Fifth Sunday in Lent A

Fifth Sunday in Lent C. March 25, 2007. Our Lady of Grace 5:15, 9:30. Ezekiel 37: 12-14. Romans 8:” 8-11. John 11: 1-45.

Oprah Winfrey was born out of wedlock. She grew up in poverty in rural Mississippi. When she was very young her mother moved away and left her to be raised by her grandmother. Oprah says that her relationship with a grandmother who couldn’t read probably saved her life. Her grandmother insisted that she learn to read. Reading opened up a whole new world to a child trapped in poverty. When Oprah was nine she moved to Milwaukee to be with her mother. It was a very crazy time in her life. She was raped by her cousin and molested by other family members and friends. At age 14 she gave birth to a child who lived only two weeks. From this traumatic background Oprah worked hard to lift herself up from being a victim to being the woman that we know today.

In 2006 Time Magazine listed Oprah among the 100 most influential people in the world. Fortune Magazine listed Oprah as number 8 among the 50 most powerful women in business. She is said to be worth more than a billion dollars. But wealth and power are not the most important part of Oprah’s story. While interviewing a woman who had been sexually abused as a child, Oprah was overwhelmed with emotion. She felt like she was going to come apart. She signaled for the cameras to move off of her, but the cameras kept rolling. She said, “That was the first day I recognized that I was not to blame” for what happened to me. Her demons had haunted her until that day. She had worked to achieve vast wealth and influence to reclaim her dignity. From that day on her mission was about much more than personal success. Now, she had moved beyond being a victim having to prove her worth to being a person responsible for her own life. Her mission became helping poor women accept responsibility for their lives no matter how unfair life had been to them. Out of her pain Oprah has turned her attention to helping thousands of women and children in the United States and Africa better their lives.

My purpose is not to make Oprah a saint. I would not claim that for her and I suspect that she would not claim that for herself. My point is to show that we do not move ahead in the deepest meaning of our lives until we face death honestly and rise from the dead. When Jesus heard that Lazarus was dead, he faced the reality of the situation very honestly. He told his disciples, “Lazarus is dead!” We so often mask the harshness of death by saying that a person “passed away,” or “went to a better place.” Death is a hard thing and to be healthy we must face the reality of death very honestly. Sometimes we are emotionally dead and refuse to face the stark reality of our emotional and relational death. Sometimes we are spiritually dead, and we try to mask the reality by jumping though all the hoops and fulfilling all the legal expectations in a spiritual life that really does not exist. The first step to resurrection is facing death in our lives as it really is and being honest about it.

When Jesus arrived at the tomb of Lazarus he was moved by the deepest emotions and he wept. We are all on a journey to eternal life. Many years ago I made a Jesuit 30 day silent retreat. One of the things I had to do on the retreat was to tell the retreat director the story of my life. After being asked to repeat my story for the third day in a row I noticed tears running down the cheeks of my director. When I said, “Why the tears?” He said, “You are telling a very sad story – I am surprised that you do not have tears as well.” Facing the death of Lazarus was more than an intellectual experience for Jesus. Jesus was moved deeply by the experience. We are not ready to rise from the dead until we feel deeply the pain and tragedy of death in our lives. It is a very sad thing that we allow ourselves to remain dead when we could be so much more fully alive. Being too little alive and too little filled with grace should move us to tears.

As Jesus approached the tomb of Lazarus the dead man’s sister said to him. “Lazarus has been dead for four days now. By now there well be a stench.” Jesus was not put off by the odor of a decaying dead man. He ordered that the stone be removed from the door of the tomb and cried “Lazarus come out.” And Lazarus came forth from the tomb, truly risen from the dead.

The miracle of the raising of Lazarus shows us the way to resurrection in our own lives. While only Jesus can give us new life, even now, the three steps in the gospel point out the way that we prepare for resurrection during the season of Lent:

We must honestly face spiritual, emotional, relational and physical death in our lives. If we are afraid to face areas of our lives that are dead there is no way that God can work the miracle of resurrection in us.
We must experience the sadness that death in various parts of our lives causes us and those around us. Our hearts must be moved, not just our intellects. Unless we are moved to tears about the tragic lack of life and health in various parts of our lives God can not work the miracle of resurrection in us.
We must be willing to deal with the stench of sin and tragedy in our lives and enter into it and deal with it if we are to rise from the dead. The smell of death must not keep us from dealing with the things we must deal with to rise again.

Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” For the grace to seek resurrection and the fullness of life in Christ we give God thanks and praise.