Life Comes Out of Death
- davidwperk
- Jan 5, 2024
- 7 min read
Devotional Reflection, Friday, January 5, 2024: Eve of the Epiphany
The week of the first Sunday after Christmas
The Rev. David W. Perkins, Th.D.
Key phrases for reflection from today’s Gospel reading:
17 When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21Martha said to Jesus, `Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.' 23Jesus said to her, `Your brother will rise again.’ . . . 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, `Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42I 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.' 43When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, `Lazarus, come out!' 44The 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.'
You will find the full text of today’s Gospel reading at the end of this reflection.
Daily Office Lectionary Readings (BCP, 941)
AM Psalm 2, 110:1-5(6-7);
Jonah 2:2-9; Eph. 6:10-20; John 11:17-27,38-44
Today we celebrate the Feast of Sarah, Theodora, and Syncletica of Egypt. (See below.)
David's Reflections
If four portrait painters painted portraits of the same model, the four portraits would be unique efforts to interpret the model's identity as understood by each artist. And, each portrait would differ because the gifts of each artist differ.*
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John could be understood as painters, trying to depict the personality and identity of Jesus for their particular readers. The four Gospel portraits do present Jesus differently. The unique interpretations of Jesus and the literary skills and gifts of each writer account for much of that. Yet, we stand the four "portraits" alongside each other in our reading, and the one obvious conclusion is that they are indeed portraits of the same "model."
John's portrait presents several miracles in the first twelve chapters that John presents as acted signs of Jesus' identity. Here, Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. What better way to underline that Jesus gives life and delivers us from our entangled existence in a spiritual void of death and darkness. Salvation for John means to experience God's rich, everlasting life in one’s own experience. Just as Jesus brought life out of death by raising Lazarus, so God brings life out of death in Jesus’ resurrection, and in that way cracks open our burial places; our graves become temporary way stations to a larger life.
The conversation with Lazarus' sisters, Mary and Martha, takes us a step farther. To experience that transforming and freeing life within ourselves calls for faith on our part, trusting in Jesus' intent and ability to lift us into another existence, a new experience of love, forgiveness, freedom, and eternal life.
That faith may not come easily. The sisters’ conversations with Jesus were pock marked with misunderstandings. Jesus’ behavior in this entire episode feels mysterious. No one seems to get what he’s up to. Mystics like John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila got that. God evades our gaze and works in the darkness of our need. Otherwise, we might well seek to steer God’s activity, were we to know what God was about in our lives. Like the rising sun reveals the landscape, we often look back on a dark, confusing period and see God’s hand at work in retrospect. “So THAT’S what God was up to!”
Faith comes to us as gift. Mary and Martha found themselves in dialog with Jesus, dialog in which their misunderstandings, lack of fait, and their met with a response of loving encouragement from Jesus. How odd to realize that our internal dialog with ourselves about our doubts, our reservations, and our struggle with faith might indeed be a dialog with another presence within us, the Spirit of Jesus. Note also that Jesus took the first step, drawing near them and eliciting their faith in conversation. That dynamic continues to be the way of the Spirit of Jesus, approaching us and eliciting our faith.
When the light chased their darkness away, they had their brother back. Can we persevere? Can we affirm that God’s Spirit is at work, even though we feel clueless about how and feel confused and disoriented? The light will dawn and chase away our darkness. Life will sprout out of the composte heap of our losses.
Quaker poet John Greenleaf Whittier captures so much of this in his poignant verse entitled “A Dream of Summer.” The poem closes with these lines.
The Night is mother of the Day,
The Winter of the Spring,
And ever upon old Decay
The greenest mosses cling.
Behind the cloud the starlight lurks,
Through showers the sunbeams fall;
For God, who loveth all His works,
Has left His hope with all!+
*I am indebted to an observation by C. H.Dodd, British New Testament scholar, for this image.
+John Greenleaf Whittier, The Complete Poetical Works of Whittier. (Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1891), p. 144.
©David W. Perkins, 2024.
The Collect of the Day, First Sunday after Christmas Day
O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, you Son Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (BCP, 214)
Today we celebrate the Feast of Sarah, Theodora, and Syncletica of Egypt, desert mothers (4th-5th. Centuries).
Collect of the Feast of Sarah, Theodora, and Syncletica of Egypt
Fix our hearts on You, O God, in pure devotion, that aided by the example of your servants Sarah, Theodora, and Syncletica, the vain pursuits of this world may have no hold upon us, and that by the consuming fire of your Spirit, we may be changed into the image and likeness of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord; to whom with you and the same Spirit be all honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.
A Collect for Protection
O God, the life of all who live, the light of the faithful, the strength of those who labor, and the repose of the dead: We thank you for the blessings of the day that is past, and humbly ask for your protection through the coming night. Bring us in safety to the morning hours; through him who died and rose again for us, your Son our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. (BCP, 124)
A Collect for Early Evening
Almighty, everlasting God, let our prayer in your sight be as incense, the lifting up of our hands as the evening sacrifice. Give us grace to behold you, present in your Word and Sacraments, and to recognize you in the lives of those around us. Stir up in us the flame of that love which burned in the heart of your Son as he bore his passion, and let it burn in us to eternal life and to the ages of ages. Amen. (BCP, 113)
A Collect for Mission
Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen. (BCP, 101)
Daily Office Gospel, John 11:17-27,38-44
17 When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21Martha said to Jesus, `Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.' 23Jesus said to her, `Your brother will rise again.' 24Martha said to him, `I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.' 25Jesus said to her, `I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?' 27She said to him, `Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.' 38Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39Jesus 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.' 40Jesus said to her, `Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?' 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, `Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42I 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.' 43When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, `Lazarus, come out!' 44The 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.'
Daily Offices in The Book of Common Prayer
Morning Prayer, Rite 2, page 75, The Book of Common Prayer
Noonday Prayer, page 103, Book of Common Prayer
Order of Worship for Evening (Vespers), p 109, Book of Common Prayer
Evening Prayer, Rite 2, page 115, Book of Common Prayer
Compline (Night Prayer), page 127, Book of Common Prayer
Daily Devotionals, page 136, Book of Common Prayer
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