Listen,
the guy was dead! Dead – I mean dead! Kids, I mean, ahhhhhhh, blahhhh, dead! I’m talking about
find-a-cave-with-a-hole-in-it-stick-him-in-the-hole-seal-it-up-or-you’ll-be-sorry-next-Tuesday-dead!
Dead! And we were all miserable.
See,
this young guy Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha were good people in our
village. I liked them. Everybody liked
them. They’d had enough misery in their
lives, what with their mom and dad dying and them having to bring each other
up. But they worked hard.
Lazarus
had always been a healthy, hardworking kid brother. He was kind of a cross between his two
sisters.
Mary
is really sensitive, thinking all the time and she contemplates stuff. When you talk to her, she’s kind of quiet and
thinks over what you said and then gives these really profound insights.
Whenever
Jesus comes to visit – and he does whenever he’s in the area, because he loves
them all as much as we do – she drops everything and just sits along with the
guys at his feet like she was in school!
And nobody says anything. Not anymore!
Martha,
her sister, complained about it – once! See,
they had all this food to get ready for Jesus and his mob, because there’s
always a bunch of people following him around.
And, of course, since Jesus was in town and stopping at their place, I
showed up and the whole village too - everybody always turns out to see Jesus. You know, we’d go mobbing over to their place
to hear what he said and see if maybe he’d do a miracle or anything else happened,
we didn’t want to miss.
Well, here’s Jesus, sitting in front of their
house, teaching all this wonderful stuff
about the nation of God coming to earth and how we should be changing our lives
because of that and here comes Martha storming out from behind the house where
they do the cooking in the fire pit and she bursts right through the group, points
a ladle at Mary, and says something to Jesus like: “Lord, is it of no concern
to you that my sister has left me all alone to do the serving? Tell her to come and help me”[2]
(which was really kind of snippy and bossy - ordering the Lord around - but, I
guess she had kind of got stuck with us all, and, I mean, I could kind of see
her point. Why should she do all the
work?).
But, Jesus was so kind and understanding with
her. He didn’t yell back at her or
anything, but just smiled kind of gently and said, “Martha, Martha, you’re
worried and distracted about a lot of things, but only one thing is
necessary. Mary has chosen the good
portion; it will not be taken away from her.”
Now,
at first I thought he was talking about food.
You know, because he said “the good portion” and Martha was cooking and
all, but Mary wasn’t eating anything – oh,
and then I got it. He meant another kind of nourishment. Something for the spirit, you see? Then we all got it and stopped just looking
for a miracle and paid more attention to what he was saying. And, after that, nobody said anything about
Mary sitting in.
So,
you get an idea of the kind of people they were. Martha was the one who held the place
together after their parents died. And
contemplative Mary and nice young guy Lazarus all did their part and they got
along just fine. That is, until bit by
bit Lazarus started to get sick.
It
wasn’t all that much at first. We were
in the fields and I was helping out and he kept stopping to mop his brow and
drink something and then he sat down for a long while and pretty soon he was
showing up later and later and then he couldn’t come at all. In fact, he wasn’t getting out of bed.
So his sisters did what every good woman does,
because, as we all know, no guy ever wants to call in a doctor.
First,
they tried some home remedies. Then they
called in the village healer. Then, when
it began to look serious, they called me in to take a message to Jesus, because
that’s one of the things I do as the local odd-job specialist and utility fix
it man. I’ve got a really good donkey
and reasonable rates – you’ve probably heard some of my slogans, like:
·
“I never shirk your job of work,” and
·
“If it’s busted, I can be trusted,” and, especially,
·
“When you need to send word, I’ll make sure it’s
heard!”
So,
you’ll all want to keep that information in mind, you know, in case you need
some help in the future.
Well,
anyway, the sisters send this message by me to Jesus. You can see Martha’s style in the first half
– snappy, brief and to the point, but also Mary’s hand in the second, her
roundabout and cryptic way of talking about their brother. Their message was: “Lord, listen” (that’s
Martha), “the one you love is sick” (that’s Mary). Definitely a composite – from the hearts of
both the sisters. Well, that was the
message, so off I go without delay!
