If we’re friends on Facebook, you probably saw that I considered titling my sermon “No More Zombies” today…I mean, did you HEAR that passage from Ezekiel? He hears a rattling and the bones come together with sinews and flesh and skin but no breath?! (shudder) I was going to show a clip from the zombie classic, Army of Darkness, to illustrate this but I just couldn’t do it. Zombies freak me out!
Anyway…I would watch that part through my fingers because I was so scared…but I couldn’t look away! THAT’S the clip that plays in my head when I hear this passage from Ezekiel. Verse 11 says, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.” The skeleton army wins! But wait…in verses 13 and 14, God says, “You shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live.” Yeah! No more zombies!
But wait! There’s more! Check out our New Testament scripture for today, John 11:1-45. Yeah, I know, this is a lot of verses but it’s a familiar story and worth hearing again in its entirety. Read John 11:1-45 (NRSV).
But wait! There’s more! Check out our New Testament scripture for today, John 11:1-45. Yeah, I know, this is a lot of verses but it’s a familiar story and worth hearing again in its entirety. Read John 11:1-45 (NRSV).
No zombies here, either! The God of Ezekiel who reassembled dry bones into breathless corpses and then breathed life into them is the same God who breathes life back into Lazarus and commands him to come out. Life wins! If we trust this God who has been faithful since Ezekiel’s day, then we MUST believe that life always wins!
But…the truth is, we don’t always believe that, do we? We look around our world and we see too much evidence to the contrary. Protestors are still being beaten and killed in Egypt, the death toll in Japan is over 25,000 after the earthquake and tsunami, Libya is in the midst of a violent military takeover…but that’s halfway across the world – not something that hits too close to home, right? Surely life always wins here in the good ole’ US of A.
But…the truth is, we don’t always believe that, do we? We look around our world and we see too much evidence to the contrary. Protestors are still being beaten and killed in Egypt, the death toll in Japan is over 25,000 after the earthquake and tsunami, Libya is in the midst of a violent military takeover…but that’s halfway across the world – not something that hits too close to home, right? Surely life always wins here in the good ole’ US of A.
Really? With our federal government almost shutting down due to financial turmoil? With the gas prices rising and the cost of beef, milk, vegetables, fruits and butter skyrocketing? With all of the secret things in our lives that we don’t tell anyone that are killing us slowly? Life always wins?
Let’s be honest here. Sometimes we’re the zombies; the valley of dry bones, Lazarus sealed up in the tomb. Sometimes we’re Martha and Mary, falling at Jesus’ feet and wailing, “If you had been here...if you really loved me…if you really listened to my prayers…none of this would happen!” We want to believe…oh, how we WANT to BELIEVE that life always wins; that Jesus is the Messiah! But when confronted with the tombs of our life, with the stench and decay of death heavy in the air around us, our faith falters. And Jesus weeps. Just like at Lazarus’ tomb, he stands shuddering, shaken to the core. Maybe we can even hear a hint of anger in his sobs…a defiance of death?
Jesus traveled to Bethany to pick a fight with death—to announce that death doesn’t get the last word – to claim that the Resurrection and the Life…ALWAYS…WINS. “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.”
Our job, beloved, is to unbind the grave cloths of others…to let them go! And as we unbind others, we are also set free. So this morning, if you’re dead in the tomb, bound by past hurts, illness, grief, doubt, despair, addiction, abuse…whatever binds you – listen! Hear Jesus’ voice calling to you! Come out! Come out and believe that life always wins!
Let’s be honest here. Sometimes we’re the zombies; the valley of dry bones, Lazarus sealed up in the tomb. Sometimes we’re Martha and Mary, falling at Jesus’ feet and wailing, “If you had been here...if you really loved me…if you really listened to my prayers…none of this would happen!” We want to believe…oh, how we WANT to BELIEVE that life always wins; that Jesus is the Messiah! But when confronted with the tombs of our life, with the stench and decay of death heavy in the air around us, our faith falters. And Jesus weeps. Just like at Lazarus’ tomb, he stands shuddering, shaken to the core. Maybe we can even hear a hint of anger in his sobs…a defiance of death?
Jesus traveled to Bethany to pick a fight with death—to announce that death doesn’t get the last word – to claim that the Resurrection and the Life…ALWAYS…WINS. “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.”
Our job, beloved, is to unbind the grave cloths of others…to let them go! And as we unbind others, we are also set free. So this morning, if you’re dead in the tomb, bound by past hurts, illness, grief, doubt, despair, addiction, abuse…whatever binds you – listen! Hear Jesus’ voice calling to you! Come out! Come out and believe that life always wins!
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