Open the Word: Dead or alive

Is this a story about a corpse, or is it about life?

The ‘impossible possibility’ of resurrection which is at the heart of the Christian faith is, perhaps, the key to this story and the journey through Passiontide to Easter day. What is John doing in this account of Lazarus? Is he saying that Jesus is God and therefore can do ‘God things’, even raising stinking, dead corpses to life? Or is there a similar but more subtle message? That God is about those things which give life to the people of God, which free us, unbind us, release us — and that therefore we should be about such things too. Help people to ponder on the things in their lives which are life-giving.

In the play Lazarus Laughed by Eugene O’Neill written in 1925, Lazarus says, ‘But I tell you to laugh in the mirror, that seeing your life gay, you may begin to live as a guest, and not as a condemned one!’ How would it feel to be given your life back after facing or even passing through death? Those who have had near death experiences often talk about being ‘dragged’ back to their bodies on a hospital bed from a place which was full of light and love. How does that compare with O’Neill’s Lazarus who now lives as a guest with joy rather than one waiting for death?

The temptation for us sometimes is to look for new life somewhere in the future — better relationships, justice, happiness, hope — to be yearned for at the end of time or at the judgement day. But many Christians believe in what the theologians call ‘realised eschatology’ which means that the end-time things are also the now things. As Jesus stresses, ‘the kingdom is among you’. We are already on the journey of eternal life — it doesn’t start when we die or on the day of judgement. Sometimes facing our own death through imagination — perhaps thinking what we would like our obituary to say or the tribute at our funeral, can help us see the parts of our life which are ‘on hold’ waiting for the time in the future when everything will be somehow better. Jesus said ‘I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly’. (John 10.10) We might add: now!

In Stanley Spencer’s painting, The Resurrection in Cookham Churchyard , those from the village whom he knew so well are rising out of their graves, brushing the soil from their clothes and resuming their lives (see Further resources ). But for Lazarus, and for Jesus himself, the experience they have undergone has marked them forever. How do the experiences we all live through mark us and mould us?