Where
was I going? Where was Jesus? Nobody knew exactly, but we all had a general
idea. Because, wherever Jesus went, he
caused a stir. And word would always
come back telling of all the marvelous things he was saying and doing. It seems like every other traveler had a new
account to tell. One amazing thing after
another.
Ironically,
he was up around the other Bethany – not our Bethany, but, you know, the one way
up in Galilee, over on the east side of the Jordan about 30 miles just below
the Sea of Galilee, right across from Aenon and Salim where John did his
baptizing – in fact, where John baptized Jesus.
Our Bethany, of course, lies down in Judea on
the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives about one and five eights’ miles
outside of Jerusalem.
So that put Jesus about 46 miles away from
us.
There’s a mountain road from that Bethany
directly through Jericho, but it’s kind of dangerous for a lone traveler,
because the hills are full of robbers – and they don’t just take all your stuff
– they beat you up and leave you for dead.
So, it’s best to go with a caravan.
You cut north at Jericho and head across the
small roads to Archelais. These weave
along between the flood plain of the Jordan and the hill country, but you don’t
get anywhere near Mt. Ebal. No, you stay
pretty much in the fertile valley.
There’s a ford around Jericho, as everybody knows, but there’s not much
on the other side, so I stayed on our bank and worked my way up.
Now, I mentioned my donkey is still pretty
strong and fast – it can actually out-gallop a horse and a camel when it’s
scared – so I figure three days if we travel well to get up there and maybe
another one to find Jesus and bring him back, so we can be back home in our
Bethany in about a week, figuring, of course, an extra day in for the Sabbath.
Praise God, the trip was uneventful, and,
sure enough, the crowds were getting thicker as I’m approaching Aenon. The name means “double spring” and it really
is a pretty place, with a lot of lovely willows by the waters. And the closer I get, the more people I
see! So, I find a place to cross the
Jordan and there’s Jesus himself!
Well, he’s kind of hard to get to, between
the mobs and his disciples who are trying to keep people from swarming all over
him – but, me, I’m not shy – I’m yelling, “Message for Jesus from Bethany! Message for Jesus about one he loves!” and
that got their attention.
Well,
I shoulder my way through the crowd and, then, there I am before the man
himself!
He’s looking as healthy as always and strong
like he always is from all that physical labor when he was a fix it man like me
and all that walking since.
But, he’s also looking tired like we’re all
taking a lot out of him, but he’s still got that smile just lurking behind his
serious expression and he looks at me with those clear eyes like I’m the only
person on the whole riverbank and he says hello to me by name!
I’m, of course, astounded. I mean, sure he’s been to our Bethany a bunch
of times, having friends there and all, and I’ve listened to him, but I didn’t
know he’d actually noticed me in the crowd -
I mean, knew my name and all.
He listened real intently to what I had to say
and then he said to me, but also to his buddies and to the crowd as well, “This
sickness is not to death, but about the glory of God, in order that the Son of
God may be glorified through it.”
Well,
I’m thinking, that’s good news. Lazarus
isn’t going to die. But, we should put
a move on anyway because he is extremely
sick – and why should he be uncomfortable?
So,
I water my donkey, pick up some food that’s always lying around when Jesus is
there, and I’m ready to head on back in the morning – if not now!
I’m
figuring we can walk the donkey, since so many of Jesus’ people are on foot –
and they go everywhere he goes – and, of course, with this mob we don’t have to
worry about bandits – this is like a race migration!
So,
I’m figuring again, okay, if we push this crowd, we can cover maybe 12 miles a
day max? At least for the
swiftest. The rest that are going six,
five, four, three a day, well, they can catch up. So, we can be back in Bethany in, say, maybe
four days for sure. That’ll work.
And
then a strange thing happens. Jesus
doesn’t pack up; he doesn’t say anything more; he doesn’t move.
That
day passes. The next day passes. The next day passes. Two whole days more he stays there preaching
and healing and his disciples baptizing new believers and then he decides to
set out.
I’m
thinking – come on! Come on! Lazarus is back home trying to hold out – I
mean he was really sick when I left him and that’s over a week ago now – and we
still got a half week of travel to go.
Did
I say a half week? Now I realize, this
is Jesus we’re talking about. The
Prophet of Nazareth himself. He could be
stopped to heal every leper along the road!
And I’m thinking, if I don’t deliver him in time, I may not get paid! Especially,
if it takes us so long that Lazarus does end up dying.
