LENTEN REFLECTION

Message

When Jesus raised the decomposing Lazarus back to life, He showed us for our sakethat He is God the Son, who gives life. It was for Lazarus. We rejoice with Lazarus. But this was a precursor to Jesus’s own resurrection. The Holy Spirit that raised Him from the dead, is in us, and raises us too from the dead, to be Christ-like. We rejoice that Jesus gives us fullness of life, through His resurrection. We begin to live this eternal life right away before our death, when we accept and receive our Lord Jesus Christ (Jn 11:25-26, 17:3, 20:31). We live as if death doesn’t matter, for we already live forever; the Holy Spirit in us, we are children of God by grace received, we choose to be and become Christ-like in our lifestyle, world view and fidelity to God (Jn 1:12-13).

Gospel Reading

Lazarus Lives

John 11 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.”

Jesus the Resurrection and the Life 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.”

Jesus Weeps

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?”

Jesus Raises Lazarus to Life

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.”

The Plot to Kill Jesus

45 Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. 46 But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what he had done.

This Gospel reading has a detail that clarifies a mistake. The woman who anointed Jesus with a very expensive perfume, weeping, and drying His feet with her hair, was not Mary Magdalene or the prostitute, but Mary the sister of Martha and Lazarus (vv.1-2).This clarification let to the decree by Pope Francis announced on 26 January 2021 of the Feast of Martha, Mary and Lazarus, which we now celebrate on 29 July every year. We thank God for the gift of Martha, Mary and Lazarus; for their friendship with our Lord Jesus Christ, listening to Him and providing Him a home to retreat to; and for the love of our Lord to us as individuals and families. As families, we can make our homes truly homes where we welcome and receive our Lord Jesus Christ, listen to Him and entertain Him. He is the word of God, the scripture readings that we can set time to contemplate daily as individuals and family, and in the divine office or Prayer of the Church when we can pray the Psalms. He is in the hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, prisoner; the poor, the broken-hearted, the disabled and the oppressed (Mt 25: 31-46, Lk 4:16-22).

The raising of Lazarus is the seventh sign in the Gospel of John. The others are: changing water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana (2:1-11), healing the son of the royal official (4:46-54), healing the man at the pool of Bethesda from 38 years of disability (5:1-11), multiplication of bread and fish for the 5000 (6:1-15), walking on water as only God does (6:16-21), and giving sight to the man born blind (9:1-12). The reason the Gospel of John was written is “so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name” (20:31). All the signs in particular point to Jesus as God the Son. The resurrection is the utmost of the signs (20:1-29). With St Thomas, we confess at the core of our being and proclaim to the entire world that Jesus is “My Lord and my God” (v.28). Jesus reveals God to us, for He is God, and He reveals to us who we truly and fully are: we too rise from the dead and get glorified bodies. We are divine by adoption, children of God. In Jesus, we receive fullness of life, when we accept it. And we already begin to live that life on earth before our physical death (1:12-13, 3:3-6, 5:24, 10:10, 17:3, 20:31). In the Gospel reading, Jesus says clearly, “ 25 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” (vv.25-26). He has prayed for us to the Father, who has granted it so that we have fullness of life (vv.41-44) and the Holy Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is already in us, so we also will live forever (Rom 8:8-11). What all this means is that we need not fear death. We live forever. We can live in total freedom and joy, knowing that Jesus has conquered sin and death, and given us eternal life, which we begin to live now. We live as if death doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t matter at all, for we live.

In the raising of Lazarus, we see our Lord Jesus Christ restoring a decomposing man to life. According to Jewish tradition, a person was totally and completely death on the fourth day (v.39). Jesus gives life; He is God. He gives us life even when we are rotting, or have rotten and become bones. We can offer Him our bones, and He will restore us to fullness of life (Ez 37:12-14). For He is God. We can list the worst things and sins we have done, our worst fears, the worst-case scenarios of the future, our worst qualities, what we most dislike about ourselves, what is worst about the world and all society around us: Jesus gives fullness of life to us as individuals in all that is worst about us and all our circumstances, to our communities in all our anxieties and hopes, and to the whole of humankind despite the folly of structural sin that appears every now and then through wars, pandemics and other public health emergencies, climate change, rogue artificial intelligence, discrimination and exclusion, debt and inequality, apathy and loss of meaning in life. Jesus infuses life in all these situations. But He doesn’t render us useless, without a role. He invites us into partnership, to be co-creators, to be on God’s side. WE have a role, each and everyone of us. That is our dignity as having the image of God, being Christ-like. We join Jesus, offering all our faculties, our minds, souls, and body; our hands and feet; all our thoughts, words and actions; to love as He loves, and to make everything new (Rev 21:5). As individuals we recognise that we are each God’s own idea (Ps 139) and we forgive everyone everything, to begin life anew, to have a new worldview, for the time is fulfilled and the right time is right now, we have a full conversion and return to God (Joel 2:12-13, Mk 1:15, Lk 4:21). As communities and societies, we recognize that we are family, God’s family (Gn 2:7, Jn 1:12-13).We are to care for the natural world and all God’s creation as stewards in all its beauty and grandeur as our home and neighbourhood (Gn 1:31, 2:15, Laudato Si). And in God we find the ultimate explanation for everything, for why there is anything rather than nothing (Job 38:4-7, Eccl 2:24-25, 8:15; Jn 10:10, 15:11). As St Augustine found out, we are ever restless until we rest in God. And St Thomas Aquinas explains, all things ultimately seek God in so far as they seek their perfection. God is the Good.

The raising of Lazarus to life is a critical turning point. Jesus did a good act, restoring life, but the chief priests and the pharisees do the very opposite: they start planning to kill Jesus, sheerly out of their jealousy, self-preservation, and insecurities. We can wonder why the Jewish authorities could possibly have rejected Jesus and had Him put to death. This is the explanation. And, for us, this is a paramount lesson for us on what never to do in life about good people. We should be on their side, supporting them in furtherance of the reign of God on earth among us as communities and the global family, rather than getting jealous and trying to get rid of them due to our petty insecurities. 46 But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what he had done. 47 So the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the council, and said, “What are we to do? This man is performing many signs. 48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation.” 49 But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing at all! 50 You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed.” 51 He did not say this on his own, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus was about to die for the nation, 52 and not for the nation only, but to gather into one the dispersed children of God. 53 So from that day on they planned to put him to death.

For the rest of the Lent, we can pray Psalms 22, 51 and 130 more intensely, praying for ourselves and for the whole world, remembering how we have made a mess of the gift of life and creation that God has given us, choosing what is contrary to God’s plan for our happiness, and undertaking a permanent irreversible conversion to be Christ-like for ever. With our Lord Jesus Christ, we can pray the Psalms He Himself prayed: Psalm 88 in the dungeon in the night before His crucifixion, and Psalms 22 and 31 as He hang on the cross in excruciating pain before He died, in solidarity with our Lord, imitating Him, and with the greatest affection for Him. We shall be satisfied, we shall praise the Lord,and we shall live forever! (Ps 22:26).