Like the Samaritan woman and the man born blind, Martha and Mary speak as individuals but also as representatives of the Christian community that gives us John’s gospel. Between Jesus’ death and resurrection (A.D.30) and the writing of John’s gospel (A.D.80-100), this community told and lived Jesus’ story. The cycle-A Lenten gospels show us that this early community faced its own later conflicts by reflecting on events in Jesus’ life.
On one level the raising of Lazarus is an event in Jesus’ lifetime. On a second level the raising of Lazarus is a sign that shows us the Johnnine community’s reflecting as we must on who Jesus is to them and to their loved ones who are dying. The dialog Martha and Mary have with Jesus explores the relationship between the crucified and risen Jesus and disciples like their brother who face death in the late first century.
When Martha and Mary meet Jesus, they each say, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would never have died.” The repetition tells us this statement is important. Martha and Mary raise a question in the life of the early Christian community in which many expected Jesus to return in glory within their lifetimes.
- What questions do you have about death?
- Before what graves have you stood and asked as Martha and Mary do, “Why didn’t you save the one we love?” What answer did you get?
In reflecting on Lazarus’s death, the death of someone Jesus loves, the community remembers Jesus himself suffered death and transformed its meaning. The gospel inextricably links Lazarus’s death with Jesus’ death, and Lazarus’s new life with the promise of Jesus’ resurrection.
Jesus’ journey to Bethany takes him just two miles from Jerusalem, where mourners quickly carry the news Jesus has raised Lazarus from the dead to the high priests. These officials immediately convoke the Sanhedrin and decide to kill Jesus (John 11.46-53).
This chapter that tells the story of Jesus’ raising of Lazarus ends with the officials deciding Jesus must die. When he weeps with Martha and Mary over the death of their brother and his friend, Jesus stands at the door of his own grave. Raising Lazarus sets his passion in motion. Lazarus lives to face death again. Jesus leads Lazarus and all his disciples through death to life. We can see Martha and Mary in the gospel art unwrapping not only Lazarus but every Christian in the promise of the resurrection.
- What do you appreciate about Jesus, truly human in this scene as well as truly divine?
As her conversation with Jesus begins, Martha believes Lazarus would not have died if Jesus had been there. To her, Jesus is someone who cures illness and has a special closeness to God that will get him whatever he asks. She believes in a wonderworker.
When Jesus says, “Your brother will rise again,” Martha thinks he is talking about resurrection on the last day. This is faith that Jesus is the apocalyptic figure who will bring good to triumph on the last day. Early Christians expected this day in their lifetimes.
The community that gives us John’s gospel believes Jesus is more than a wonderworker or an apocalyptic figure. In Sunday’s gospel Jesus calls Martha to this deeper faith. “I am the resurrection and the life,” he says. Jesus’ words say that he is I Am. This is the name of God in the Old Testament. Martha affirms one of the ten I Am statements in John’s gospel, identifying Jesus as the pre-existent Word who was with God from the beginning and was God.
John’s community also sees Jesus as the messiah, the king greater than David that the prophets expected. Martha affirms in her confession of faith that Jesus is the Christ, the messiah. “Yes, Lord,” she says, “I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who has come into the world.”
Martha confesses the faith of later disciples who have reflected on all the scriptures say about Jesus and who have faced the death of their loved ones. The raising of Lazarus manifests God’s same life-giving power that raises Jesus himself from the dead and makes the grave a threshold of divine promise for every Christian.
The time above all to make Martha’s confession is at the graves of our loved ones. Jesus is the resurrection and the life. The gospel calls us to find the ultimate meaning of our lives in the mystery of Jesus’ story, in the light he gives to life, in the hope he gives in death.
- What helps you believe God can and will raise us up when we are in pain? When we face death?
- What do you say to someone suffering the pain of a child, parent, or spouse dying?