Tag Archives: Martha

Dinner Disrupted [OR Let’s Try the Mary and Martha Thing Again, Shall We?] Genesis 18:1-10a and Luke 10:38-42

**sermon art: All Are Welcome by Sieger Koder (1925-2015) German priest, writer, and artist

Caitlin Trussell with Augustana Lutheran Church on July 21, 2019

[sermon begins after two Bible readings]

Genesis 18:1-10a The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. 2 He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the ground. 3 He said, “My lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant. 4 Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. 5 Let me bring a little bread, that you may refresh yourselves, and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.” So they said, “Do as you have said.” 6 And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, “Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes.” 7 Abraham ran to the herd, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it. 8 Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate. 9 They said to him, “Where is your wife Sarah?” And he said, “There, in the tent.” 10 Then one said, “I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.”

Luke 10:38-42 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. 40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” 41 But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; 42 there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

[sermon begins]

 

Imagine your travel being dependent on who would welcome you into their home when you arrived in a new town.  No hotels exist.  You arrive hot and dusty at a random house and hope to high heaven that whoever lives there is having a good day.  The ancient world depended on this kind of hospitality.  When the three men showed up at Abraham’s, there was not a doubt that Abraham would feed them.  Now that could be because he saw the Lord in the three men. Regardless, hospitality was the first order of the day when strangers arrived.  Abraham and Sarah pulled out all the stops too – special cakes, tender veal, soothing milk, cool shade, and a warm welcome.  Just as everyone gets comfortable.  Something happens.  An announcement disrupts dinner.  It’s not the first time this announcement happens.  Sarah and Abraham are promised that they’ll have a child in their old age.  Dinner was disrupted by God’s promise that they’d heard before, that they wondered if it would ever happen, and that they didn’t control one single bit. Revelation over a meal is as commonplace now as it was then.  People are gathered already so why not make an announcement.

Growing up, my parents hosted weekly Sunday dinners for us and my adult step siblings.  As we aged, these were a little less than weekly but they still happened regularly.  I was living at home and going to Pasadena City College at the time of one such dinner.  There was the general chatter that accompanied those meals.  Then, there came the moment when everything changed.  Mom and Pops announced that they were moving to Australia with my younger sister Izzy.  Pops had found actuarial work down under in Sydney.  The house that I’d called home since 9 years old was to be rented.  The immediate thought in my head was, what about me?  After a bit of conversation passed while I remained silent, Mom looked at me and reported that Carl and Sharon were willing to have me rent the tiny home behind the their house when it was ready and that I would bunk with my stepsister Carol in her apartment in the meantime.  Such a strange thing to wonder what was going to happen, to have people tell you what was going to happen, and to not control a single thing about any of it.  Talk about dinner disrupted by a stunning revelation. So many of our lives changed after that announcement in more ways than we could imagine.

And, finally, we come to Martha’s moment of dinner hospitality disrupted by her own distraction and worry.  She welcomed Jesus and friends into her home in the ways of her ancestors in the faith, Abraham and Sarah.  Her moment of welcome gets it right, by the way, in contrast to earlier in Luke when Jesus was asked to leave by the Gerasene gentiles and not received by the Samaritans.[1] From Martha’s welcome and other Bible stories, we know that the movement of the early church was solely dependent on the hospitality of local people in the places visited by Jesus and the disciples.[2] Not to mention much of the Apostle Paul’s travel as evidenced in his letters that made it into the Bible.  Hospitality was key to spreading the good news of Jesus, and Martha was spot on with her welcome from the get go.[3]  Let’s give her some credit where it’s due.

It’s what happened next that has busy, welcoming hosts everywhere beat up by unhelpful interpretations that leave the value of Martha’s work in question.  For those of you in that crowd, let’s agree that the role of the people who do welcoming work is critical.  Scripture tells us that there are many gifts of the Spirit when it comes to discipleship vocations.[4] The thing in question in this story is not about Martha’s work.  The question raised in this story is about Martha’s worry and distraction stirred up by Mary’s radical behavior in the other room that disrupts getting dinner ready.  The Gospel of Luke has an ongoing concern with worry.[5] Here again the question raised is about worry and about how Martha handles her aggravation by going to Jesus – creating a classic, unhelpful triangle to try and control the situation.  Who of us here today hasn’t done that very same thing?  Overwhelmed by our many tasks, we identify our problem as someone else rather than ourselves, and then we rope a third person into the mix and create an unhelpful triangle to get someone on our side and blow off steam.  Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her to help me.”

