all saints struggle

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The text for Sunday is John 11 - the great story of the raising of Lazarus. I'm struggling so that my sermon does not sound like a funeral sermon. This is the story I want read at my funeral, I know, but the day is a Sunday, is a day of celebration, a day of celebration of that which is yet unknown and a day of celebration for what is known.

So, for me, it's not just about what goes on after death. The gospel speaks to me of this life, this time, the work we are currently engaged in. I'm just having a hard time getting a handle on this point.

The work is: we bring a word of life. We say: Death is not the end. We say: transformation is possible - not by your own effort, but by living in the life of Christ. We say: this community is more than a human organization - it is the body of the Messiah, with the Messianic task to do.

So, we are saints through our participation - our attention to - the gifts of God. Gifts of sacrament, and word, and prayer, and shared work.

In this story Jesus does not raise Lazarus for the comfort of Mary and Martha (that's a tack I have taken in the past). When I look closely - Jesus is 'self-differentiated' from them and their grief. He is disturbed. He is not responding to their grief - he already knows what he is going to do. He weeps - but why? Are the on-lookers correct? He weeps, because he loved Lazarus? (But Jesus knows this grief is only for an few moments more) He weeps, because his friends Mary and Martha are weeping? He weeps, because no one believes in the glory he is about to reveal?

So this is for the glory of God. This is so that the crowd will believe that Jesus was sent by God.

Where does the speaker stand in this story? Am I presenting Mary or Martha's story - the grievers who become the incredible joyful (that is what my older sermon has done)? Shall I stand with the disciples, who have a little more, but not enough vision to comprehend what Jesus is going to do?

Or this time, let us stand with the crowd. The crowd has known sorrow, grief, death. The crowd has known life in all it's messy complications. Lets not diminish the spiritual need of the crowd. They are there, for the family, for tradition sake, for curiousity - it is, after all, 4 days after burial.

And Jesus is there for them. Jesus will do this thing for the sake of the crowd. That is exactly what he says. This is a public miracle.

And we are the crowd, who must struggle with the implications of this miracle. Some would have Jesus die. Some will follow. Some will always remember. And some will tell the story. So that all will know.

Tell the story.
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