“Take Away the Stone.”

ALL SAINTS B-2015       

This morning we heard a reading from the 11^th Chapter of John. This is classic Gospel of John.  It is a “sign” story - in this case the rising of the dead Lazarus - the “sign”, or miracle showcasing the Glory of God. Jesus is being himself predictably unpredictable; working from his own sense of God-time.   As is typical of John’s Gospel, readers also know that the story is not really about Lazarus, all the queues point to the bigger picture: a tomb near Jerusalem, a stone to be rolled away, Jesus dead, to rise again. The telling of Jesus outside Lazarus’ tomb, is John’s Gethsemane scene.  Jesus weeps. Jesus grieves. Jesus is in anguish.

There is a human element of course, where the characters although in the presence of the glory of God, understand or get the meaning of the sign to varied degrees. We hear Mary and Martha with words that sound familiar to our ears and our experiences:

 If only…. If only you were here… If only you were my brother would not have died.

Mary is grieving.

It has been four days….there is a stench because he has been dead for four days.

Martha is fearful.

Jesus says to Martha, ‘Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

Martha lacks belief.

Jesus addresses their grief, fear, and unbelief with the words: “Take Away the Stone.”

Jesus faces the grief, fear, and unbelief directly. In a moment of God-time grief, fear, and unbelief are changed.  Perhaps one could say shattered – although a myriad of questions arise from this “new thing,” this “new creation,” the idea of a new heaven and a new earth.

Jesus speaks to the people gathered with Mary and Martha outside the tomb of their brother Lazarus, not unlike the people who gathered to mourn those whom we remember today.  Jesus says, ‘Take away the stone.”

Read metaphorically, John’s Gospel has Jesus asking us to do the same: ”Take away the stone.” Stones of grief, fear, unbelief.

At the graveside of Lazarus, Jesus offers a new creation – of not only hope for life after death, but, the possibility for belief and hope for the present. Jesus connects their faith with life and then enlarges faith for the gathered community – by having a moment of time infused with the glory and fullness of God.  In the moment fear of death and stink of the grave disappears, grief is lifted, and belief is renewed by hope and possibility.

How is it that we can live in the moment of God-time, where fear disappears, grief is lifted, and belief is renewed?

Some Lutheran theologians, one from the 19^th Century, and 2 from the 20^th Century have a shared notion of living into the glory and fullness of God.

Soren Kierkegaard (whose last name ironically translates as graveyard) speaks of “living death.”  Living death is a spirit-less-ness; where at death one realizes the finitude of earthly busyness and politics. Living death is at the end of a whole life realizing that life has been consumed and for naught - also explained as life has been “hell” for in the end one finds their spirit and soul shrivelled, at best dying, but, really dead. Kierkegaard wrote that spirit-less-ness arises from a lack of will.  Humans have an enormous responsibility in life, for in death one stands alone before God.

Take away the stone of Fear.

Jurgen Moltmann in his book Theology of Hope, writes,  “Those who hope in Christ cannot put up with reality as it is …They chafe under it, resist it, for the goad of the unfulfilled future stabs inexorably into every unfulfilled present.”

Take away the stone of Grief.

Paul Tillich reflected that the meaning of being human – our life and our common life - in the world is to be a healer – to be an agent of resurrection and reconciliation.   And for this one needs inner and outer openness.

Take away the stone of unbelief.

Because Jesus asks for the stone to be taken away, because the people willing remove the stone – the “new” is brought to living reality.  This new reality and encounter of the glory of God has grief look at the present and the human predicament of a yet unfulfilled new creation – but the grief is changed to propel movement to belief and faith – both expressed through the continued desire to make the present whole.  This openness, the taking away of stones, is accomplished as those who have fear, those who grieve, those who have unbelief, engage in being healers; agents of resurrection and reconciliation.

Steve Jobs co-founder of Apple talked in a 1995 interview about what it is like to work with a group of people who really believe in what they are doing. He also talked about how “designing a product is keeping five thousand things in your brain and fitting them all together in new and different ways to get what you want. And every day you discover something new that is a new problem or a new opportunity to fit these things together a little differently. And it’s that process that is the magic.”

In the interview he related a story from his life:

“when I was a young kid there was a widowed man that lived up the street. He was in his eighties. He was a little scary looking.  … And one day he said to me, “come on into my garage I want to show you something.” And he pulled out this dusty old rock tumbler. It was a motor and a coffee can and a little band between them. And he said, “come on with me.” We went out into the back and we got just some rocks. Some regular old ugly rocks. And we put them in the can with a little bit of liquid and little bit of grit powder, and we closed the can up and he turned this motor on and he said, “come back tomorrow.” And this can was making a racket as the stones went around.

And I came back the next day, and we opened the can. And we took out these amazingly beautiful polished rocks. The same common stones that had gone in, through rubbing against each other like …, creating a little bit of friction, creating a little bit of noise, had come out these beautiful polished rocks.

That’s always been in my mind my metaphor for a team working really hard on something they’re passionate about. It’s that through the team, through that group of incredibly talented people bumping up against each other, having arguments, having fights sometimes, making some noise, and working together they polish each other and they polish the ideas, and what comes out are these really beautiful stones.

Is that not what we do in this space and as Christian community around the world?  Is this not our purpose?  To be open about our fears, our griefs, our unbelief – the stones of life -  to bring the regular old ugly rocks in our lives to this place and share the burden with each other.  We come here where our stones are tumbled in words of hope, possibility, healing, resurrection, fulfillment, and reconciliation; so that as beautiful stones, made beautiful by the glory of God – through the rubbing elbows with others in the pews, we are bound to be healers of the world. Free – to face the stones of our day and say with Jesus, “Take away the stone.”

And in the taking away of the stone, life is born anew.

On this All Saints Day, may our stones be tumbled together – our griefs, our fears, our unbelief – such that when we leave God’s presence will have been made known and we are can be God’s healers in the world.