Fifth Sunday of Lent
The same night that I had the “Attack of the Kidney Stones,” at about 2:30 in the morning I had an emergency call from South View Hospital. Margaret was actively dying. Sometimes, I receive emergency calls in the middle of the night only for me to get there and realize that the family had panicked. This night, because I had had intense pain, I said to myself, “She better be dying.” When I reached the hospital, the nurses were barely managing to keep Margaret alive. I gave Margaret the last sacraments. There is something strangely blessed and beautiful about moments like these. To consciously and deliberately hand someone we dearly love into the hands of God for eternity is a hauntingly awesome thing. A little after I left, Margaret had died. She was a hundred years old. I came to know later that Margaret had four kids and she had buried three of them and her husband. There were quite a few tragedies in the span of hundred years. Her funeral was held here on Tuesday. None of the family present at the funeral was Catholic. They were clearly grieving deeply as their tears told the story. And yet, not one of them went away from the funeral in despair and hopelessness. Some of them met me outside to let me know how peace-filled they were. More than anything else, though, it is in moments like these that I become most intensely aware of the power of my faith in Jesus Christ. If you have buried someone you love, and you have grieved like Martha and Mary in today’s gospel reading, you too probably are grateful for your faith in Jesus Christ.
Even though today’s gospel reading is the account of the resurrection of Lazarus, I am choosing to take the gospel reading of the last three weeks into account. The story of the Samaritan woman, the blind born blind and the story of the resurrection of Lazarus have common themes that run through them. In these common themes, I would like to draw the practical implication for us today.
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The first common theme in each of these stories is the fact that there is the main characters of these stories come to recognize Jesus very gradually. Jesus is first thought of as an ordinary man, then a prophet, and finally the messiah. In the end, Jesus asks Martha the same question he asked the Samaritan woman and the blind man, “Do you believe?” And each of them says, “Yes Lord, I believe.” For each of them that was a life-changing and a life-transforming moment. It was their experience of salvation! They experienced hope, love, and life as God lifted them out of their despair. My dear friends, we are here at this Eucharist and the same Jesus is here both in Word and Sacrament. The gospels today are posing the same question to us: “Do you believe this?” This Eucharist is our chance to make our confession. This Eucharist is our chance to experience God’s love, hope and life. This can be our salvation experience! Let us allow Jesus save us.
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The second common trend in each of these stories is that there are challenges to the profession of the Samaritan woman, the blind man and Martha. The Samaritan woman had to face her past. She had to overcome her insecurities, her sinful life, her pretensions, and her self-sufficiency in order to confess Jesus. Her demons were within her. The blind man, on the other hand, faced obstacles from the outside. The Pharisees grilled him numerous times about the healing. He was insulted, called names and even thrown out of the synagogue because he defended Jesus and the miracle. But it was Martha who faced the greatest obstacle – death. I think that the Gospel readings are saying to us that nothing – not our inner demons, not outside opposition, not even death – can come between God and us. Jesus is presented as the hope of the entire human race. Jesus is our healing, Jesus is our peace, Jesus is our reconciliation, Jesus is our life, Jesus is our resurrection. Jesus eliminated the most hopeless words from the dictionary – death and despair. For those who believe, there is only life and hope.
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The third common theme is the interaction between Jesus and the characters involved. Jesus offered to the Samaritan woman “living water.” In Jesus God intervened to save her. Jesus healed the blind man. In Jesus God intervened to save him. At the tomb of Lazarus, Jesus wept. Imagine that! Jesus wept. That is the entire incarnation story. Each of us like the Samaritan woman, like the blind man, like Martha has a story. Some of it is good, some of it is sad; some of it is sinful, some of it is holy; some of it is tragic, some of it is heroic; some of it is shameful, some of it is heroic. Jesus embraces it all. In that weeping at the tomb of Lazarus God tells us how much he loves us. We see God’s weeping most of all on the cross. The Cross is God’s tears. The cross is God’s tears for our sins, for our selfishness, for our death. And having nailed our sin and shame and death itself to the cross, he invites us into his own eternal life. Just like Lazarus is brought to life at the tomb, we are brought to life at the cross. And that is our hope.
This Eucharist captures the entire depth of these three events. Here Jesus transforms our lives; here Jesus heals our soul of its blindness; and here Jesus offers us eternal life. May we come to Jesus like each of these three people in total surrender and in total trust. Amen.
Fr. Satish Joseph