Wilderness: Walking through Grief

John 14:1-3

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.

I don’t know if I’m here tonight because of a wilderness or because I’m bewildered. And maybe it doesn’t matter. O those wildernesses. Scripture says Elijah RAN to his, and even Jesus was LED to one. I was DROPPED into my wilderness last year, first when Susan died, and then deeper into it just a month later when Mary died. Susan and Mary didn’t know each other, but it looked like they planned their exit strategy together. I had texted Susan multiple times without a reply. My last text cheerfully said, “Susan, are you there?” She no longer was. Mary and I were arranging lunch for a Tuesday, but on Sunday Mary died in her kitchen. Without warning, they just disappeared. I was and still am bewildered.

Of the many synonyms for “wilderness,” I chose the word “empty.” The deep, decades-long, trusted friendships I had with these women each ended so abruptly, they left me lost in an emptiness, of grief. I love them still and will always be homesick for them, even as my grief changes, because being in their lives was anything BUT empty.

Susan was warmth and lofty ideals, gentleness, calm, and refinement. Living in a tiny traditional home with her tapestries, carvings, music, books, and friends filled with life, it’s no wonder I thrived on her laughter and her bright conversations, about faith and justice, about love and deep soul-searching, about the heart stuff and hard stuff of life. Ever caring, she Facetimed her grandchildren when they came home after school to their empty house, faithfully grandparenting from 200 miles away. I especially loved that she watched Cross of Grace services on YouTube so often that she even knew some of you who served by name. She loved people tenderly, including me…and you.

Mary, on the other hand, was everything earthy and creative, funny, colorful, and outrageous! Her small double-wide home in the country overflowed with rescued dogs, cats, and grown kids. I cherish the way she usually started our conversations with an abrupt, “Hey, DK, I have an idea.” And she always did. Her friends still talk about the time she was in the bar where her son was a bouncer, and a wild brawl broke out. Mary suddenly rushed into the middle of it, (and Mary was not one to rush anywhere,) and began pushing drunk guys out of the way to get to her son, all the while shouting to him, “Are you ok?!? Are you OK?!?” She never once considered that her son was a Green Beret in the military and probably didn’t really need her help. Mary loved fiercely. She would have rescued just me the same.

Maybe you can see my empty holes no one will ever fill the same way. I tell you all this tonight, not about grief especially, but wondering if maybe you have been bewildered and lost in a wilderness too. If not in one of grief, then maybe in a loss of another relationship, or one lacking, of health, a job, a loss of a home, a dream, of time passing, a loss of purpose, or the road not taken. Maybe it’s a longing for an undefined something missing. If you don’t have a story to tell yet, you probably will. Together in this world, it’s hard to have a life without a wilderness, eventually.

My wilderness felt like this picture behind me. * Our baptismal fount at CoG, is usually filled with fresh, life-restoring, touchable water, but looked like this last Lent. Could it have been any drier, or less nourishing, or less life-filled? I mean, Jesus was there, in the middle of my wilderness, just like the cross is in the photo. No one had to say to me, “Have hope in the resurrection.” That wouldn’t help. I knew that. I never doubted it in my head ever, but I was achingly sad anyway. I noticed more of the cold, hard stones, than the warmth of grace and love I knew was there. I was empty. I felt like Elijah in the lesson, looking for God in multiple places, certain God would show up, but not quite finding Him like I hoped. A wilderness can be a lonely place. Can anyone ever really know exactly what you are missing? Really?

The coldest time in my wilderness was during Advent, hearing a Wednesday message about how a different Mary, pregnant mother of Jesus, went to her wonderful, wise Aunt Elizabeth for support and love. Imagining that relationship, my tears ran. I hurt. I needed my go-to Aunt Elizabeths for ideas and creativity, for memories made together, and the joy of long-time belonging. I would have cried with Mary about Susan, and with Susan about Mary, but I could do neither. I needed my Aunt Elizabeths. Do you know what that longing is like, no matter your wilderness?

All that made the late Christmas Eve service sermon especially touching, reaching deep within my being, and settling there. That night, the reason for Christmas all sounded different. Compassion as I saw it on the video that night looked different. Things changed.

