22 March, 2026, Fifth Sunday of Lent, YR A: Ezekiel 37:12-14; Romans 8:8-11; John 11:1-45
In John’s Gospel, Christ is life, but much more than biological life. For those who believe, Christ gives eternal life. In Christ, we begin to function at that level where faith is cultivated, where compassion is born, where our life with God is more than fulfilling religious obligations. But we must continue to grow into that eternal life because it is a calling more than it is a reward. If I don’t start to live that resurrection-life now, will I ever be able to live it?
However, it is no easy calling!
My empathy turns toward the persecuted, for example; but when I consider their persecutors, what do I find in myself? Frustration, powerlessness, anger and a hunger for retribution; it is so difficult to separate the sinner from the sin. Let’s not pretend that it is easy! Were it up to me, I’d constrain powerful leaders and the damage they generate, but I accomplish nothing.
However, my sense of justice, my concern for the persecuted is good and is growth towards God. In my helplessness, when I offer these persecutors to God to provide the forgiveness I cannot, there is real trust in God and in our relationship. In some inarticulate way am I not stretching my capacity to receive that transfigured life from God? Do I not affirm the reality of repentance, forgiveness, and loving the unlovable?
Lazarus is more than a resuscitated corpse; he’s truly alive, restored to his family, his neighbors, the moral conflicts and struggles of a life well lived. He will die again to await the resurrection at the consummation of time and the human race. Isn’t he like us, already regenerated by Jesus, but awaiting the fullness of eternal life?