Jesus doesn’t complete the triangle with her.  He keeps the focus on Martha rather than siding with her against Mary.  I hear so much compassion for Martha in his challenge to her.  Perhaps this lens of compassion is because of the Good Samaritan story that comes just before it, in which Jesus commands neighborly compassion.[6]  Jesus says, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing…Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

It’s difficult for us to fully appreciate Mary’s radical action.  First century rabbis did not teach women.[7]  Mary’s posture likely mimics that of the men around her who were also listening to Jesus teach in postures of recognition, adoration, and submission.[8] Jesus is referred to as Lord three times in these four verses, highlighting his lordship.  Similarly to Sarah and Abraham, Martha’s dinner is disrupted by the Lord’s divine revelation. In both situations, the revelation disrupts social norms and promises something more than any of them can imagine.  For Sarah and Abraham, the promise of a child in their older age is inconceivable to them, both physically and intellectually, and is not something within their control.  For Martha and Mary, the promise that the Lord’s teaching is also for them and not something controlled by other people who would prevent it for reasons of gender or anything else.

Notice that Martha ends up receiving direct teaching from Jesus, too, differently than Mary, to be sure, but receives Jesus teaching nonetheless.  Jesus meets Martha where she is in her worry and distraction and offers her the “better part” too.  Both of these disciples are worth our reflection but NOT as a zero sum game where one wins and one loses.[9]  Both disciples receive the teaching they need to hear in the time and way they need to hear it.  Both receive the “better part” as they submit to Jesus’ lordship in word and deed. Martha welcomes him into her home and calls him Lord.  Mary sits at his feet, listens and learns. Both experience his direct teaching. Not only do they experience his teaching as a challenge to social norms of the day.  They experience a word from him that is directly for them – drawing them more deeply into discipleship, transforming their lives into ones that are ever more Christ-shaped.

Jesus also disrupts our shared dinner at the communion table with his word today – challenging the limited, critical view that we have of ourselves and others, transforming our hearts with compassion and for compassion, and focusing us on the better part.  For this and for all that God is doing, we can say, amen, and thanks be to God!

__________________________________________________________

Hymn of the Day following the Sermon.

ELW #770 Give Me Jesus (African American Spiritual)

1 In the morning when I rise,
in the morning when I rise,
in the morning when I rise,
give me Jesus.

Refrain:
Give me Jesus,
give me Jesus.
You may have all the rest,
give me Jesus.

2 Dark midnight was my cry,
dark midnight was my cry,
dark midnight was my cry,
give me Jesus. [Refrain]

3 Just about the break of day,
just about the break of day,
just about the break of day,
give me Jesus. [Refrain]

4 Oh, when I come to die,
oh, when I come to die,
oh, when I come to die,
give me Jesus. [Refrain]

5 And when I want to sing,
and when I want to sing,
and when I want to sing,
give me Jesus. [Refrain]

_____________________________________________________________

[1] Luke 8:37 and 9:53 as noted in ProgressiveInvolvement.org “Luke 10:38-42” for July 21, 2019. https://www.progressiveinvolvement.com/progressive_involvement/lectionary/

[2] Luke 8:1-3

[3] Matthew Skinner, Professor of New Testament at Lutheran Seminary. Luke 10:38-42. Sermon Brainwave podcast for July 21, 2019. https://www.workingpreacher.org/brainwave.aspx?podcast_id=1165

[4] Ephesians 4:11-16 and 1 Corinthians 12 (the whole chapter but especially vv27-31)

[5] Luke 12:22-34

[6] Luke 10:25-37

[7] Progressive Involvement Lectionary Study on Luke 10:38-42 for July 21, 2019. https://www.progressiveinvolvement.com/progressive_involvement/lectionary/

[8] Ibid.

[9] Matthew Skinner, ibid.

 

Looking Backward to Move Forward – John 11:32-44

[sermon begins after the 3 Bible readings]

John 11-32-44  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.”

