross trumps the vain plots of humanity. Jesus comes back to life. Not like Lazarus who died again. Jesus comes back to life and will not die again.
We are all like Lazarus. We have been set free and let loose but mortality is still part of our journey. We will die. Perhaps in response to what Jesus has done for us and through us. Perhaps in a heroic moment. Perhaps hurting and alone. Perhaps in a lingering and painful way. We don’t know how many days we have and what those last moments will be like.
We do know that God, Jesus, has set us aside. That God, Jesus, has made promises about eternal life that began with him and end with all whom God chooses. We have been elected. We have been made saints. We have been made part of that great cloud of witnesses. Romans 14:8 reminds us that whether we live or whether we die we are the Lord’s.
God, send us into our pain-stained world. Help us draw close to others. Help us speak life in the face of death and healing in the face of contagions that plague us. Help us never forget your calling and your example. And, at the last, deliver us into your presence as your promises assure. Amen.
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