20230526 COMING OUT OF OUR TOMBS
26 March 2023, Sunday, 5th Sunday of Lent
irst reading |
Ezekiel 37:12-14 © |
I shall put my spirit in you, and you will live
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.
Responsorial Psalm | Psalm 129(130) © |
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.
Second reading | Romans 8:8-11 © |
The Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you
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.
Gospel Acclamation | Jn11:25, 26 |
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!
Gospel | John 11:1-45 © |
I am the resurrection and the life
There was a man named Lazarus who lived in the village of Bethany with the two sisters, Mary and Martha, and he was ill. It was the same Mary, the sister of the sick man Lazarus, who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair. The sisters 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.’ The disciples said, ‘Rabbi, it is not long since the Jews wanted to stone you; are you going back again?’ Jesus replied:
‘Are there not twelve hours in the day?
A man can walk in the daytime without stumbling
because he has the light of this world to see by;
but if he walks at night he stumbles,
because there is no light to guide him.’
He said that and then added, ‘Our friend Lazarus is resting, I am going to wake him.’ The disciples said to him, ‘Lord, if he is able to rest he is sure to get better.’ The phrase Jesus used referred to the death of Lazarus, but they thought that by ‘rest’ he meant ‘sleep’, so Jesus put it plainly, ‘Lazarus is dead; and for your sake I am glad I was not there because now you will believe. But let us go to him.’ Then Thomas – known as the Twin – said to the other disciples, ‘Let us go too, and die with him.’
On arriving, Jesus found that Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days already. Bethany is only about two miles from Jerusalem, and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to sympathise with them over their brother. 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.’
When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in a low voice, ‘The Master is here and wants to see you.’ Hearing this, Mary got up quickly and went to him. Jesus had not yet come into the village; he was still at the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were in the house sympathising with Mary saw her get up so quickly and go out, they followed her, thinking that she was going to the tomb to weep there.
Mary went to Jesus, and as soon as she saw him she threw herself at his feet, saying, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’ 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?’ 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.
COMING OUT OF OUR TOMBS
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [EZ 37:12-14; ROM 8:8-11; JN 11:1-45 (OR JN 11:3-7,17:20-27,33-45)]
For many, life has no meaning because there is no purpose, no direction and no goal. They have no idea what they are living for and why they are living. They have no inclination of their identity as sons and daughters of God. They just drift through life, living not out of their centre but simply like a robot reacting to the demands of the world. They are not living life to the fullest because they are not true to the deepest calling in their hearts. Until we have searched the deepest inclination of our heart and follow it, we cannot live deeply and passionately. Many of us are contented with a mediocre life and a mediocre religion.
Even for those of us who are active in Church, we might seem to be alive but deep inside us, there is no joy, no enthusiasm and no life. Religion for us is a matter of obligation; fulfilling duties and routine beliefs. Ministry members can be so overwhelmed by their responsibilities that they suffer burn-out. Many are burdened because of division and unhappiness in the ministry. We are doing all the things that religion taught us but we do not understand what we do. We do not stop to ask why we do what we do. We can do the right things and yet not for the right reasons e.g. fasting and service to the Church. Our motives are not godly or selfless. Indeed, it is an irony that for those of us serving the Lord, God can seem so far from us. We are in church but Jesus is not present. We cannot feel His love and presence either at prayer, worship or in service or in the community.
If you are feeling this way, then there is no longer the need to live in despair or in resignation. God wants to give us new life. Through Ezekiel, the Lord says, “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.” Indeed, we are just two weeks from Easter, the celebration of New Life. Are we ready to enter into the New Life that God is offering us? The Church on this 5th Sunday of Lent makes this last attempt before entering into Holy Week next Sunday to get us ready to welcome Jesus when He enters into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday to bring to fulfilment the work of salvation through His death and resurrection.
What, then, is needed for Him to open our graves so that He can raise us up? Firstly, we need to put our faith in Him as our life-giver. This is the central message of today’s scripture readings. He had already healed the blind; now He wants to give us life. He is the fulfilment of the prophecy of Ezekiel. Jesus said: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Do you believe this?” Faith in Jesus as the Life-giver is the first pre-requisite. Can we confess with Martha, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come into this world.”?
If we believe, then Jesus will give us life not only when we die but here and now, for He is not just referring to the last day. He said, “If anyone believes in me, even though he dies he will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” Indeed, if we believe than we will see the glory of God.
But for this to happen, for us to see the glory of God, we need to take that heart of stone away. “Jesus said, ‘Take the stone away.’ … 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.'” Indeed, acceptance of Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God is to believe in Jesus as the forgiveness of God. The passion, death and resurrection of Jesus is to demonstrate to us the mercy and love of God who forgives us and only desires us to live.
For this stone to be removed, we need to become aware of our blindness and the rotten life that we are living right now. This new life can only be given to those who desire it. It is an either or. We cannot live in sin and yet seek new life. St Paul makes it clear that a life of sin is not compatible with the life of grace. He wrote, “People who are interested only in unspiritual things can never be pleasing to God.” When we seek the things of this world, the things of the flesh and self-indulgence, we cannot share the life of God which is a life of love, self-giving and self-denial. It is a life in which we put others before ourselves. Hence, the pre-requisite of the offer of this New Life is that we desire to give up sin. We must come to recognize that we are ill, otherwise we will not see a doctor.
If we are not well, then all we need is to come to Jesus who will heal our blindness, give us strength when we are weary and limping, and life to those who are dead. Before the Lord can raise us up, He needs to open our grave of sins. To come to Jesus is to see ourselves as we are before Him. He declared, “A man can walk in the daytime without stumbling because he has the light of this world to see by; but if he walks at night he stumbles, because there is no light to guide him.” Jesus our Light will show us the way to fullness of life if we acknowledge that we are blind unlike the Pharisees in last Sunday’s gospel. He loves the man who is ill, that is what the gospel says. He came for the sick not the healthy.
So to Jesus, let us seek forgiveness. We must not delay any longer. The Lord wants to see us free from our bondage. We are all sinners. No one is exempted from sin. But the Lord is ever ready to show us His unconditional mercy and forgiveness. So we must examine our conscience and with a contrite heart go for confession. Why wait when the Lord wants you to be reconciled not only with Him but with your fellowmen and most of all within yourself? We need not be afraid of the confessional because the Lord knows we are weak and we are sinners. Only by recognizing our need for forgiveness and receiving His forgiveness, can we learn to empathize with others who have sinned and even sinned against us. Only with the forgiveness we have received from Him, can we truly forgive ourselves and those whom we have wronged and those who have sinned against us.
With our sins removed from the tomb, our empty tomb will then be ready to receive the infilling of the Holy Spirit, the love and mercy of God into our hearts. When the Holy Spirit lives in us, our lives will change as God’s love and life will dwell in us. So the decision lies on us to accept the grace of conversion and salvation.
This is the appeal of the Lord and that of the Church, “Take the stone away!” We must open our tombs so that the Lord can raise us up. In faith, let us surrender to the Lord and with courage, come out of our tombs.
Yes, Jesus will take that stone away. St Paul assures us, “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.” With Thomas, let us also say, “Let us go too, and die with him.” Let us die to our sins and our past so that the New Life which is within our reach will be ours. All we need is to cooperate with His grace.
Written by His Eminence, Cardinal William SC Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights Reserved. .
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