Isaiah 25:6-9 On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. 7 And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; 8 he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. 9 It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

Reveleation 21:1-6a  Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; 4 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” 5 And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 Then he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

[sermon begins]

One of the things I get to do at Augustana is work with a Faith Community Nurse as part of the staff here.  Sheryl is so titled because (a) she’s a nurse and (b) she works in a faith community.  See how that works?  She has a Master’s Degree. She’s a Nurse Practitioner.  She has worked in an ICU.  She has worked in an outpatient clinic. She has a passion for wellness.  She has a heart for the gospel.  She brings an amazing amount of knowledge to the congregation.  We all benefit.  She’s on vacation this week so I get to brag on her all kinds while she’s out of town.  That has to be some kind of reverse gossip, #Lutheranhumility, right?

Sheryl is part of our weekly Care Team meeting that also includes our Children and Family Minister and the pastors.  Two weeks ago she told us about a conference she attended to prepare for the upcoming Grief Support Group at Augustana.  The conference was led by Dr. Alan Wolfelt, Director of the Center for Loss and Life Transitions in Fort Collins and known for healing and grief.[1]  Sheryl summarized Dr. Wolfelt’s three main points in this way – we need to say hello to the person who died before we can say goodbye, we need to sit in the darkness before we see the light, and we need to look backwards before we can go forward.

All three points are worth addressing.  And Sheryl will facilitate the Grief Support Group beginning on Sunday, November 15th between worship services.  I encourage you to take advantage of it.  However, it was the last point that really caught my attention.  “We need to look backwards before we can go forward.”

The story of Lazarus is a long story in the Bible.  We are only privy to part of it in the reading today.  Lazarus has died.  Jesus takes his time getting there.  Martha, Lazarus’ sister, is in tears.  Mary, Lazarus’ other sister, is also tears.  The Jews are in tears.  Jesus ends up in tears.  There are a lot of tears.  The Isaiah and Revelation verses reference no more tears but we are not there yet.  We are in the Gospel of John with a lot of tears.  Mary says, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  Mary is looking backwards.  She is looking backwards on the event of her brother’s death with Jesus by her side and with her people, the Jews, by her side.  She is doing the work of grief and the people around her are doing the work with her.

Funerals happen here in Augustana’s Christ Chapel and Sanctuary.  Sometimes the funeral is for a member of the congregation.  Sometimes they are not.  As a pastor, I make no distinction between member or not.  We are a visible church on a busy road and a lot of people know people connected to the people here.  Sometimes they just know that the building is here.  Sometimes they know the Early Learning Center is here.  Regardless, this congregation offers hope and healing in Jesus Christ and there is no more significant moment in which God’s promise is more alive than at the time of death.

A few weeks ago, Pastor Todd was the officiant for one such funeral here in Augustana’s Christ Chapel. The Early Learning Center children were on their way to lunch.  I was headed downstairs as they were headed up.  Their teacher was reminding the children to walk quietly with the funeral going on upstairs.  I crouched down and whispered to the kids, “There are people upstairs who are sad because someone they love died a few days ago…can you all help them by being quiet on your way to lunch?”  They all nodded at me, big-eyed, some serious, some smiling, some telling me their names, some waving wildly.  The children became part of the community doing the work of grief with the people at the funeral.  They started ever so quietly on their way to lunch while looking backwards up the stairs before moving forward.

There is sometimes a misconception that tears show a lack of faith. Or that funerals should be only a celebration of life – no sadness allowed.  Indeed, funerals are a celebration of the person who lived.  But they also make space for our loss and surround us with people who also feel that loss.  In the Lazarus story, Jesus cries with Mary and the people with her.  When people we love die, Jesus cries with us too.  There is indeed a time for tears to be cried and we do well to let our bodies do what bodies do cry them.  When we allow the tears to come, we are looking backward to move forward.

Today is All Saints Sunday.  Today we remember by name those who have died as part of the Augustana congregation or loved by those in the congregation over the last year.  Some of us are in worship today to hear a particular name.  Like Mary, there are people with and around us.

Today is All Saints Sunday so we also remember the saints who came before us in last two millennia.  Today there is a sign marking the stairs to the choir loft.  It reads, “No seating upstairs in the choir loft for worship today. We leave them empty in remembrance of our ancestors in the faith.”   I like the idea of seats held empty in remembrance of the people who came before us.

