20170402 UNBIND HIM, LET HIM GO FREE
Readings at Mass
Liturgical
Colour: Violet.
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First reading
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Ezekiel 37:12-14
©
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The Lord says this: I
am now going to open your graves; I mean to raise you from your graves, my
people, and lead you back to the soil of Israel. And you will know that I am
the Lord, when I open your graves and raise you from your graves, my people.
And I shall put my spirit in you, and you will live, and I shall resettle you
on your own soil; and you will know that I, the Lord, have said and done
this – it is the Lord who speaks.
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Responsorial
Psalm
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Psalm 129(130) ©
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With the Lord
there is mercy and fullness of redemption.
Out of the depths I
cry to you, O Lord,
Lord,
hear my voice!
O let your ears be
attentive
to the
voice of my pleading.
With the Lord
there is mercy and fullness of redemption.
If you, O Lord, should
mark our guilt,
Lord, who
would survive?
But with you is found
forgiveness:
for this
we revere you.
With the Lord
there is mercy and fullness of redemption.
My soul is waiting
for the Lord.
I count
on his word.
My soul is longing
for the Lord
more than
watchman for daybreak.
(Let the watchman
count on daybreak
and
Israel on the Lord.)
With the Lord
there is mercy and fullness of redemption.
Because with the Lord
there is mercy
and
fullness of redemption,
Israel indeed he will
redeem
from all
its iniquity.
With the Lord
there is mercy and fullness of redemption.
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Second reading
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Romans 8:8-11 ©
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People who are
interested only in unspiritual things can never be pleasing to God. Your
interests, however, are not in the unspiritual, but in the spiritual, since the
Spirit of God has made his home in you. In fact, unless you possessed the
Spirit of Christ you would not belong to him. Though your body may be dead it
is because of sin, but if Christ is in you then your spirit is life itself because
you have been justified; and if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the
dead is living in you, then he who raised Jesus from the dead will give life to
your own mortal bodies through his Spirit living in you.
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Gospel
Acclamation
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Jn11:25, 26
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Glory and praise to
you, O Christ!
I am the resurrection
and the life, says the Lord;
whoever believes in
me will never die.
Glory and praise to
you, O Christ!
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Gospel
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John
11:3-7,17,20-27,33-45 ©
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I am the
resurrection and the life
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Mary and Martha sent
this message to Jesus, ‘Lord, the man you love is ill.’ On receiving the
message, Jesus said, ‘This sickness will end not in death but in God’s glory,
and through it the Son of God will be glorified.’
Jesus
loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, yet when he heard that Lazarus was ill
he stayed where he was for two more days before saying to the disciples, ‘Let
us go to Judaea.’
On
arriving, Jesus found that Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days already.
When Martha heard that Jesus had come she went to meet him. Mary remained
sitting in the house. Martha said to Jesus, ‘If you had been here, my brother
would not have died, but I know that, even now, whatever you ask of God, he
will grant you.’ ‘Your brother’ said Jesus to her ‘will rise again.’ Martha
said, ‘I know he will rise again at the resurrection on the last day.’ Jesus
said:
‘I am the
resurrection and the life.
If anyone believes in
me, even though he dies he will live,
and whoever lives and
believes in me will never die.
Do you believe this?’
‘Yes, Lord,’ she said
‘I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come
into this world.’
Jesus
said in great distress, with a sigh that came straight from the heart, ‘Where
have you put him?’ They said, ‘Lord, come and see.’ Jesus wept; and the Jews
said, ‘See how much he loved him!’ But there were some who remarked, ‘He opened
the eyes of the blind man, could he not have prevented this man’s death?’ Still
sighing, Jesus reached the tomb: it was a cave with a stone to close the
opening. Jesus said, ‘Take the stone away.’ Martha said to him, ‘Lord, by now
he will smell; this is the fourth day.’ Jesus replied, ‘Have I not told you
that if you believe you will see the glory of God?’ So they took away the stone.
Then Jesus lifted up his eyes and said:
‘Father, I thank you
for hearing my prayer.
I knew indeed that
you always hear me,
but I speak for the
sake of all these who stand round me,
so that they may
believe it was you who sent me.’
