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March 13, 2005; The Fifth Sunday of Lent, Year A
    The Rev. Harold "Skip" Comer, Rector

           Our reading from Ezekiel, known as the vision of the valley of dry bones, is one of the most bizarre scenes in the Bible.  We have only heard a portion of the vision this morning, yet the description of what Ezekiel saw is clear.  The valley is littered with bones.  Skulls, backbones, ribs, tibias – well you get the picture. The bones have been bleached by the sun, they are all dried out.  Any chance of life is gone.  To the question from God, “Mortal, can these bones live?” the prophet can only respond, “O Lord God, you know.”  To Ezekiel there was no hope of life in the valley, yet he believed in the power of God to take even these lifeless bones and create living beings.

This mystical experience in the valley of dry bones was a prophesy from God that symbolized Ezekiel’s mission to the Jews who were being held captive by the Babylonians.  God’s people in total despair with no hope of a future, felt like life was being zapped from them and they were becoming nothing but lifeless bones.  Yet, through this prophecy, God told Ezekiel that the Jews would receive a new spirit that would enable them to rise from their hopelessness and lead a new life.

“Can these bones live?”   It is the type of question that many of us have asked when we are overwhelmed with feelings of despair.  It happens when we or someone we care about is diagnosed with a life threatening illness or slip into depression and the odds seem against us that we will go on living.  Sometimes it is a question that we ask of our society or the world that seems so bent on destruction.  It is even a question that is asked about the church when it becomes lethargic and looses members.  It is a way of asking about the possibility of new life in times when only dry, empty lifelessness seem to exist.  It is also a way of asking ourselves about the limits of our life – more especially about the limits of our faith in the resurrection that God promises to all people through Jesus Christ.

In the Gospels, whenever Jesus is confronted with death, he overcomes it.  Now you may say, I know that.  I know that Jesus died and rose from the dead.  But this is not the only account of Jesus overcoming death.  As we have just heard, Lazarus, Jesus’ friend is brought back from the dead.  But there are two other occasions when Jesus was confronted by the death of someone and he brought them back to life.  In the fifth chapter of Mark, Jesus raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead.  And in the seventh chapter of Luke, Jesus encounters a funeral procession and raised up a widow’s only son.       Our attention is drawn like a magnet to near death experiences or of someone coming back from the dead.  Remember ten years ago when Betty Eadie wrote about her near death experience in Embraced by the Light?   It made the best seller list.

But this morning I do not want to talk about life after our physical death or near death experiences.  While we will all face death someday, and perhaps may even have a near death experience, there is another message in our readings for this morning.  It is an important message because it can have an impact upon our lives right now, and in the end determine what will happen to us.

I believe that the point of Jesus’ three encounters with death (prior to his own death) were not primarily about the restoration of physical life.  When we speak of resurrection we tend to think of it as some future event.  Even Martha held this belief, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”[1]  Jesus declares, and then shows that the resurrection is a present reality – in and through him.  All, who like Lazarus, hear his voice – move from death into life, whether they are six feet under, driving down the road, playing golf, or watching television.

Jesus not only raised a young girl and boy, and his friend Lazarus; but has also raised millions of people out of their present life into a new life with him.  The confusion that Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman at the well experienced in our Gospel reading two and three Sundays ago is not uncommon even among Christians.  They were thinking in physical and material ways and trying to understand what Jesus was saying about being born anew and receiving living water.   As we have heard, Jesus was talking about the new life that is to be found in and through him.

All of our readings in Lent have emphasized the power of God to bring about change.  This morning the focus is the power of God to bring life out of death.  And we are called to exercise our faith, to open our eyes and ears, and to see God’s hand at work – not only in Scripture, but in the lives of people around us.

And who is it that hears this voice of Jesus saying, “Come out!”  It is those who are dead.  Those who need to hear his voice to live, not only in the resurrection but in everyday living.  They are the ones in other words who come to the realization that they are dead, their life is meaningless, without Jesus.  They hear his voice calling to them, “Come out!   Come out!”  Come into the light, be born of the Spirit and receive the living water now.

This is what the story of Lazarus is all about.  The power of Jesus to make people come alive.  The raising of Lazarus and the resurrection of Jesus testify to the power of God in Jesus Christ to make people come alive.

The play, “Lazarus Laughed,” by Eugene O’Neil begins with the dramatic raising of Lazarus.  The family as well as friends and neighbors have gathered for what they thought was going to be Lazarus’ funeral.  All of that sadness is transformed into gladness as Lazarus’ father proposes a toast, “to my son Lazarus, whom a blessed miracle has brought back from the dead.”  Laughing softly, as if to himself, Lazarus responds, “No! there is not death!”  The people with their goblets uplifted, together ask, “There … is … no … death?”  Other questions follow, and finally the people ask, “What is beyond?”  Lazarus replies, “There is only life.”[2]

As LaRue Loughhead, a Baptist minister, points out, “Eugene O’Neill is half right anyway.  He is right in saying that there is life.  He is wrong in saying that there is no death.  Lazarus was dead, and later Jesus himself was dead.  Death is real and death is strong, but there is a life that defeats the ultimate power of death.”[3]

That life is to be found in Jesus Christ, who calls to us to “Come out!”  To be unbound from the death of sin and to live in him.

“Can these bones of mine live?”   (Point to myself.)  Yes, they can.  But only as I allow Jesus to resurrect and transform my life and fill me with the Holy Spirit will I come out of the tomb of sin and walk as a child of the light.

May we give praise to God, who through Jesus Christ, has the power over death, the power to transform us now into his children, and in the age to come, to give us eternal life.

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