Thus proximity is key to understanding the behaviour of Jesus. Firstly, the Jewish authorities were demonstrating an increasing hostility towards Jesus. He was at the Hanukkah or the Feast of the Dedication and when they questioned Him on His identity, He claimed His divinity and the proof was the work He was doing on behalf of God. “The Father and I are one”. That audacity to place Himself on par with God sent the religious authorities into a murderous frenzy and Jesus barely escaped a stoning for blasphemy.
Jerusalem was for Jesus a dangerous place and Bethany was perilously nearby--about 2 kms away from the centre of danger. But Jesus was on the far side of the Jordan when He received news about the death of Larazus.
Interestingly, a prevailing spirituality at that time was that the soul remains with the body for about 3 days after death. After receiving news of Lazarus’ death, Jesus continued to work. He waited for two days more before going to Bethany which meant all in, Lazarus was already in the tomb for four days. Thus, aninterval of four days was meant to show the power of Christ in bringing the truly dead back to life.
Given the advances we have made in medical technology, bringing back a dead to life is not impossible. We see that in emergency resuscitation. A person who is clinically dead may be brought back to life using a defibrillator especially when he or she had suffered a cardiac arrest. However, there is a difference between a revival, which is what a resuscitation is about, and the resurrection. Medical gadgetry is able to revive many a clinical dead for that. If we accept the Jewish notion that the soul is proximate to the body after death for about 3 days, then a revival, whilst amazing is still possible even though we would classify that as a miracle.
What is interesting is that Jesus managed to bring a body back to life way after the 3-day interval that a soul can remain in the body. This is the point for the Gospel today. Christ has the ability to raise a body from death to life. Yet that is not the main message of the Gospel passage. John does not give much details to Lazarus’ life after his resuscitation or revival. Presumably he lived on. Even if he did live to a ripe old age, John is silent about Lazarus’ subsequent death. In other words, Lazarus would have to die again.
What does that mean?
Well, it brings us right into the heart of the Passion and the Resurrection. Somehow we may have conflated or mistaken a long life with eternal life and that the main goal of existence is to prolong life for as long as we can. It may help explain why we are hyper-focused on being healthy. What can help presently is that the process of organ harvesting and replacement lends a semblance of prolongation of life, meaning, we can live forever. In some ways, medical technology is geared towards this goal.
The question is, can we? Can we live forever here on earth?
The Transfiguration is the key to understanding the Resurrection. If anything, the raising of Lazarus is like the Transfiguration, a foretaste of a life that is changed or transformed. The Risen Christ who appeared amongst the Disciples in the Upper Room provides the clearest picture of His new reality. He told Thomas to put the finger onto His side and into the hands. Jesus was still bodilyor earthly and yet the physics of this material world does not apply entirely to Him. Just as He appeared suddenly in the room and in the silent way He crept up to the two disciples departing for Emmaus.
Jesus deferred in going to Bethany and when He did decide to go, the Disciples met His decision with trepidation. They felt that they would meet some forms of violence, walking directly into a death trap set for Jesus. But the deliberate delay was not out of fear but rather to prove that He was in charge.
Life and death were both in His hands. Jesus showed us through Lazarus’ revival or resuscitation that there is a future which is ours through the Resurrection. As they rolled away the stone covering Lazarus’ tomb, that day will arrive then they will discover Christ’s empty tomb.
Jesus in summoning Lazarus out of the tomb showed that even the dead will listen to His voice. Thus each one of us is called out of the tomb of our sins to walk into the light of Christ. It is a command to shake off the sins that cling on to us. But it requires that we want to come out into His light. While the body of Lazarus in the tomb is a reminder of the reality that bodies in graves will decompose and yet we are assured that neither death nor decomposition would be the last word on our ultimate destiny.
Finally, for the Lourdes medical pilgrimage, we are taking Qatar Airways, flying right into the heart of Iranian drone attacks. I asked a couple of persons who will be going to Lourdes on the medical pilgrimage if they were fearful about the prospect of being shot down like MH17 and the answer was a resounding no. As Annette and Catherina said, “If our time has come, so be it. We shall go and meet our Saviour”. He is the Resurrection and the Life. As He commanded Lazarus to come out, He will command our bodies too.