When he had said this,
he cried in a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, here! Come out!’ The dead man came out, his
feet and hands bound with bands of stuff and a cloth round his face. Jesus said
to them, ‘Unbind him, let him go free.’
Many
of the Jews who had come to visit Mary and had seen what he did believed in
him.
UNBIND
HIM, LET HIM GO FREE
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [
EZ 37:12-14;
ROM 8:8-11; JN 11:1-45 (OR ><
11:3-7,17:20-27:33-45)]
We are created to be free.
This is what it means to be created in the image of God. Freedom is
so intrinsic to our happiness that God’s gift of freedom extends even to the
possibility of our rejecting Him. He gives us the freedom of
conscience. He respects our freedom and choice in life. How
generous God is to us that He took the risk of being rejected by His
creatures! Parents who have been rejected by their children will
understand the pain of rejection. Right from the start, in the spiritual
world, the Devil and the fallen angels rejected the authority of God over
them. Adam and Eve also wanted to be like God, to have knowledge but without
Him. The serpent tempted the woman saying, “For God knows that when you eat of
it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and
evil.” (Gn 3:5)
Not just the devil and our first parents,
but we have abused our freedom from the beginning of time. This is the
irony of humanity. We seek freedom but end up in slavery. We say we
are free to do what we like. But we know this is not true. We are
prisoners of our desires and attachments. We are addicted to things and
people. We cannot do without smoking, drinking and we cannot resist
food. We eat unhealthily and are too lazy to exercise or look after our
health. We are possessive of our friends and we seek to control their
lives and movements. Often, we are envious of them and of others.
So we are trapped in our sins and we cannot break free. Being a
slave of sins means that we have no freedom, since by definition freedom is the
ability to determine for oneself.
Not only are we a slave to our sins but
also of our past. We cannot forgive ourselves, especially for the
mistakes we have made. We condemn ourselves and give up on ourselves.
We find it difficult to let go and move on in life. We keep
returning to our past hurts, refusing to forgive and unable to forget.
This explains why we are still in our graves, entrapped by our sins and our
past. We live in darkness, not knowing what we are doing and where we are
going in life. Jesus said this is because “if he walks at night he
stumbles, because there is no light to guide him.”
If you are feeling this way, then there
is no need to despair anymore. If we want to be set free from all that
enslaves us, there is hope. God desires to set us free. The
psalmist say, “with the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption, Israel
indeed he will redeem from all its iniquity.” The light of day
awaits us if only we turn to the Lord who is all mercy and
compassion. Indeed, God wants to open our graves. “I am
now going to open your graves; I mean to raise you from your graves, my
people.” What He said to Lazarus, He says to us. “Lazarus,
here! Come out! Unbind him, let him go free.”
The Lord feels with us in our misery and
pain. He knows our struggles in life. Indeed, He understands our
attachment to our loved ones. With them and us, Jesus weeps too. We read
that “at the sight of her tears, and those of the Jews who followed her, Jesus
said in great distress, with a sigh that came straight from the heart, ‘Where
have you put him?’” Indeed, anyone of us seeing our loved ones in tears,
or even our pets in pain, cannot but immediately reach out to help them without
any hesitation or delay.
The Lord wants to take away the stone
that keeps us in our prison. “Still sighing, Jesus reached the tomb. Jesus
said, ‘Take the stone away.’” Truly, we can be confident that the Lord
will release us from our captivity if we are willing to let go and allow
Him. But what is this stone that prevents us from allowing Jesus to
enter into our lives? As we draw nearer to the Feast of the
Resurrection, it is important that we acknowledge the barriers that hinder us
from being set free.
This stone can be the lack of repentance.
If we are not ready to change, then there is no way for us to live the
life of God. St Paul makes it clear when he wrote, “People who are
interested only in unspiritual things can never be pleasing to God.”
Again, he said, “your body may be dead because of sin.” The first step to be
set free from our prison is to acknowledge the state we are in. If
we do not wish to admit that we are not free and instead deceive ourselves into
believing that we are free simply because we can do what we like, then we
cannot change. Which is better? To be under the authority of
God, which is goodness and truth, or to be under the Evil One, which is
falsehood and misery?