Saints, so named by their baptism, whose lives and voices proclaimed the good news of Jesus Christ so that we might live in faith today.  Some of whom went on to lead extraordinary lives that we can look to as examples for our own lives of faith. Looking back toward the saints, we look forward in faith.  We can look as far back as Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.  Slightly more recently through history to Hildegard of Bingen, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Rosa Parks.  We look backward and hear them crying with grieving people, proclaiming Christ crucified and risen for you, and setting the captives free.

In the Lazarus story, Jesus cries with Mary and the people with her.  There is a time for grief.  Jesus spends time looking backward with them.  And, only then, Jesus looks forward.  He rejoins them with Lazarus raised from the dead.

Jesus is the one who turns death into life.  Jesus turns death into life for Lazarus.  Jesus turns death into life for you.  This is an unconditional promise made by the power of the Holy Spirit through the cross of Jesus Christ, through Christ crucified and risen, for you.

God, the Alpha and the Omega, cries with us and opens our future through Jesus Christ.  “[God] will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more.”

Amen and thanks be to God!

 

[1] Alan D. Wolfelt. Understanding Your Grief: Ten Essential Touchstones for Finding Hope and Healing Your Heart.  (Fort Collins: Companion Press, 2003).

John 11:1-45 “Tomb-Vision”

John 11:1-45  “Tomb-Vision”

Caitlin Trussell on April 6, 2014 at Augustana Lutheran Church

 

John 11:1-45   Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. 3So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” 4But when Jesus heard it, he said, “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” 5Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, 6after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.
7Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.” 8The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?” 9Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. 10But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.” 11After saying this, he told them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” 12The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.” 13Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. 14Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead. 15For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” 16Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
17When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” 23Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” 24Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” 25Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” 27She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
28When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” 29And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. 30Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32When 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.” 33When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35Jesus began to weep. 36So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” 37But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”
38Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39Jesus 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.” 40Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42I 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.” 43When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44The 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.”
45Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

[See Ezekiel reading at end of sermon]

Some of us know what it’s like to watch someone’s life leave their body through an illness.   Mary and Martha certainly do.  There is enough time after Lazarus became ill to send word to Jesus.  There is more time after the sisters sent word and even more before Jesus arrived after Lazarus died.  Some of us know how long those days, hours, and minutes can seem while we wait to see what will happen.   Will the outcome be life?  Will it be death?  We know the fear and the despair as we wait and as we watch…as we lose.  We develop tomb-vision as we try to look everywhere but toward the downward spiral of life on which our loved one is attached.  We try, but we cannot keep from seeing the tomb edge closer and closer.

The prophet Ezekiel knows this despair too.  In the early 500s B.C.E., Ezekiel became part of the first deportation of the Southern Tribes of Israel at the hands of the Babylonians.  They were taken into exile to ancient Babylon, located in what is now modern day Iraq.  The Northern tribes of Israel were long gone, taken by the conquering Assyrian armies in the late 700s B.C.E..  Everyone knew that the temple in Jerusalem was God’s dwelling place.  Everybody knew.  And yet Ezekiel and the Southern Tribes ended up far, far away in a land where their God was not known.  From this reality, comes the lament of the people in verse 11, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.”   After all, their cousins in the Northern Tribes had disappeared just a hundred or so years before.  It was in the realm of possibility.  These people can’t even pretend to look anywhere but the tomb that edges closer and closer.  Their tomb-vision is sharply honed; with death seemingly inevitable they make the leap that God certainly doesn’t seem to be anywhere in sight…in this valley of the dry bones.

Mary, Martha, and Ezekiel are not the only ones with tomb-vision.  Variations on tomb-vision connect natural disasters, or illness, or accidents to the absence of God…or, even worse, attributing these events to the intentional hand of God.  The temptation is to deny God’s presence in times of despair and presume God’s presence when things go well.  Many, many of us actively worry about where God is and where God isn’t.  We add this to some additional worry about what’s going to happen to the people we presume that God has abandoned because of certain actions.  Presuming God’s absence in this way is antithetical to the crescendo of the cross and the silence of the tomb that we are edging toward as Palm Sunday and Holy Week loom on the calendar a week from today.