• I understood why Jesus actually WANTED to live in the same kind of vulnerable human mess I was In…..so that He could recognize and be the compassion I needed. He could say, “Dianne, I’ve been there too. Really.”

• I understood that Jesus experienced courage, in order to give ME courage…. so I could be courageously compassionate to others. He could say, “Go ahead and try it, Dianne. I’ve done that too. Really.”

• I understood how Jesus came to love people through all their wildernesses… so we could love a person through a wilderness too. He could say, “Yep. I’ve shown you how. And still do. Really.”

Jesus was replacing this cold stone * cross with His warm Presence again. I surely don’t know how it was happening, but it was. Really. I knew Jesus lived with MY particular grief, MY experiences with MY special friends, MY emptiness too. My very real compassionate Jesus knew what I was missing and was sad right along with me the whole time. He could say, “Dianne, I get it. Really.” and totally mean it. Mary and Susan left, but Jesus never did. I didn’t know it while in my wilderness, but I was being cared for.

I wonder, when Elijah ran fear of his life, did he realize how he was also being cared for? Or did he see it in HINDSIGHT? He was given courage, direction, and support while he was trying to find home again. He found Grace in his wilderness. In HINDSIGHT, I know Grace was always there for me too. Like our Lenten song has said repeatedly, more or less, ´Elijah and I may have had to wait, may have had to pray more than we usually do.” No voice or manna or burning bushes came to me in my wilderness. I wish. But there WERE words, emails, hugs, and conversations. Earthly ones. There was Grace when I realized, in HINDSIGHT, that in my Stephen Minister training, I had already heard about, read about, and practiced grief situations and had been given the privilege to walk it with others BEFORE I was dropped into my own. Jesus led me gently into my grief and I didn’t even know it. There were lovely souls around who were sad with me, and said so. People gave me God’s Word and their words. People sang song lyrics, even sad ones, and served me bread and wine, and did some serious listening that I’m sure Jesus overheard. Some people were put in my path, or on YouTube, authors and teachers, friends and strangers alike.

In HINDSIGHT I think Jesus knew I had to walk differently with Him for a while, before I could see His invitation to take His hand again. And so He gave me PEOPLE. I was tended to, held up, and provided for in my wilderness, by the warm love of Jesus, through people. It took time, and listening. ”I may have had to wait. I may have had to pray more that I usually do.” When I thought the happy Jesus of Christmas and Easter sometimes looked pretty puny in my wilderness, I was sustained and tended to anyway. Really. How cool is it that our God loved me enough to provide, and provide and provide, even when I wasn’t ready to see it.

Exodus 15: 13 says about our Lord, “In your unfailing love, you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength, you will guide them to Your Holy Dwelling.” I believe that. And more.

In His unfailing love, I believe God leads and guides us to emerge differently from our wildernesses, no matter our wilderness, no matter how long it takes.

I believe God’s love and strength provided Jesus with the vulnerability, courage, and compassion He needed just to get through His own life, death and resurrection. And He emerged differently, for us.

I believe Jesus left all that behind in each of us. Vulnerability, courage and compassion, is in, us. I am reminded about that often at Cog, even this Lent.

I believe we need that vulnerability, courage, and compassion to walk with each other in the wilderness, as we are called to do.

I don’t believe it looks the same for everyone or happens in the same timeframe. In fact, sometimes I wonder if maybe we are ALL in a wilderness ALL the time and maybe don’t see it; all the time maybe searching for a way to fully live as God intends. Maybe we are ALL still aching for some holes in our lives to be filled…mental, emotional, physical, or spiritual. While in Our own daily wilderness, we are called to walk with others, as much as we are able, anyway.

I believe God has called me to walk with others through their wildernesses and I’ve missed the opportunities.

I believe we each are to look for them, and when we find them…. I believe we are called to love through those hard times, love through it all, through messy empty places. Just keep loving.

Because I believe that when one of us walks another through a wilderness, every single time that happens, we are ALL, ALL of us, a step closer to being, led, home…… through the love of God and Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Tombs for the Living

John 11:1-44

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.”

