Lent 5A: The Dignity of Tears
There are so many things I don’t understand about the world.
I don’t understand why the accumulation of outrageous wealth is accepted for a few while so very many more are deprived of basic needs,
I don’t the most scientifically literate generation to walk the earth can fail to address the dangers of climate change,
I don’t understand how leaders of nations can commit the lives of others to war, or how a species with the same beauty-seeking eyes of Van Goghs can also create weapons of such destructive power that they literally unmake the life of creation.
The world so often does not make sense to me—which is why I think Christianity does. How else can one respond to a reality that inevitably baffles and bruises us all but with compassion for our fellow travellers. To meet the baffling challenges of being human with faithful companioning is to me, the only response that makes sense.
But then I look at scripture and hear the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead and I’m lost again. This is a story I struggle with because I simply cannot understand Jesus behaviour.
In other healing stories, Jesus drops what he’s doing to respond to suffering—so when the request comes to help a dear friend, why does he delay?
Jesus spends his life pushing back against rules that get in the way of being a good neighbour - he teaches compassion above all things always - above the law, above the social norms, above even sabbath observance. So why does he now set it aside for what he calls “God’s glory”? What kind of glory depends on the suffering of friends?
I’m continually baffled as to why Jesus chooses the language of sleep only to arrive at the tomb to find his friend not only dead but in a state of decay. (As the King James Version puts it: “He stinketh!”)
And perhaps most painfully—why raise one man, while countless others remain in their graves and countless families continue to grieve? Where is the justice in that?
The Gospel offers no comfort as we see Jesus break with the rule of compassion we have come to trust in him. It genuinely disturbs me. So much so that it’s a relief when I read further and hear the words: “Jesus wept.”
Finally - this is something I can understand.
The same grief that stops us in our tracks also breaks the heart of Jesus as he stands at the grave of his friend.
The same grief we experience when love has nowhere to go welled up in the throat of the one in whom we see God.
Jesus wept. And for me,this is where real story begins.
There are some languages that are universal. Mathematics, music, beauty… and tears. Long before we had words for grief, or recognised the lasting impacts of loss, every society on earth had already formed rituals to honour the dead, and help us release them.
Grief is a universal human language—and in this story it has ripples on earth and in heaven. In Jesus, God does not observe human sorrow from a distance, but God enters it, shares in it, expresses it.
That is a good thing, because it reassures us that our grief is not a failure of faith or a departure from love; rather - grief it is one of love’s clearest expressions.
When Jesus weeps, he gives human grief its full dignity. Yes, Lazarus’ resurrection is near, but Jesus does not use that minimise Mary and Martha’s pain - or his own. His tears say that a loved one is worth weeping for.
When Jesus weeps, he honours the complexity of faith. Martha is hurt and trusting at the same time. Mary’s sorrow contains both accusation and devotion. Faith is not a sanitised existence. It is bringing the whole of ourselves with raw honesty before God.
When Jesus weeps, he honours the messiness of human life knowing that even if Lazarus returns everything has now changed. Mary and Martha will remain traumatised by what they have endured and Lazarus will always be known as the man who came back. Grief mourns not only death but also the lives we have lost along the way.
When Jesus weeps, his sorrow is not a dead end but a force that moves us forward. The act of raising Lazarus is a response to shared lament. From broken-heartedness comes the call to life.
A call that is for all of us.
Lazarus was called from the tomb by Jesus, but still needs friends and neighbours to unbind him from the grave clothes -
from the death weighted things that would cling, constrict and stigmatise him.
New life is given by God—but that life must be made livable by human hands..
If then we are people of resurrection, then “unbind him” is a continuing call to the Church.
One of the most helpful things a friend has ever said to me in the midst of grief was, “There is more life yet to live.” She was not telling me to buck up. But in a conversation about the numbness that grief can bring, she reminded me that I was not paralysed.
Grief may have broken my heart, but I was still breathing..
Lament may have consumed me, but only because I was still able to imagine.. and wish for… and work for… a more intentional, more gentle, more beautiful world for each other.
Perhaps then, faith is not about understanding everything that troubles us.
Perhaps faith is about watching and waiting, ready with compassion -
for our ourselves, and for our fellow travellers -
in the midst of what we cannot explain.
And if that is so,
then the tears of Jesus are not a detour in the story.
They are the place where heaven and earth meet.