We are treated to whispers of Holy Week in the first few verses of the John reading today.  Mary’s anointing of Jesus’ feet is remembered to us even though we don’t actually get to that part of the story until the beginning of the next chapter.   Anointing is done for divine kings and for the dead.  Jesus’ anointing conflates the two.  In verse 25, using yet one more divine “I am” saying, Jesus claims to be the resurrection.  In verses 4 and 40 Jesus talks about God’s glory in conjunction with the Son of God being glorified.  When the word “glory” is used in the Gospel of John, it is code for Jesus hanging on the cross. We tend to think all kinds of things when we hear the word “glory” but hanging on a cross is not typically one of them.

Years ago, I had a strong aversion to Holy Week.  I just wanted to go from the Transfiguration straight to Easter.  After all, Lent is quiet and grey culminating in Holy Week that is dark and gloomy and ends in a tomb.  It runs smack up against the addiction to optimism, smack up against our desperation not to look at the ever-so-obvious tomb.  But these days, as I look forward to sinking into the depths of Holy Week, focusing on cross and tomb simply feels like freedom.  It feels like freedom because it feels true.  There is pain in the world and human beings are the cause of much of it.  Since I include myself in the ‘human beings’ category, the relief of Holy Week is enormous.  Facing this truth head-on, using the clarity of tomb-vision that neither looks away nor blocks out God in the midst of it, reveals what Jesus does when confronted with a tomb.

In the tomb of Lazarus, lays a man who’s about to walk again.  Jesus tells him to come out.  Lazarus comes out.  His disorientation must be staggering.  Jesus looks at the people and says, “Unbind him.”  They are participants in Lazarus’ moment.  Among the people who unbind Lazarus are surely many who participate in Jesus’ crucifixion.   A lot of us might be able to relate – after all, how many of us participate in a moment of new life only to turn around and call for a crucifixion of one sort or another?[1]

Raising Lazarus is Jesus’ final sign – at the same time declaring his divinity and inciting his execution.  On Palm and Passion Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday we are confronted by Jesus’ passion, all the events that lead to Jesus hanging on the cross and dead in a tomb.  It is a week during which we can relate to those people at Lazarus’ tomb who unbind a man into life one moment, and march off to court to call for the execution of another man in the next moment.  The people are ready to crucify because the fear that the one who brings life might get noticed by the powers that be in Rome and bring death to them all.  So as Holy Week whispers to us from the faraway place of next week, we pause with the crowd of people who unbind Lazarus.  We, like them, wonder about the power that can resurrect.  The power that can draw unwanted attention.  Lazarus isn’t the only one standing there dazed and disoriented, afraid.

There’s this one thing that occasionally pops up during Holy Week on Good Friday.  It’s called the Solemn Reproaches.  The accusations come fast and furious from the Crucified one and, in turn, the refrain from the people gathered is a cry for mercy.   Here’s one example:

O my people, o my church, what more could I have done for you?  Answer me.

I lifted you up to the heights, but you lifted me high on a cross.

I raised you from death and prepared for you the tree of life,

but you have prepared a cross for your Savior.

[and the people gathered together on Good Friday respond]

Holy God, holy and mighty, holy and immortal, have mercy on us.

And as we the people acknowledge the mercy of God our tomb-vision gets clearer still.  We see the fullness of life that God pours through us in the face of our fear.  We see what is already there; our asking merely unveils what is already there.  We see the Christ, Word made flesh.   We see Jesus’ self-sacrifice on the cross simultaneously revealing the breadth of divine power poured out to reveal the depth of divine love. [2] We see each other receiving the Spirit who breathes life into our bodies – here, now, today, with these people whom Jesus calls to help unbind us as we are called into resurrected life.

 

Ezekiel 37:1-14 The hand of the LORD came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the LORD and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2He led me all around them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry. 3He said to me, “Mortal, can these bones live?” I answered, “O Lord GOD, you know.” 4Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. 5Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. 6I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the LORD.”
7So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. 8I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. 9Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord GOD: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.” 10I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude.
11Then he said to me, “Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’ 12Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. 14I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken and will act, says the LORD.”



[1] Personal conversation, April 2, 2014, Nadia Bolz-Weber reminded of her friend “Sara’s” question about this Lazarus story.

[2] Koester, course notes, 12/1/2010.  For further study see: Craig R. Koester, The Word of Life: A Theology of John’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008).