Plus, his disciples weren’t looking too
pleased with me when I told him what was up at Bethany. And, when Jesus finally says, “Let’s go back
to Judea,” sure enough, they start objecting, “Teacher, right now the Jews are
looking to stone you, and you’re going back there again?”
Then
Jesus said something that went right over my head and I think everybody else’s
too. He said, “Aren’t days 12 hours? If someone walks in the day, he won’t
stumble, because he sees by the light of this world. But, if someone walks in the night, he
stumbles, because the light is not in it.”
Okay. I
had no idea what that meant. Maybe he
was trying to say we should travel by day?
That’s fine. Camping out at night? No problem.
I was planning to take us all back by day anyway. In fact, we’d just wasted two perfectly good
days not traveling! But, never mind
that.
Apparently,
however, that wasn’t what he was talking about, because he went on to say,
“Lazarus, our friend, is sleeping, and we go to wake him up.”
His
disciples must have been thinking, what’s the matter, he’s got no rooster? We’ve got to walk four days into certain
danger to wake this guy up? One of them
says, “Lord, if he’s sleeping, he’ll get cured.”
But,
Jesus is talking about a different kind of light, a different kind of
stumbling, a different kind of sleep – and he clues us in. “Lazarus has died, and, so that you may
believe, I rejoice that I was not there, but let’s go to him.”
Then
Thomas the Twin, who was a sour and skeptical individual, grumbles to his
friends, “Let’s go so we can end up dead like him.”
And
all kinds of things are racing through my mind, like maybe Lazarus isn’t
dead? Maybe it’s not true? But, look, Jesus himself said it and he always
seems to know this kind of thing without being told. So, I’m thinking, if he’s already dead, we’re
wasting our time. As it was, we probably
never could have made it back in time.
But – wait a minute - hadn’t I heard about Jesus healing some Roman
Centurion’s servant with just a word – and at a distance? Why can’t he do this for his dear friend
Lazarus and save us all a trip? I mean, what’s
the point of him going home with me now if it’s way too late?
Well,
the trip back was pretty anxious for me.
It took us four full days even with Jesus striding purposely along in
the lead and the rest of the people turning back or trailing behind, scattered
along the road for miles.
We hadn’t even arrived on the outskirts of
town on the fifth day when we started meeting travelers who told us the bad
news – Lazarus had indeed died and just at the exact time Jesus said he had.
Next,
here comes Martha to meet him. She
doesn’t look at me, but goes directly to Jesus and he embraces her. We can see she’d been crying, but she’s
trying to keep control of it, though it’s obvious the tears are still ranked up
in her eyes and they could come marching out at a moment’s notice.
Then
Martha says to him with regret and just a little bit of reproach in her voice –
which is so Martha – “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have
died.” And then she says something
really strange, I don’t know why. It was
like some really bizarre hope was suddenly looking out from somewhere deep
inside her – maybe it wasn’t even from her, but from someplace else, because
what she said was: “Even now I know that whatever you may ask God for, God will
give to you.”
Jesus picks that right up and says to her,
“Your brother will rise again.”
Well, wherever that wild hope came from shut
down and it’s the old Martha talking again, because she says, “I know that he’ll
rise in the resurrection in the last day,” like she’s sitting at his feet like
her sister Mary does, reciting the right answer as if she were in the school
where the local rabbi teaches us boys our Torah lessons.
But Jesus isn’t teaching a class about the
last day. Instead, he says to her one of
those puzzling things he’s always saying, especially before something big comes
down, “I am the resurrection and the life.
The one believing in me, even if dead, will live. And everyone living and believing in me will
not die forever. Do you believe this?”
Martha answers right back to him, “Yes, Lord,
I have always believed that you are the Anointed One, the Son of God who has
come into the world.”
Jesus nods at her and he asks for Mary and she
turns around without another word and hurries back to get her sister.
Jesus, however, doesn’t move. He stays in the same spot and waits.
Me,
I’m feeling really uncomfortable, because Martha hasn’t even acknowledged
me. I can’t help but think she’s blaming
me for not getting Jesus back on time – but I’m not the one who wanted to wait
two more days up in Galilee!
So, I kind of fade back a little into the
crowd and then here comes Mary and says the exact same thing that Martha
did. These girls certainly think alike
on some occasions!