The second stone that is blocking our
path to freedom is the lack of faith. Like the Jews, we say, “He opened
the eyes of the blind man, could he not have prevented this man’s death?”
Many of us lack faith in God to set us free. This is because we do not
know God our Father. For many of us, God is far away. He is a
distant God. He does not care for us. When Martha said to Him
“,’Lord, by now he will smell; this is the fourth day.’ Jesus replied, ‘Have I
not told you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?’ So they took
away the stone.”
What kind of faith is required of us to
be set free? It is not sufficient to have faith in life after death.
Such faith is great but will not help us today. This was the faith of
Martha when she told the Lord, “I know that, even now, whatever you ask of God,
he will grant you. I know he will rise again at the resurrection on the last
day.” But Jesus replied, “I am the resurrection and the life. If anyone
believes in me, even though he dies he will live, and whoever lives and
believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” Today, people
are not living for a pie in the sky. They want to live today, not tomorrow.
Many are not willing to sacrifice the present for the future, unless the future
is real. This explains why today the world lives in a hopeless
situation. People live as if there is no tomorrow. They are
desperate to enjoy life as much as possible because most do not believe that
there is a tomorrow. They do not want to waste this opportunity. As
for life after death, their attitude is, “who knows?” That being the case, we
better make the best of life here and now.
Hence, we can live for tomorrow only if
we have faith in Jesus as the resurrection and the life. This is the
ultimate faith response that is asked of us. Only this faith can set us
free from all fears and our sins. Only faith in Christ as the
Resurrection and the Life can set us free from death. As the Resurrection
and the Life, He conquers death and gives us new life.
Contemplating on His passion and His love for us; and contemplating on His
resurrection, we are confident that the Lord can deliver us from our fears and
give us a certain future. To say that Jesus is the Resurrection and the
Life means to confess that Jesus is the life-giver. This means that we
are identifying Jesus with God who is the author of all life. Hence, the
confession of Martha is also the confession of the Church, “Yes, Lord, I
believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come into
this world.” Indeed, only because He is the Son of God, could He pray so
confidently that the Father would hear His prayers. “Father, I thank you
for hearing my prayer. I knew indeed that you always hear me, but I speak for
the sake of all these who stand round me, so that they may believe it was you
who sent me.”
Indeed, it is this faith in Christ as the
Resurrection and the Life, the Son of God, that gives impetus to the apostolic
mission of the Church. Without faith in His resurrection and therefore
ours, it would be meaningless for us to continue to proclaim the gospel.
It is only because we know that our life goes beyond this world that we seek the
salvation of all. And it is His resurrection that makes it possible for
God to act through the Church and the apostles. Because of His
resurrection, we know for certain that He can still act in and through us
today. That is why the Lord says, “You will know that I am the Lord, when I
open your graves and raise you from your graves, my people.” Only when we
come to experience the liberating power of God in our lives, can we then begin
to have faith in Him. Those of us who have experienced His love know what
we are talking about.
This power is given to us in the Spirit
which the Lord gave to His disciples at Pentecost. God gives us His
Spirit to help us come out of our prison. It is not by our strength alone
that we live the life of Christ. He said, “And I shall put my spirit in
you, and you will live, and I shall resettle you on your own soil; and you will
know that I, the Lord, have said and done this.” In the Holy Spirit, we
become one in Christ, as the Father comes to make His Home in us with His Son.
“Your interests, however, are not in the unspiritual, but in the spiritual,
since the Spirit of God has made his home in you. In fact, unless you possessed
the Spirit of Christ you would not belong to him.” We belong to Christ
only because He lives in us.
Conversely, life comes about when we live
the life of Christ. “If Christ is in you then your spirit is life itself
because you have been justified; and if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from
the dead is living in you, then he who raised Jesus from the dead will give
life to your own mortal bodies through his Spirit living in you.” Walking
in the freedom of the Lord in love and service is what sets us free. This
is what it means to walk in Christ and to die with Him. With Thomas, we
too must say, “Let us go too, and die with him” so that we might live. By
sharing the life of Christ, walking in freedom in love, we find the purpose and
meaning of life. We share the joy of loving and of serving, especially
the poor and those who are suffering. Ut Vivant!
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All
Rights Reserved
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