Title: “The New (but hard) Life in Christ”
Text: John 11: 1-16
Date: July 27, 2008
By: Kendall Brown
The illness, death and raising of Lazarus in today’s lesson is not the central story.
More than a miracle story, this passage is a glimpse into the inner spiritual life of Jesus and a commentary on his relationship with God. If one reads on to the conclusion of the story in verses beyond this morning’s reading, one wonders if Jesus did any favor at all for Lazarus and his two sisters by raising Lazarus. I am not so sure if I would really want to be brought back from the dead only to find out that what awaited me was a CIA plot to finish me off. According to some interpreters, that is what awaited Lazarus. The chief priests plotted to kill him and that was the reason so many were in town when Jesus arrived. The Gospel does not tell us what actually ever happened to Lazarus. But one ancient tradition makes him an early martyr.
There is another focal point in this story, however. When Lazarus became ill, his sisters, Mary and Martha, sent for their friend Jesus to come to them. They wanted his presence in this disturbing moment. Perhaps, they thought Jesus would make their brother better. Jesus was in another town, not to far away. John describes something very strange when Jesus received the word about Lazarus’ illness.
John writes, “Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, Jesus stayed two days longer in the place where he was.”
That is strange. Johns says that Jesus loved Lazarus and his sisters. But what did Jesus do when he heard that Lazarus was sick? He putzed around for two days longer right where he was. Perhaps he went fishing or maybe even golfing. By the time he got to Bethany, Lazarus was dead. What kind of love is this. While Jesus was twiddling his thumbs for two days, might not some of Mary and Martha’s friends in Bethany have said, “With friends like Jesus, you gals hardly need any enemies.”
John is a very careful writer. He did not put one word into his Gospel without thinking about it and having a reason for it. John tells us intentionally that Jesus waited two days before responding. There is a connection between his waiting two whole days before finally going and his love for Mary and Martha and Lazarus.
Most of us would be sadly disappointed in a friend who responded to an urgent request the way Jesus did to the two sisters. By the time our friend arrived, we might be inclined to tell our friend to get lost. What kind of friend could that be? What was Jesus doing? Jesus knew what he was doing. The delay was not an accident or a mistake or the product of a too tight schedule. Jesus was putting first things first. His purpose in life was to be the Son of God. Not even the crisis of Lazarus’ illness could keep Jesus away from his first purpose. Faced with Lazarus’ illness, Jesus did not loose sight of the wider picture of God’s plan for him. He knew that even if Lazarus died, God would still have a purpose to use in this event. So Jesus waited for two days, not to fish or golf, but to pray and meditate and reflect and to keep in touch with God’s purpose for him. Knowing that his friends were in distress, how much he probably wanted to be with them and to help them. But he waited two days. Then he went to Bethany. He went to Bethany, not as a family friend, but as the son of God. The crisis did not cause him to loose touch with who he was, what his real relationship with the family was, or what his purpose on earth was.
Jesus was living out a new life in the spirit at this point. It is a new life that is available to us all but it is one that can be difficult to live and execute. It is a new life for us if we put first things first. It is a new life for us if we do not constantly allow ourselves to be defined by whatever crisis that happens to come along. It is a new life for us if we make the effort to discern what the things are that we really are responsible for and what the things are that we are not responsible for. Jesus knew what he was responsible for. As the Son of God it was not his responsibility to run right over to Bethany as soon as he learned of a crisis in his friends’ lives there. His responsibility was to witness to the glory of God, and in this case to wait two days, if that was what it took, to discern God’s will for him before acting.
The implications of this lesson are all around us. Opportunities to live the new life in Christ are everywhere. Frequently, I have heard parents, and have for years, talk about their children in school. From time to time, I will hear a story like this. A child has a project or paper that was assigned months ago. Now it is due tomorrow and the child has hardly done a thing. What happens? Many times the parents bail out the child. A lot of projects and papers that teachers have given grades to are papers and projects submitted by the child and done by the parent.
In this little scenario, the new life is lost. First things first are forgotten by the parent when all of a sudden the child has a crisis. The parent sets aside the primary role of parent and replaces it with that of rescuer or even best friend. When first things are first in bringing up our children, our primary goal is to help our children take care of themselves and take responsibility for their selves. No child can learn that when they have been constantly bailed out of every crisis by a parent. Better to flunk an assignment or two than to have never learned how to grow up.
Some psychologists have identified a new generation and have called it the Pre School generation. These are people in their twenties who are out of college and faced with taking on a job in the real world. They have had a sugar coated life handed to them since the day they were born. Our daughter, who is in her mid-thirties, has shared a few stories about her experience with this herself. She is in charge of hiring and firing in her firm. She has been encountering such things as employees, who are upset about something at work, threatening to call their parents. Hannah’s response, “Try it.”
John tells as that Jesus loved Mary and Martha and yes, he did. His love was genuine because it came from a person who know what he was and who kept his roles straight. Sometimes this means staying put and not running right over and fixing things immediately and ending any crisis.
In the early years of our marriage, Cheryl had a tendency to see my problems as her problems and perhaps out of some maternal instinct acted to fix things for me. For some reason I never was much good at returning this favor.
After awhile Cheryl caught on and that of course changed things for me. I had to grow up. She realized that my dark moments of depression were my problem, not hers, and that there was nothing she could do to fix me. I had to do what I had to do to fix myself. Specifically, I remember her saying, “Boy, Kendall, you must really love being miserable or you wouldn’t spend so much time and energy being miserable.” I must admit that I didn’t like hearing that, but I did have to realize the truth in it and start working on my own problems.
What kind of friend waits for two days without responding? What kind of parent doesn’t bail out his or her child? One kind of spouse doesn’t take care of every little once of self pity in the other? It is the person who puts first things first. It is the person who knows who she or he is and who discerns the things that they are responsible for and those things for which they are not responsible. It is the person who Jesus was by not running right over to Bethany as soon as he heard of his friend’s crisis. And it is the mature person Christ calls us to be as he invites us to walk with him and share with him from the cup of life.