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The Rev. Dr. Dennis E. Morey, Pastor
Scripture: John 11:32-44
Tomb Preference
Every one of us has been there, in a situation where we have said—if not out loud, certainly to ourselves—“If only Jesus would have been here, this would not have happened.”
Disappointed in our Savior, it is easy for us to begin insulating ourselves, wrapping our time and our days in the cocoon of business-as-usual, isolating ourselves from friends and family. When someone asks, “How are you?” we quickly smile and say, “Fine,” because we really don’t want to expend the energy it would take to let them know we are sinking.
That is where two sisters who knew Jesus’ friendship found themselves when Jesus finally showed up. Their brother had been sick and they had sent for Jesus to come. But Jesus didn’t come. They did not know why. Did he not get the message about the urgency of their brother’s illness?
When Jesus finally arrived, it was too late. Lazarus was dead and the funeral was over. He had been dead four days. Mourners were still hanging around, but that would soon end and everyone would go back to their normal lives while the sisters would continue in disbelief.
Lazarus was gone. It seemed impossible. They had depended on his counsel, and his protection. They loved to cook what he loved to eat.
They shared a long history that included years of every day life, holidays, birthdays, and the good times of childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood. Now it was all gone. His body lay just behind the huge stone that covered the entrance to his tomb.
The sisters had gone to the cemetery several times in those four days to find comfort and peace but always left bewildered about their future. How would they go on without Lazarus?
When Jesus finally got there each sister, in turn, greeted Jesus with the same thought, “O Lord, if you had only been here, our brother would not have died.” Which meant, “Jesus, it is your fault he died. If you had come when we sent for you, this would not have happened.”
They had seen it time and time again. Jesus could heal the sick of any disease, no matter if it was sudden, or a lifelong condition. Jesus’ touch was all that was needed, and the person was not only well but better than ever before.
They were glad to see Jesus, and it was nice that he and his disciples had come to comfort them, but now there was nothing that could be done. It was over. Lazarus was gone. End of story. As surely as the body of Lazarus lay just beyond the stone, the sisters’ lives were being entombed. They would be confined to circumstances beyond their control and would surely sink.
Jesus said, “Show me where he is buried.” That was nice. Jesus wanted to at least go to the cemetery. The sisters accompanied him.
There at the tomb he said to a couple of the disciples, “Roll the stone away.” Even though there were objections because by that time the body would have started to decompose, the stone was rolled away and Jesus called out, “Lazarus, come forth!”
At this point, let’s rewrite the story.
Lazarus refuses to come out. Imagine a struggle between Lazarus and Jesus. When there is no sign of Lazarus, Jesus calls out, “Lazarus, get out here now!”
Lazarus replies, “Who opened my tomb? The light is blinding. Leave me alone. Go away! Oh, it is you, Jesus. Where were you four days ago when I needed you? Little late, aren’t you? Well guess what? I like this tomb.
“I don’t want to go back to living with those two busybody sisters. They talk constantly, they can’t agree on anything, and they are always trying to steal each other’s boyfriends. I would like to get married myself, but then what would I do with them?
“Mary uses too much perfume. I wish she would get rid of that stuff. In fact, from the smell of this place, I think she has poured some of it on me. Martha is always fussing about keeping the floors clean, and the cost of groceries. There is just no end to the miseries I have known.
“I like it in here on this slab of stone. It is so nice and cool here inside my tomb, and peaceful. Just let me quietly decompose.”
Now of course that isn’t how the scripture says it happened. No one would prefer the tomb over life, no matter how complicated life would be. The tomb is forever, there are no possible changes. Life holds constant possibilities.
Yet many of us prefer the tomb. There was a time in life when things fell apart. Jesus wasn’t there when we thought we needed him, and we have slipped into some kind of comfortable religion.
We can come to church on the Sundays we feel like it, and cling to some vague hope of heaven, peacefully become more like the world, adopting its standards and practices and blending into the ashes around us.
We prefer not to be disturbed. Yes, we are depressed. But we prefer to remain depressed. We remain in our sorrow. We continue to say that life is not fair, that we have been cheated and things would have, should have, could have been different.
If only Jesus had been there to halt our sorrow, to interrupt the downhill slide of our relationships, to make us richer, prettier, smarter.
We prefer to believe life has passed us by and our opportunities have been reduced to nothing. We prefer the tomb.
We sit at home with few friends, dozing in the chair content to end another day unaffected by the trouble around us, and being ineffective in our relationships.
