“I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE”
John 11:21-25, 32-44
November 1, 2009 ~ ALL SAINTS DAY
Rev. Janet Robertson Duggins
You may remember from our “Bible 101” series that John’s Gospel is quite different from the other three. Like Matthew, Mark, and Luke, it is about Jesus’ life, ministry, and teachings which form an extended introduction to the story of Jesus’ death on the cross and what happened afterward. But John tells it all in a different way. Some people find John the strangest and most mysterious of the four gospels. It’s been said that on one level it is the simplest of the gospels, but on another it is the most profound.
Some of our favorite verses come from John’s gospel. Some of the most beautiful, comforting words in the Bible, as well as words that define the core of Christian faith for many people.
Yet John’s gospel can also be difficult for us to understand. It is certainly the most theological and philosophical of the gospels, sometimes dealing in abstract concepts that are hard to pin down. It doesn’t present a story organized into a chronological account like the other gospels do; John organizes his material more thematically. Compared to the other gospels there are relatively few stories of miracles and there’s very little in the way of parables that make up so much of Matthew and Luke.
John tells us fewer stories of encounters between Jesus and other individuals, but the ones he does tell tend to be longer and more involved conversations than the other gospels describe. John also presents a very long section of teaching in which Jesus speaks almost uninterrupted for four lengthy chapters, in which much of what he says puzzles his disciples and still sometimes puzzles us. There is a lot in John’s gospel that his readers have always found a bit mysterious.
John’s portrayal of Jesus is distinctive too. John’s Jesus is more divine than human. Certainly John believes what Christians have traditionally affirmed, that Jesus is “fully human and fully divine.” And we clearly see compassion and human emotion in Jesus as John portrays him – for example when Jesus cries with the others who are mourning Lazarus’ death. But always in John, Jesus is “the Word made flesh.”
John views Jesus through the prism of resurrection. In other words, even as he tells the stories of Jesus’ earlier ministry, John has the resurrected, victorious Christ in mind. In John, even before his death and resurrection, Jesus acts and speaks like the One who triumphs over death.
Maybe the most intriguing thing about John’s gospel is what’s found in the section dealing with Jesus’ ministry (approx. chapters 2-11; what we read today is the end of that section). The highlights of this part are seven “signs” (or miracles) and seven “sayings.” It’s certainly no accident that John includes seven of each; in Jewish tradition, seven was considered the number of perfection or completeness.
The seven signs are miracles performed by Jesus:
Turning of water
into wine at the wedding at
Healing – at a distance, no less – of the son of an official who comes begging him to help his little boy dying of a fever.
Healing a paralyzed man.
Feeding 5000 people with a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish.
Walking on water.
Healing a blind man.
And, finally, calling his friend Lazarus out of the tomb four days after his family had buried him there.
Those are all the miracle stories John tells. They aren’t meant to be a complete list, but they are meant to be a complete picture of the kind of difference Jesus’ presence made in the lives he touched. They demonstrate Jesus’ power and authority and the divine mandate of his mission.
For John, it’s all about WHO Jesus is. The seven sayings, which (sort of) go along with the seven signs emphasize that focus. These sayings are found only in John, and therefore we can reliably conclude that they reveal a lot about what’s important to him. These are what we usually call the “I AM” sayings. ”
“I am the vine.”
“I am the bread of life.”
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
“I am the light of the world.”
“I am the door.” (or “gate” in some translations)
“I am the good shepherd.”
and, finally, from our reading today: “I am the resurrection and the life.”
Seven signs. Seven “I am” sayings.
Now, not every one of the sayings can be clearly and neatly linked with one of the signs (although you can certainly see connections between, for example “I am the bread of life” and multiplying the loaves of bread to feed a multitude.”) But this last one – arguably the most important because it is the final one – IS clearly linked to the raising of Lazarus. The Lazarus story is told (and I should note that John is the only gospel writer who tells it) to illustrate Jesus’ saying, “I am the resurrection and the life.”
I’ve given you this bigger picture of John’s message because I think it helps us to have a different perspective on this story, which, let’s face it, is a difficult one for us.
It’s hard to
believe, for one thing. And it raises a
lot of unanswerable questions. Why raise
Lazarus from the dead anyway? Why him
and (apparently) nobody else? We don’t
get our loved ones back, no matter how much we miss them or how premature their
deaths seem to us, and neither did most people in the towns of
“I am the resurrection and the life” is the most abstract of statements. We could debate its meaning all day and not reach a firm conclusion. If you heard it unconnected to Lazarus’ story you might think of another gospel story, right? You might connect it to Jesus’ resurrection, and you wouldn’t be wrong. But to connect it with the story of Jesus calling someone else back to life is to say that resurrection and life is not just for Jesus: it applies to us, too. And the “life” Jesus calls Lazarus to in the story isn’t “eternal life in heaven” but life in this world. Sure he will die – we all will, and we don’t have to be afraid of it because it doesn’t separate us from Jesus’ love – but new life in this life comes first. Jesus’ power is what makes it possible; Jesus’ call to us is what initiates it … and that’s not an abstraction; Lazarus is the embodiment of that truth. So are all those who believe in Jesus and live lives made new in his name. But as far as John is concerned, the story isn’t about Lazarus, or about any of us, it’s about who Jesus is.
I said that in his telling of the gospel, John projects the vision of Jesus as risen and victorious back into the stories of Jesus’ ministry. I think that equally his gospel aims to project that vision forward as well, into the life of the church. John has no interest in history, per se. For John, it’s all about who Jesus IS, and what that means to the church. And as far as John is concerned, who Jesus is and what he means doesn’t change.
All the things John wanted his community to understand about Jesus, from his gospel, are the same things the gospel still communicates to us:
Jesus shares our joys.
Jesus provides for our needs.
Jesus moves us out of paralysis.
Jesus cares about those we care about.
Jesus brings calm amid life’s storms.
Jesus takes away spiritual blindness and ignorance and gives vision instead. Jesus faces death with us and takes away our fear.
Jesus is the one in whom we have our “roots” and the one who connects us together in community.
Jesus is the one who opens a way into relationship with God.
Jesus is the one who gives us a path and a mission.
Jesus is the one who provides for our needs.
Jesus is the one who shows us truth.
Jesus is the loving companion who never leaves us.
Jesus is the one who breathes new life into us and
the one to whom we can trust our lives and our loved ones …
in life and in death.