Sermon 2023.03.26
“How’s the church”?
I get asked this question everywhere all the time all at once. “How’s the church?” And what do I say? I say that we are good. We are plugging along with our worship services, our ministries, and everything is pretty good. But you know, things aren’t that simple, are they? I mean, what is the church, anyway? The church is the people. The church is the members of Grace Lutheran Church, and then extended family members, our neighborhood, and of course all of the Christians all over the world. How is the church?
So let me ask you. How are you? I look out and I see your faces, and I think about the things you have shared with me about your life, what your concerns are, what your struggles are, and I know that it is a lot. I know that many of you have very significant challenges that you are facing. I know that there are significant health challenges. I know that there are family concerns. I know that there are financial troubles. I know that many people are worried about current affairs; about war, and the environment. When I think realistically about all of this, what could we possibly say about “How is the church?”
How could we ever expect the church to be doing well when the people aren’t doing well. What we see happening in churches is a reflection of the wider society. We are the canary in the coal mine. When you see little churches struggling to survive what you see is the very fabric of society barely holding together.
It reminds me of Lazarus. Lazarus was ill, and was not doing good. His sister Mary sent for Jesus to come and help, to heal Lazarus, but did Jesus come? No. Not right away. So what happened? Lazarus died. I think people today are desperate for Jesus to come and help us out a little bit, to heal us from our suffering, to fix things up. And where is he?
So what are we going to do? What can we do? If Jesus is going to take his time coming back to help us, how are we going to get by in the meantime? That’s what Lazarus’s sisters were asking themselves. They were saying, “We thought Jesus was our dear friend, but he’s gone, so what can we do for ourselves in his absence?”
There’s a problem. Before we can go on any further with this sermon, I need to tell you about the controversy with this story from the Bible. Within the past couple of years some humungus discoveries have been made that are turning this Lazarus story completely sideways. And here it is.
A Biblical Scholar named Elizabeth Schrader made a tremendous discovery that I heard about from public theologian Diana Butler Bass. She was studying an ancient manuscript called papyrus 66. This is literally one of the oldest most authoritative sources of our Bible. What she found is that there were not two sisters at all: there was not a Mary and a Martha who were sisters of Lazarus. There is just one sister, named Mary. Now you might ask yourself, what about the beloved story of Mary and Martha? That’s just the thing, the wonderful story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10 never mentions Lazarus. And at the time of that story Jesus isn’t near Bethany, he’s near Galilee, northern Israel. The story of Lazarus is in Bethany modern day al-Lazariya in the Western Bank of Palestine. Furthermore early commentators of the Bible such as Tertulian and the pilgrim diary of Egeria both mention Lazarus and only one sister, Mary. So what? What does matter? Quite a lot actually.
In the story of Lazarus if he only has one sister named Mary, then it was Mary who confessed that Jesus was the Messiah. That’s a big deal, because it would be the same Mary who anointed Jesus’ feet with perfume, and the same Mary who is the first to witness the resurrection. And which Mary is it? Mary Magdalene. As Diana Butler Bass said, this no Dan Brown novel, this real scholarship with hard evidence. Mary Magdalene rivals Peter as the first person to lead the church. Magdalene means tower. If Peter is the rock, Mary Magdalene is the tower.
And the thing that impresses me most of all about Mary Magdalene is that she doesn’t take, “no” for an answer. When Jesus finally shows up after her brother has been dead for four days, she looks Jesus in the face and says, “If you had been here this would not have happened.” She falls at his feet and in a way almost shames him. She is so expressive with her hurt, grief, and outrage, that we have the one and only place in the Bible that says that Jesus wept. He wept.
Sisters and brothers this is what we need. We need the ferocity of Mary Magdalene who isn’t ashamed to call out Jesus and say, “Where have you been!” My brother is dying over here. We got too many Lazaruses all over. We got young men and women dying all over the place, from preventable things, and we ask “How is the church?”
What we need is some more Mary Magdalenes, getting up in Jesus’ face saying “Where have you been?” “We need you here!” “We need you now!”
Because then what does Jesus do after being berated by Mary? He says, “Move the stone.” Then he says, “Lazarus come out!” And the Bible tells us, “And he that was dead came out!” What! How can this be? Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life.” Mary the Strong Tower. Lazarus who once was dead living again. And if you think this is crazy, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Because just a few chapters later Jesus says, “If you believe me, you will do greater things than I have done.” I mean once this happened what else did Mary Magdalene do?
I was able to visit Barb Dinger on Friday. Many of you know her, and have been her friend for many years. She is in a memory care facility, and suffers from dementia. I go and see her occasionally. This past Friday was different. I went with a group of people, with her brother Jim and Diane, her sister Pat and her daughter in law Elizabeth. We had some cake, ate some oranges, drank some tea, and I’ll tell you what. I haven’t seen Aunt Barb as animated and talkative like that since I started visiting her pretty much in the past four years. Why? Because her sister and brother were there. Her family was there. And they were saying in their own way, “Barbara come out of there! And she did.
That is what faith is. Faith isn’t sitting in our laurels waiting for Jesus to come back. It’s getting in the car, picking up the phone, baking a cake, grabbing a coffee, and showing up. It’s knocking on doors. It’s putting old grudges in the grave, swallowing our pride and advocating so incessantly on behalf of our brother or our sister who is suffering that Jesus has no choice but to resurrect. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection.”
What is God’s name? I am.
Who is God? I am.
Who is the resurrection? I am.
So do it.
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