{"id":144,"date":"2020-03-28T07:12:00","date_gmt":"2020-03-28T07:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/?p=144"},"modified":"2020-03-29T06:26:21","modified_gmt":"2020-03-29T06:26:21","slug":"mary-tucker-on-lent-five","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/2020\/03\/28\/mary-tucker-on-lent-five\/","title":{"rendered":"Mary Tucker on Lent Five"},"content":{"rendered":"

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, \u2018Lord, he whom you love is ill.\u2019 But when Jesus heard it, he said, \u2018This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God\u2019s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.\u2019 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.<\/p>\n

Then after this he said to the disciples, \u2018Let us go to Judea again.\u2019 The disciples said to him, \u2018Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?\u2019 Jesus answered, \u2018Are 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.\u2019 After saying this, he told them, \u2018Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.\u2019 The disciples said to him, \u2018Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.\u2019 Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, \u2018Lazarus is dead. For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.\u2019 Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow-disciples, \u2018Let us also go, that we may die with him.\u2019<\/p>\n

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for 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, \u2018Lord, 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.\u2019 Jesus said to her, \u2018Your brother will rise again.\u2019 Martha said to him, \u2018I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.\u2019 Jesus said to her, \u2018I 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?\u2019 She said to him, \u2018Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.\u2019<\/p>\n

When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, \u2018The Teacher is here and is calling for you.\u2019 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, \u2018Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.\u2019 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, \u2018Where have you laid him?\u2019 They said to him, \u2018Lord, come and see.\u2019 Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, \u2018See how he loved him!\u2019 But some of them said, \u2018Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?\u2019<\/p>\n

Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, \u2018Take away the stone.\u2019 Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, \u2018Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead for four days.\u2019 Jesus said to her, \u2018Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?\u2019 So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upwards and said, \u2018Father, 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.\u2019 When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, \u2018Lazarus, come out!\u2019 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, \u2018Unbind him, and let him go.\u2019<\/p>\n

Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.<\/p>\n

John 11:1-45<\/cite><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWell \u2013 what a pickle!\u201d as one elderly lady I spoke to on the phone yesterday said. \u201cAll we can do is pray I suppose.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prayer is, I\u2019m sure, a constant part of our lives but at this point, each sitting in our own little safe bubble, we may be forgiven along with many others for wanting to scream out to God in fear, \u201cWhy aren\u2019t you here? If you were really here this would not have happened!\u201d<\/p>\n

And it is perfectly understandable that many in the secular world may also ask, \u201cIf your God is so loving why do fires devastate Australia? Why is COVID 19 killing the old and infirm, depriving people of their income, making lonely people lonelier? Why do bad things happen to good and innocent people? Why isn\u2019t he here? If he was really here these things would not have happened!\u201d<\/p>\n

So it is with all this in mind that I actually find today\u2019s reading helpful. If nothing else it shows us that \u2018it was ever thus.\u2019 Along with Martha and Mary trying to understand Jesus\u2019 actions the world still cries, \u201cLord, if you had been here my brother would not have died.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is no easy answer to the problem of undeserved suffering. Perhaps that is why Jesus wept. In his divinity he knew that out of even this tragedy good would come, but in his humanity perhaps he also understood the total lack of comprehension felt by Lazarus\u2019 family. We too can know from his earthly experience that he can understand the incomprehension felt by us today, as to why a God, who is supposed to love us, allows such things to occur even if good is the outcome.<\/p>\n

After all as day follows day we are seeing so much good \u2013 half a million people offering to help the NHS by volunteering, neighbours looking out for each other, if at a distance, and most heartening of all the kindness of strangers, but still, couldn\u2019t God in all his power find a way to bring about that good without appearing to abandon his own to their pain and fear, distress and loss?<\/p>\n

There are no easy answers but, strangely, I am beginning to hear stories of people of faith, to whom the worst is happening, sticking with God, trusting him, indeed depending on him. Despite all that has happened to them and its apparent unfairness they would still claim that God is bringing good out of, in one recent case, their multiple tragedies. And significantly their understanding, such as it is, is NOT that God has caused their particular catalogue of disaster but that, in a broken and fallen world where such events do happen, God\u2019s power is sufficient to carry them through and to take and use even the worst things for some eventual good.<\/p>\n

Perhaps then, in this part of the Gospel story, Jesus, as ever, is living out the way God is. God is NOT always understandable, he does NOT always respond to our prayers, to our situations, in the way we think he should. In fact, sometimes, it even feels as though he is absent, delays his appearance. Yet we know he understands our life, we know he has been like us, suffered like us and somehow, despite everything, he is able to use every situation, offered to him in faith, to continue his work of salvation in the world.<\/p>\n

It may however be that, though we have a deep desire to believe this, sometimes when things are at their worst our faith wavers. I am filled with hope though that later on, with hindsight, we will glimpse the fact that God\u2019s loving purposes were being worked out, his kingdom is still being built, even in this imperfect and often tragic world.<\/p>\n

From a personal point of view, though less dramatically, in this season of Lent as we face our own lack of perfection we can still give thanks that, despite the tragedy of our sin, the sadness of our inability to live out the lives we know we should, even from this, beyond our understanding, we have a God who IS capable of bringing good things from bad situations and good things for and from us, his imperfect people. And this, whilst not giving us any pat answers to our lack of understanding, should give us hope.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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, \u2018Lord, he whom you love is ill.\u2019 But … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Mary Tucker on Lent Five”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":150,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions\/150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heuristika.co.uk\/lfgdiscussion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}