Mary,
of course, falls to his feet and she’s crying away, and I can see Jesus is
really moved by her sorrow.
One
thing about Jesus, he has the most tender heart of anybody I ever met. “Where have you placed him?” he asks really mournfully. And then Jesus starts crying. Given that we waited two extra days up north,
I’m thinking maybe he’s feeling bad about that, you know, that he didn’t hurry
here. But I soon learn that that
wasn’t it at all – not in any way.
Given what happened next, I’ve puzzled over
those tears for a long time. I mean, he
must have known he was going to do what he did – that in a couple of minutes he
was going to turn all their hearts to joy and all their tears to laughter – and
still he cries.
I
wasn’t feeling too good myself. I never
cry, but I was getting pretty close to it.
Another hour of this great sorrow might just do it.
Mary
can’t even answer him, she’s so overcome with misery. So the women with her,
friends and relatives who’d come in from Jerusalem to comfort her and Martha –because,
like I said, everybody loved this family – they say, “Come and see, Lord.”
So,
finally, Jesus goes at their invitation.
Me, I’m trailing along behind – and that puts me back with the grumblers
who are saying, “Wasn’t he able – this one who opened the eyes of the blind man
– to make it so this one wouldn’t have died?”
And
these complainers got me wondering too.
Maybe Jesus was never actually able to heal Lazarus. Maybe he’s only good on the small stuff;
that’s why he didn’t hurry here! So, I
didn’t try to defend him or say anything.
I just shuffled along with the rest of the crowd. And that’s when things got really strange…
Lazarus’s
tomb was a cave in the side of a small rise.
The entrance faced east. It had
been carved into a rectangle and had a large stone fitted into place over
it. Martha and Mary couldn’t afford to
have grooves cut on the outside and a rolling stone to cover it. So, friends had simply laid a stone across
the entrance. It was very sad to see
the tomb.
Jesus
arrived and he was obviously filled with emotion. Then he says something astounding. “All of you, remove the stone!”
Now,
you see, Lazarus had been buried for four days.
Some of the folks standing around were superstitious, as country people
are. Some of us believe the soul hangs
around the body for three days in hopes it could return to it, but, after four
days, see, it gives up. This was the fourth
day, so Lazarus was unsalvageably dead.
That’s why we all mourn so heavily for three days and there’s a
perceptible shift on the fourth day.
Some of us feel that’s the time when our loved one is now completely and
irrevocably gone. So, Martha spoke for us all, when she said, “Lord, there’ll be
a sour odor, because he’s been there for four days.”
But, Jesus stays steadfast and he reminds her
of what he’d said on the outskirts of Bethany, “Didn’t I tell you that if you
believe you would see the glory of God?”
And he looks at her. And then he
glares at the crowd. His face was full
of certainty and power.
On impulse I just turn around and grab a
corner of the rock. Samuel, who owns the
big wheat field, and John, my neighbor, who keeps a grove of almond trees,
grasp hold of it too. A couple of other guys pitch in and we slide it off the
front. I know it sounds risky. Sure, the body had been washed and anointed
with perfumes and oils and even wrapped up in linen that friends had brought in
from Jerusalem, but it had been four days, and none of that scented stuff was
going to help it now. But, see, we weren’t
thinking about that. We were just
responding to Jesus and his commanding certainty.
So,
I’m staring only at him, but he’s not looking back at us anymore. No, he’s looking up to the sky and he’s talking
to God – like God is right there in front of him. He says, “Father, I thank you that you heard
me. And I had already known that you
always hear me, but for the sake of this crowd standing around I spoke, so that
they will believe that you sent me.”
Now I’m holding my breath – and not just
because I’m worried about what might leak from the tomb. No, it’s that kind of breath-taking moment
when anything might happen.
Suddenly Jesus shouts out in an enormous
voice, “Lazarus, come out!”
I jump like four feet in the air. And then I hear this stirring behind
me. I’m gaping into the darkness. I see something moving. It’s cloth.
It’s moving! No, it’s the dead
man! He’s still got the shroud cloth
wrapped around his face and hands and feet.
My
mouth drops open. And out he
stumbles. Lazarus – alive again. We gape at him. We gape at Jesus.
