In this here place, we flesh,” writes Toni Morrison in her novel, Beloved, “flesh that weeps, laughs, flesh that dances on bare feet in grass...love it, love it hard. Yonder they do not love your flesh. Flesh that needs to be loved. Feet that need to rest and dance; backs that need support; shoulders that need arms, strong arms I’m telling you...The beat of the beating heart love that, too...love your heart.”
Sounds so very much like the drama portrayed in John, chapter 11.
We flesh. We weep and we laugh. The Word became flesh. The Word still weeps and rejoices with us.
Jesus' emotion is generated by his love. When you love, you weep.
Toni Morrison has given us a story that is visceral, and haunting, and deeply sad. A candidate for governor in Virginia ran on a platform that such novels should be banned from reading. It is an intense, at times frightening book, based upon an actual story that tells of this harsh world. A world that must not be denied. We cannot escape the hardship of thinking about slavery.
It’s not an easy read. Yet it is also an illuminating corrective, studied against the Virginia backdrop of Robert E. Lee worship and the plantations where enslaved people, many were taught in history classes, worked mostly happily for noble, caring masters.
She offers an unflinching look into the abyss of slavery, the reality of loss and pain. “Flesh that weeps. Flesh that laughs!” Flesh filled with a multiplicity of feelings and emotions.
The story concludes with the glory of God being revealed in the resurrection of Lazarus. We’ve deeply mourned him for being dead for four days, but when he has been raised, when we have loosed him and let him go, we can only assume we have given appropriate celebration, that now he lives.
Miller Williams, poet laureate of the State of Arkansas, has a fanciful time with the siblings of Lazarus interacting with him after Jesus came and made him alive. The poem is entitled: “Adjusting to the Light”
“Lazarus, listen we have things to tell you.
We killed the sheep you meant to take to market.
We couldn’t keep the old dog, either.
He minded you. The rest of us he barked at.
Please understand we didn’t know that Jesus could do this.
We’re glad you’re back. But give us time to think.
Imagine our surprise to have you—not well, but weller.
I’m sorry but you do stink. Everyone give us some air.
But listen, we’ll pay whatever the sheep was worth.
The dog, too. And put your room the way it was before.”
John has given us a story involving real human emotions.
Martha, Mary, and Lazarus are part of a family whom Jesus loves (v.5). What begins with the loss of Lazarus will become a story of deep passion and celebration. Playfulness seems appropriate as the miracle of life unfolds within this story. The glory of God is revealed for those who desire to see. What is revealed is the life-giving activity of God in the person of Jesus. The story of Lazarus is now no longer about sickness or death, but about resurrection and life and the glory of God. The disciples are invited to recognize that when they follow Jesus they are being invited into life, abundant life.
Martha and Mary are deep in their grief when Jesus arrives. Lazarus has been dead for four days. They are certain that Lazarus would not have died had Jesus been present. Our entrance into this story begins with the raw human emotion of loss and grief. Martha rushes to meet Jesus. Mary stays at home. Martha is not above some sense of blame and shame. Mary senses despair.
When Jesus saw Mary weep and noticed the tears of the Jews who came with her, he was deeply moved and visibly distress. When Mary repeats word for word, the speech of her sister, it is Mary’s grief that renders this One silent, this One, Word become flesh, is silent. His tears model for us the only pastoral response we can make when called to the side of those who grieve.
There is reason for us to speak of the God who grieves. We know this because in his weeping---over Jerusalem, at Lazarus tomb, and in the Garden of Gethsemane---Jesus reveals a powerless almighty God.
Jesus begins weeping. Then he says, “Take away the stone.”
Sister Martha, “He has been dead four days. He will be stinking.”
He called out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”
He came out. Bound by graveclothes.
And Jesus said, “Loose him, and let him go.”
We either free others by our concern or leave them bound by our indifference.
What Jesus began, the community of the beloved is called to participate in.
Jaime Clarke-Soles, in her book Reading John for Dear Life, suggests that if Jesus is about life, then surely the community should be as well. She says this story is about Jesus and it is also about what kind of communities we create.
Royal Lane, on this day of All Saints, we flesh together. We weep. We laugh.
In his book, Reality, Grief and Hope: Three Urgent Prophetic Tasks, Walter Brueggemann begins the chapter entitled Grief Amid Denial with this word from my brother, Chris: “Dying isn’t hard; what is hard is relinquishing; it’s letting go that’s hard!” It is a quote by my brother, Chris Graham as he goes deeply into ALS losing first one capacity and then another at each stage of this wretched disease.
The work of relinquishment is hard done. It must be done. There is no shortcut.
In a world of pain God and those who love God are anything but immune to it.
As Christ continued to be physically diminished by this disease, he wanted to share an experience with his family repeating a time went to see Les Miserable. He celebrated good enough health to join them at the Majestic Theatre in Atlanta to see Les Miserable.
He marveled at the experience. Sitting together along the row he realized their life then was being bracketed by this shared moment in time. At that very moment he discovered the most painful experience of his journey through this disease. He realized, “Dying isn’t hard; it’s letting go that’s hard. It is relinquishing that is hard.”
The prophetic task, amid a culture of denial, is to embrace, model, and practice grief, in order that the real losses in our lives can be acknowledged. There’s no shortcut to letting go; no shortcut in our journey to Jerusalem where we discover the downward bent to our lives; where we learn our lives are best lived in the shape of the cross.
There is indeed enough loss among us to evoke profound sadness.
Our lives are called to bear witness to this cruciform existence. Life given. Life shared. In this here place, we flesh to the Glory of God!