Untangling Death-- Lent 5A 2020

Text: “25Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.” (John 11:25–27)

You and I aren’t physically standing at the tomb of our brother, like Mary and Martha were. But we’re not too far off. Many of you have seen the memes that have been making the rounds of social media. One pointed out: “I didn’t expect to give up this many things for Lent.” Another declared “This is the Lentiest Lent we’ve ever Lented.” All I can say is: This is most certainly true. Most years you and I try to carve out a little space in our schedules to be reminded of our need for repentance, our ongoing battle against the devil, the world and our sinful flesh. You try to find time to prepare to remember the suffering and death that Christ endured to fight and win that battle for you. This year our lives have been turned upside down. Everything that claims our attention and keeps you from making that effort is forcefully set aside. And, if that weren’t enough, you have a healthy dose of an awareness of death added on top of it.

You’re not in the same position as Mary and Martha, thankfully. But you’re not too far off. Like them, you started calling upon Him for help days ago. And He seems to be in no hurry to intervene. He seems content to let this run its course, with the vague assurance that this is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God might be glorified through it.

But there’s nothing vague about today’s readings. They speak quite directly.

God speaks through the prophet Ezekiel—“13And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. 14 And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the LORD; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the LORD” (Ezekiel 37:13–14).

God speaks through the Apostle Paul—“11If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you” (Romans 8:11).

“25 Jesus said to Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world” (John 11:25–27).

It may still be “the Lentiest Lent that you’ve ever Lented,” but these readings remind you that Easter is almost here. Today is not a day for generalities and vague promises. It is a time for Jesus Christ.

Speaking of which, did you notice how correct Martha’s answer was? She didn’t just get the answer right, she got the answer EXACTLY RIGHT in v. 27. “Yes, I believe that you are the Christ….” How many of us, in her place, would have answered, “Yes, I believe in the resurrection”? Not Martha. Her answer wasn’t that she believed in the resurrection—that she believed the doctrine—but that she believed in Him. “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world” (John 11:27). She could not have given a better answer.

God grant each of us such faith!

The challenge, of course, is that this promise is hidden. It’s hidden beneath your aches and pains. It’s hidden behind the fact that God’s people aren’t immune to sickness. It’s hidden beneath the growing darkness, beneath the shadow of death that gathers over our world.

And yet, as you were reminded during the season of Epiphany, “16 The people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light, and for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned” (Matthew 4:16). You haven’t simply been taught about a resurrection. Jesus Christ has come to you.

Jesus weeps over death just as you and I do. If anything, He feels it more because He remembers what this world was supposed to be. That’s why He comes to you. God Himself left His throne in heaven and came down to become one of us so that He could live the perfect life that you and I could not live, so that He could take your sins and pay the full price for them, so that He could bear the full weight of death and hell as hung on the cross. And then He passed through death and the grave to eternal life. “21For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:21–22).

And He has come to you.

Yes, that promise seems hidden for now. But, as Johann Gerhard has written, “Everything that [Christ has] promised to [you] for that future life and for which [you] now hope is as certain to [you] as all those things that [He has] provided for [your] use in this life. …[Christ’s] mercy precedes and follows [you] (Psalm 23:6). It precedes [you] in justification and follows in glorification. It precedes [you] and helps [you] to live a godly life. It follows so [you] may live with [Him] forever.[1]

It is hidden, so He came to you in baptism and gave you the Holy Spirit as a pledge. The Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you and he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you (Rom. 8:11).

Storms and tempests of doubt may strike your heart, the boat in which Christ sails, but He has given you the promise of salvation and He is the faithful God (Psalm 31:5). How can you doubt whether [His] words of promise are immovably and unchangeably certain? That promise is free. In no way does it depend on the merit of [your] works. [You] can be as certain about the benefits promised to [you] by [His] grace as [you are] about those things [you] see with [your] eyes. [Your Heavenly Father feeds you] with the body and blood of [His] Son. [He has] seal[ed you] with the internal certainty of faith granted by the Holy Spirit. How could You confirm the promise of salvation to me by a more certain testimony or a more precious pledge? In the Supper, [you] know that [He is] with [you] in the tribulations of this present life (Psalm 91:15). [And you will] also enjoy [His] presence in the most blessed comfort of eternal life[.] If [He gives you] so much while [you] live in the peasant’s hut of this world, how much more will [He] give [you] in the palace of heavenly paradise?”[2]

The One who died for you on the cross will stand by you in death. The One who was unjustly judged will protect you in the day of Judgment. When this earthly tent of yours has been destroyed (2 Corinthians 5), He will bring you, body and soul, into the dwelling of your heavenly home. Through the holy wounds that He endured as He suffered on the cross, He will grant that you are able to overcome the fiery arrows of Satan with which he attacks you even in death. The price for your redemption has been paid in His blood.

By His death, He destroyed death. By His resurrection, He merited for you a blessed resurrection to eternal life. And He will grant you a blessed departure from this wretched life and a blessed entrance to eternal life on the day of resurrection. Even when your body returns to the earth—ashes to ashes, dust to dust— even when the promise is hidden, not just by our frailty but by a casket and a gravestone, it is guaranteed by His cross and His empty tomb.

“25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.” (John 11:25–27) This may be the “Lentiest Lent we’ve ever Lented”—and, God willing, that we ever will Lent—but Easter is almost here. And the promise of Easter is forever. Because Christ has come to you.

[1] Gerhard, Johann. Meditations on Divine Mercy, “Thanksgiving for the Eternal Promise of Salvation” [2] Ibid.