And
Jesus looks at us the way you’d look at a bunch of five year olds, as he says
matter of factly in his normal voice, “Untie him and let him go.”
You
know, since that strange day in Bethany, I’ve been thinking a lot about this
whole incident. I know it’s changed
me. I don’t look at things exactly the
way I did before. I still work – and I
work hard – but my life is not all about wheeling and dealing for money
anymore. Jesus changed that. He’s opened my eyes to a few things:
like the fact that, whenever Jesus shows up, I
should expect he’s going to turn things upside down, doing big actions like maybe
even raising the dead (!) and other surprising things, like, for example, with
the women – he encourages them to join right in and learn with men. He takes
what they say seriously. He doesn’t
think the main thing they’re supposed to do is cook!
And,
another thing, he cares about everybody – even people like Lazarus and his
sisters and me – unimportant, everyday people.
To him, our lives are as important as anyone’s and he cares deeply about
us – all of us.
In fact, you can expect to be in a community
whenever you get in with Jesus. There’s
always going to be a crowd around him, because he’s the kind of person that
makes things happen.
And don’t expect Jesus to be afraid of the
stuff we’re afraid of. He’s used to
going into dangerous places and he’s apt to drag you in there with him. So be prepared for danger!
Also, his timing won’t necessarily be
ours. We might expect to get rescued
long before we really do, because Jesus is operating on a whole different
timetable than ours.
Also expect him to say a lot of cryptic
things about which you aren’t really sure what he means. So, stop and think about them. He’s couching spiritual truths in everyday
illustrations. They’re going to take
some thought. You’re going to have to
think a little deeper. And don’t expect
the people closest to him always to know what’s up either – sometimes nobody
knows what he’s up to!
See,
Jesus is always working on another plane than we are. He doesn’t just snap to it, when we’ve got a
problem or we ask him to fix something. He’s
got a mission to glorify God and be revealed himself as God’s Anointed
One! He does things so that we’ll
believe that God sent him to raise all of us on the last day, if we trust in
him and obey him.
Sure,
he helps with our present needs, but even more so, he’s working to ensure our
eternal safety. He has a whole higher
plane of concerns and values in addition to what we have and we need to focus
in on them and not just on what we want out of him.
Remember also, sometimes he waits to be
invited. He’s not just going to barge in
and change everything. He may not act if
you’re not reaching out to him in your life and thoughts and values and
actions. He might just stay out there on
the outskirts of your town. So, if you
want him in your life, go to him!
And when you do, expect to be changed yourself–
maybe to learn something eternal you didn’t know that will impact your life
here and now - and to see miracles in your life that you never really expected
(not to mention miracles all around you in other people’s lives too!).
Remember,
he’s got the power of life and death in his hands. As he said, he is “the resurrection and the
life” and he proved it by making our dead friend Lazarus alive again! So, when things look hopeless, you never know
when he’s going to suddenly yell, “Lazarus, come forth!” and your whole world
might right itself.
Also, remember, he’s got the tenderest heart
you ever met, so don’t give up too quickly on anyone or anything – Jesus has a
way of bringing new life when you least expect it!
Look at me – all I was concerned about was
whether I’d get paid or not for bringing him a message. Then I saw he was the One who is himself
God’s Message, who holds the power over life and death in action! Now that certainly changed me forever! Gave me a whole new perspective on
things!
For
one thing, it certainly changed my attitude toward life. I’m less concerned about what other people
think now. Especially the
grumblers. I realize, there’ll always be
people dissatisfied with what Jesus is doing.
My advice: Ignore them.
But, if
Jesus tells you to do something – get to it!
Never ignore him. Even if it
sounds crazy – like rolling a stone away from a dead guy. If it’s really Jesus talking - and not your
own wishful thinking – jump out of that safe and selfish circle of what’s good
for me, and what I think should be going down, and the way I think it’s
supposed to go down, and take a chance to help some other guy who’s tied up –
because Jesus may just be setting him free!
Finally,
remember this last and most important thing:
Jesus knows God’s heart and God’s will.
If you follow his example and his leading, you’ll never go wrong. In fact, you may just find yourself in the
life-giving business with him – and that’s a good one to be in!
Oh
yes, and Martha paid me – and well! Thank God for a good businesswoman!
Bill