Luke 10:38-42 “Taste of Forever”

Luke 10:38-42 “Taste of Forever”

July 19, 2013 – Caitlin Trussell

New Beginnings Church at the Denver Women’s Correctional Facility, Denver, CO

SIT AT YOUR FEET – Oil on Board

Bryn Gillette (artbybryn.com)

Used with permission.

Luke 10:38-42 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. 40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” 41 But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; 42 there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

 

Here’s how I’m afraid most of us hear the Martha story: “Hey, people, stop all that inconsequential doing, sit down and focus on Jesus!!!   You are delusional in the way you think about what’s important for survival and the things that you’re doing are useless!!!!!” [I use multiple exclamation points so you readers hear this in a very loud, stern voice].

Now, is it possible that we focus on some things that might be unnecessary?  Probably.   But I don’t think that this is what the text is challenging us toward.  And I don’t think this is the good news in this text.  After all, the story of the Good Samaritan, just before this one today, finds Jesus telling the lawyer to “Go and do likewise” after the example of the Good Samaritan.  The act of doing is simply not the problem.  We are commanded by scripture to do all kinds of things that show love for neighbor and love for ourselves.

So if doing is not the problem then what is the problem in this story?  Part of the problem seems to be Martha’s concern about what Mary is doing, or not doing, and trying to bring Jesus on her side against Mary.  This is a common human action that actually does create problems among us and against each other.  After all, if I can get Jesus on my side, then my side automatically puts me on the right side, and I can feel oh so much better about what I’m doing for and with Jesus.

So if Jesus is not invalidating Martha’s work, not siding against her, and is also not siding with her, then what is he doing?  Here’s where the story of Martha and Mary gets interesting.  Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet.  This is a student’s posture, a posture of one who is learning and listening to someone who has something important to teach.  This posture is reverent and focused and ready to receive.  In the first century, this posture was one reserved for students in the temple, traditionally male students.  So this posture, taken by Mary as she listens to Jesus, would be seen by first century people as radical.  But this story is so much more than simply one that breaks down the gender norms of its day or even our day.

In verse 42, Jesus says that Mary’s experience of receiving what Jesus has given her “will not be taken away from her.”  What Jesus gives her “will not be taken away from her…”   All well and good for Mary, but what might this mean for us who live now, worried and distracted by many things today?  It means that those who sit at Jesus’ feet are being given something eternal in the here and now.  If something can never be taken away and is given here, now, today, then it is indeed a taste of forever here and now.  

Did you notice that there is no “if” in our text today?  What Jesus gives, what Mary receives, is for always.  There is no contingent clause that sounds like Mary will only keep what’s been given to her if she performs a certain set of actions.  This means that:

When Jesus comes to you in the proclamation of forgiveness by the power of the Holy Spirit , He will not be taken away from you.

When Jesus comes to you by the power of the Holy Spirit in the waters of baptism by the power of the Holy, He will not be taken away from you.

When Jesus comes to you in bread and in wine by the power of the Holy Spirit, He will not be taken away from you.

Jesus remains with you today, tomorrow and forever…and you with him…which will not be taken away from you.

Thanks be to God!

John 11:1-45 “Lazarus: A Buried Hope?”

John 11:1-45 “Lazarus: A Buried Hope?”

April 10, 2011 – Caitlin Trussell

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, Aurora, CO

 

John 11:1-45 Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.  2  Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill.  3  So the sisters sent a message to Jesus,  “Lord, he whom you love is ill.”  4  But when Jesus heard it, he said, “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”  5  Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus,  6  after having heard that Lazarus  was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.  7  Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”  8  The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?”  9  Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world.  10  But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.”  11  After saying this, he told them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.”  12  The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.”  13  Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep.  14  Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead.  15  For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”  16  Thomas, who was called the Twin,  said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”  17  When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus  had already been in the tomb four days.  18  Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles  away,  19  and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother.  20  When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home.  21  Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.  22  But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.”  23  Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”  24  Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”  25  Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life.  Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live,  26  and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”  27  She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah,  the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”  28  When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.”  29  And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him.  30  Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him.  31  The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there.  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.”  45  Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

 

 

Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I was in college for the first time.  I had a good friend and fellow dorm-mate, whom I’ll call Rickie, who struggled mightily with many things about her life.  My door was open more often than not and one of my vivid memories of that first year of school was Rickie, regularly moving into my doorway, throwing her forearm up to her forehead and lamenting, “My life is a graveyard of buried hopes.”    Her melodrama would crack us up into belly laughs and help to lift her dark clouds for a little while.  While there were moments when her gesture was simply over-the-top theatrical, it was her truth as a fully loaded lament…“My life is a graveyard of buried hopes.”

