Unbinding
A Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent
March 26, 2023
The Rev. Robin Teasley
(Grateful to Lindsay Ryland for preaching this sermon, as I was unwell.)
The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me all around them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry. He said to me, “Mortal, can these bones live?” I answered, “O Lord God, you know.” Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.”
So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.” I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude.
Then he said to me, “Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’ Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act,” says the Lord. Ezekiel 37:1-14
The Vision of Ezekiel - The Valley of the Dry Bones, John Roddam Spencer Stanhope
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” But when Jesus heard it, he said, “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.
Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.” The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?” Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.” After saying this, he told them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.” Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead. For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”
Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.” Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. John 11:1-45
The readings today tell us of bringing new life out of what was presumed to be dead. In our reading from Ezekiel, the prophet is taken to the valley of dry bones, and it’s clear that this image represents the crisis of 587 BCE in Jerusalem. When the Babylonians swept in and conquered Judah, they forced the people into exile, and destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple, the place where God dwelled. The Babylonian siege was a time of devastation and despair. It was a national disaster and a challenge to the faith of God’s people. They had lost the land promised to their ancestors, their king had been taken captive, and the temple, where the Lord dwelled, where God’s glory was known, lay in ruins.
The people in exile had lost everything. They were living in a strange land, with spiritual practices that were different from what they knew. In this place of loss and grief, the prophet Ezekiel is visited by the spirit of God and is taken to a valley of dry bones. The vision Ezekiel experiences is a metaphor for Israel’s rebirth after the exile and shows him that God is not confined to the Jerusalem temple. No. God can come and go in such a way that God can be present even among exiles in a foreign land. The vision makes clear to Ezekiel that the presence and life-giving power of God is in the community, among the people, wherever they may be. This was a much-needed word of hope for a community who believed they were dead, who cried out, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.”
All of us, at various times in our lives, may feel like YHWH has set us down in a valley of dry bones. Like Ezekiel we have no hope that those dry bones can live. Maybe we hate our job and see no way out. We owe so much money we think becoming debt free is an impossibility. We face challenges with loved ones for which there seem to be no good answers. Can these bones live? If we see ourselves as dead, then we must be dead, right? And we’ve had our own exile of sorts the past three years of the pandemic, unable to gather for worship for so long that churches are still experiencing the aftereffects, still wondering if these bones of the church as we knew it can live.
In our Gospel reading we have another story about finding life when death seemed final. Jesus doesn’t get to Bethany fast enough to heal Lazarus. Martha and Mary, heading out to meet Jesus as he approaches town, both begin their interactions with Jesus by sharing their loss of hope in the midst of pain and suffering, even accusing Jesus saying, “Lord if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” This is pain, disappointment, and hurt, and it’s something that every single one of us has experienced at some time in our lives.
The Raising of Lazarus, Duccio di Buoninsegna
When Jesus says that Lazarus will be raised, Martha assumes he is speaking about the promised resurrection at the end of time and she says, “Yes, Lord, I know that he will rise again in the resurrection of the last day.” But Jesus means something more, something immediate, revealing that the life he offers is not merely a promise for the future but something that makes a difference here and now. Martha and all the rest of us can recite what we believe, but God knows that because we are human beings with hopes and fears, we sometimes need to experience a kind of resurrection and the resulting new life for ourselves. And Lazarus, who is most certainly dead, receives new life when Jesus commands “Lazarus, come out!”
But Jesus does not stop there.
After commanding Lazarus to come out of the tomb, Jesus then turns and issues a command to the waiting crowd as well: “unbind him and let him go.” In other words, the community is commanded to participate in God’s action, to bring it to completion. It is the experience of new life in community right now that strengthens our faith in eternal life. Jesus invites the community to get involved, to play a part in seeing this miracle expanded.
Raising Lazarus, Brian Whelan
The same is true with us. We are not only called to be witnesses of God’s action in our lives, but also to be changed by what we see and thereby invited into the ongoing reality of what God is doing. God does the miracle, but God also gives us a part to play as it unfolds in our life. The Gospel we hear and confess should make a tangible difference now, make new things possible now, and transform relationships now.
The transformation of the valley of dry bones, the raising of Lazarus, the promise of new life, these are only the beginning of the work we are called to do as a community committed to being the hands and feet of Jesus. They affirm for us that new life is all around us if we will look for it and help one another to experience it.
What would happen if we really believed our littlest actions made a difference? I would like to tell you that they do indeed make a difference. When we serve together in this community, we are breathing new life into dry bones, and we are unbinding things. Whether we serve on the Altar Guild, as acolytes, ushers, choir members, readers, or intercessors; whether we help with our fellowship events, knit prayer shawls, bring food for Cornerstone, or serve dinner at the Men’s Shelter, we are making a difference in this community and beyond. It’s all the small actions that reveal new life in this world. Resurrection is happening even now, all around us, if we will take time to look around, see what needs unbinding, and then do whatever small thing we can to help.
As we approach the end of Lent, I encourage you to look around for the possibility of new life – at home, at work, in our nation, in our world. And when you notice a possibility, even in a field of dry bones or in a tomb that seems sealed, ask the Spirit to blow through with new life, allow Jesus to speak new life to you. And trust that God is also inviting us to help unbind one another from those things that keep us from experiencing the power of the resurrection in our lives right now, and in the age to come.
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