Lent 5A

[RCL] Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:6-11; John 11:1-45 These long readings from John’s Gospel during Lent have a depth and a power to them that can, if we take them into our hearts, reach the very core of our lives. Today we hear about death and new life, about the end of some things,…

[RCL]: Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:6-11; John 11:1-45 No one asks Lazarus if he wants to be resurrected. That’s the fascinating part about our gospel story today. No one asks if he wants to return to a broken and hurting body, tangled relationships, and the responsibilities of his finances and his job and his…

These long readings from John’s Gospel during Lent have a depth and a power to them that can reach to the very core of our lives. Today we hear about death and new life, about the end of some things, and, perhaps, the beginning of others. Death is always a topic close to home, one…

Friends, we are almost there. We have been on this Lenten road since Ash Wednesday: about 28 of our 40 days. We are in the home stretch. As Tom Petty so wisely put it, “the waiting is the hardest part.” Throughout this Lenten season we have been reading long stretches from the Gospel According to…

We talk a lot about God and Jesus, but rarely do we take much time to talk about the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost. And yet, an entire industry has evolved in our culture to market something called spirituality, as if it is a commodity we can purchase, or that there is some body of…

Many of us hearing today’s Old Testament reading from Ezekiel—that rich and vivid story about the valley of dry bones—instantly remember the words of a song learned in childhood. These words: The toe bone connected to the foot bone,The foot bone connected to the ankle bone,The ankle bone connected to the leg bone,The leg bone…

There is a scene in the movie Return of the King, based on the third volume of J.R.R. Tolkien’s saga The Lord of the Rings, where Aragorn gives dead soldiers who deserted their king a chance to regain their honor and be restored to peace if they will help to defend the City of Kings…

It’s hard getting God to obey us. After all we’re the ones on the scene. We know what we need, or our parish needs, or what we need as individuals. God should listen to us and take our advice. If God would only be here when needed, there would be no tragedy in our lives….

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”“I am the resurrection and the life.”And soon, there is a stone rolled away, an empty tomb, and grave clothes lying abandoned. Lazarus’ miracle is NOT resurrection, because he will die, physically, again. That’s true. But it is not ALL the truth. The other…