Do we prefer to quietly decompose into the next stage of life until finally we die, with little or no thought of the fact that Jesus stands outside the tomb calling us to life? The fact is, Jesus was not absent at some crucial point in our lives. Jesus is with us. Jesus is here. Jesus is never late. Today he has arrived outside the tomb that holds us. Jesus wants to call us away from our sorrow, away from the tomb of troubles that holds us.
We have gotten used to self-pity, we have grown accustomed to being left out and alone, we have taken the easy path of dozing in the chair, trying to blend into our society much as a dead body decomposes and finally blends into the earth around it.
Even when we realize Jesus is calling us back to life, we think coming out of the tomb would be a lot of work. It would mean a lot of change. It would mean an interruption of our routine, doing only what we are comfortable doing day after day.
When Jesus said, “Lazarus, come forth!” there was no argument. Lazarus was finished with being in the tomb. Lazarus responded. Jesus said, “Untie him from those grave clothes and let him go.”
What has you trapped? What has you in the grip of despair? What has you entombed?
What is it that is robbing you of the joy of the life to which Christ calls you?
We read these words in II Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
That says that there is a possibility of our leaving all the gloom of the tomb behind.
We don’t have to decompose into what the world teaches, believes, or wants to force on us. If we are “in Christ,” we have a new beginning.
In one of our evening Bible studies we learned that the Greek idea of the preposition “in” means to become a part of. Eggs are “in” cookie dough. The recipe says, “Add the eggs.” That means crack the eggs and stir them into the rest of the ingredients. No one would add an egg, shell and all, and hope it will dissolve while baking in the oven. The egg has to be cracked and combined with the other ingredients. The egg is “in” the dough.
When the combined ingredients are baked, they are no longer sugar, flour, eggs, butter, and chocolate chips. They are combined and now they are a new creation called a cookie.
That is what it means to be “in Christ.” It means we are a part of the mix. When we are “in Christ,” we are no longer isolated as a single ingredient in the Kingdom of God, but we are a part of the church.
“Me” is no longer the focus of life. We are called out of the tomb of serving self and slowly decomposing into whatever the world’s standards may be. Instead together, “in Christ,” our lives are combined with what Christ is doing: bringing about the Kingdom of God, a new creation.
What is wrong with the world today? Name a problem and I can show how that problem would go away if those who claim to be Christians were really “in Christ.”
What is ailing our world today is that Christians are satisfied with the tomb. We don’t want to study God’s word. “It is too complicated,” we whine.
What a smoke screen. We don’t study it because we know it would call us out of the tomb. It would call us to change. We like the tomb.
I sit in meetings with church Sessions struggling. Why are churches going downhill? Why are church boards worried about budgets? Why is the biggest burden on the church budget the fuel bill? Why are parking lots empty?
Why are there so many teenage pregnancies? Why is there so much illegal drug traffic and a police force always playing catch-up? Why do we need more prison space? Why are politicians so crooked? Why are people confused? Why are colleges filled with young people with no purpose and no direction, wasting time and resources?
Why is only one third of our congregation a part of a Bible study? Why can’t we get out of bed and get to Sunday School on time? Why do we have to hunt high and low to find a Bible in our house? Oh, we know we have one, but where is it?
Why do we go to the funeral of a friend not sure if that person knew Christ as his or her Savior? If we believe Christ is so critical to life beyond the grave, why don’t we share him with our friends?
Because you and I have chosen the tomb! There have been opportunities to study God’s word, but we skipped them. We all own a Bible but don’t read it.
We hear the words of this sermon but we will just lie here on the slab, claiming the light is too bright, we just can’t take it. We hope that if we continue to just lie here quietly, someone will roll the stone back across the opening and we can continue to decompose, becoming a part of the world around us.
Our children and grandchildren will not remember our faith. America’s schools will not grow stronger. Cities will continue to deteriorate and become the haven for crime and sin. Churches will get smaller and prisons larger. Children will continue to go hungry, and crooked politicians will continue to buy the office and wield the power.
Friends, we are the pivotal generation. These days are important not only to us personally, but to the whole world. Will our children and grandchildren look back on this generation and say we preferred the tomb?
What will be our reply to them? “Well if Jesus had been here, it wouldn’t have happened. It was his fault. He was late.”
Amen.
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John 11:32-44 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 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.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. 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.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 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.” (From the
New Revised Standard Version of the
Bible) |
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