In verse 3, we hear the sisters’ words to Jesus through a messenger, “Lord, the one whom you love is ill.”  Jesus loved Lazarus and Lazarus was ill, not yet dead and buried, a dwindling hope.  The story is uninterested in the origin of the illness but rather tells us that Jesus’ love and Lazarus’ illness both existed at the same time – “Lord, the one whom you love is ill.”  Jesus’ love did not prevent the suffering that was happening.  And when Jesus showed up in Bethany there was more for him to hear.

Martha ran to meet him with a faith-filled lament, “Lord, My brother is dead, if you had been here, he would not be dead and, beyond that, I know that God is still listening to you.”  Her lament echoes with accusation even as it echoes with faith.  What follows between Martha and Jesus is a conversation of faith.  Jesus met Martha’s faith-talk with his own faith-talk.

Mary also ran to meet Jesus but collapsed at his feet sobbing, “Lord, my brother is dead, if you had been here, he would not be dead.”  Period.  Mary, like her sister Martha, is in a faith-filled lament but in no condition to speak further.  What follows between Mary and Jesus is a connection of heart.  Jesus met Mary’s pain with his own pain, and Jesus wept with her.

Maybe you’re sitting here today overwhelmed by the thought of losing someone whom you love into the arms of death and you wonder how you will live without this person you love so much.  Or maybe you have already loved and lost someone, or more than one someone, into the arms of death.  Sitting at a bedside watching illness capturing the person you love little by little, moment by moment, breath by breath.  Lamenting either the speed at which death happens or frantically praying for death to end the suffering or desperately hoping for physical cure even to the last breath.

Know this…Jesus, God in the flesh, God with us, meets you where you are in your moment of loss, in your moment of pain.  Powerfully communicating the “the immeasurable depth of human worth” through his tears.[1]  And that can feel like the end of the story; indeed, many sermons end right here.  In our grief and in our fear, Jesus both speaks a comforting word and weeps with us, offering provisional comfort in the midst of our grief.  But, in the quiet, in the dark hours, in the honest moments, in the fear of dying, in the terminal prognosis of our earthly bodies, many of us come face to face with our fear of death.  This fear builds out into tunnel vision, or maybe we could call it tomb vision, that all we experience here on the planet is all that there is…that we end up dead…entombed…done…gone…

But then, there’s Jesus, standing and staring at a stone in front of his friend’s tomb foreshadowing time soon spent in his own tomb.  There is Jesus who says, “Lazarus, come out!”  And the man came out.  Lazarus, loved by Jesus, was given temporary reprieve from the terminal condition we call living.  Nobody has seen Lazarus still running around have you?  Clearly he had to go through death a second time.  But I invite you to consider that the inevitability of death is not ultimately not the end.[2]  Jesus gave life to Lazarus which intensified Jesus’ death spiral toward the cross.  And the cross is the place where Jesus finally destroys the inevitable so that the ultimate of resurrection is possible.

Lazarus, a specific person, in a specific time and place, dies and comes back into life through Jesus – signifying all the people of the world whom God so loves, across time and place, who also die and are raised to new life in resurrected bodies by the power of the Spirit.

And so, Jesus, whose death on a cross stirs up faith through that same cross,

Jesus, whose death on a cross pours out grace upon grace in forgiveness and healing,

Jesus, whose death on a cross reveals the depth of divine love,

Jesus, whose death on a cross unleashes the power of truth and love over the power of death,

Jesus, whose death on a cross sweeps us up into relationship with the eternal God,

And Jesus, whose death on a cross sets you free to love and care for your neighbor,

Jesus will stand at your tomb and say to you, “Come out, I refuse to live without you!”

 

 

 



[1] Justin Nickel, personal correspondence, April 6, 2011.

[2] Nadia Bolz-Weber, personal conversation, April 5, 2011.