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As good as it is, I don’t think the most important thing about this story has as much to do with the miracle of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, as we might believe. I might be wrong about that, but it’s not the most important thing for me, at least, for a couple of reasons.

First of all, I don’t think Lazarus’ resuscitation is the most meaningful thing about it all partly because it doesn’t happen often enough in ways we wish it would, or think it should – or maybe even deserve, sometimes – as far as I’m concerned. Who hasn’t wished, hoped and prayed for someone you love to have a second chance to live again after a disease or an accident or even after a long life, well-lived? We would almost always call on Jesus, just like Martha and Mary did, to do for our loved ones, just what he did for Lazarus. Would we not? But I haven’t heard of many successful returns on that investment.

And the second reason I’m not sure Lazarus’ walk from the tomb is the most important thing about it all is that – as marvelous and miraculous as that magic trick must have been to witness – and for us to wonder about, still – it didn’t last forever. Lazarus died again, eventually, so there’s that. Bah humbug. And for that reason, some people consider all of this more of a resuscitation than a resurrection, but that may be splitting theological hairs.

So I always have to remind myself that this story may not be as much about resurrection from the dead as I’m inclined to think, at first. Maybe it doesn’t have so much to do with Jesus’ power to give physical life back to someone who has lost it. After all, what we’ve heard about this morning isn’t the be-all and end-all of resurrection stories, remember. We’ll hear about that one in a couple of weeks on Easter Sunday.

So what could be the point – other than that resurrection stuff? Where is some meaning here I can sink my teeth into?

I’m thinking maybe it has as much, or more, to do with new life as we know it – right here for those of us still living, moving and breathing in the world, on this side of our respective graves. What Jesus shows us – and what he shows Lazarus, and the sisters, Mary and Martha, and anyone else who was watching that day outside of Bethany – is that tombs aren’t just for dead people. (That sounds like a commercial doesn’t it? “Tombs – they’re not just for dead people anymore!”)

See, you might say the disciples are living in their own kind of naïve tombs about the fullness of Jesus’ ministry – trying to protect Jesus at every turn and not understanding what it means to walk in the light, in spite of the darkness around them. Mary and Martha were living in tombs of grief and despair and blame and lack of faith about what had happened – missing their brother, angry at God, frustrated with Jesus, and all that goes along with that. And of course, there was the crowd from town, presumably mixed with people of all kinds living in all sorts of proverbial tombs – some curious, some suspicious, some apparently murderous – over all they’d heard and seen from Jesus up until now.

So, what about us? If tombs aren’t just for dead people, where do they show up in our lives and what are they doing there? Like so much else when it comes to the faith we wrestle with, there are as many answers as there are people to ask those hard questions.

So, I wonder where are our tombs? What is it that keeps us from really living – right here, right now?

- Maybe it’s an addiction or a bad relationship

- Maybe it’s fear of failure or fear of success

- Maybe it’s some kind of bigotry or a lack of information or a lack of faith

- Maybe it’s something in our past or something in our present or something we know is on the way

What kind of caves are we afraid to come out of?

- a cave that’s comfortable because we’ve been in there for a while?

- a cave that seems like the right place to be only because we’ve never known anything different?

- a cave that holds a secret or two no one else knows and that we’re too afraid to tell?

What is it that we find ourselves buried beneath?

- Work or family obligations?

- School or stereotypes?

- Debt? … doubt?

- Guilt? … shame?

- Bad decisions? … bad luck?

Maybe it’s something you can’t even put a name on. There are all sorts of things in our lives and in the world that keep us entombed and buried and anything but living the life that God would have for us.

And the more time I spend with people – particularly for some reason, people like us in the Church – the more it seems to me that God’s greater challenge isn’t to raise us from the dead once we’ve stopped breathing. It seems sometimes like the greater miracle is for God to wake us up and call us out of the graveyards of our Habit and Tradition; to carry us out of cemeteries of Comfort, and Complacency and Low Expectations; to dig us out of tombs of Hopelessness, Sadness and Despair.

But that’s what I see God doing this morning – as much for Mary, Martha and the people of Bethany, all of whom were alive and breathing – as for Lazarus, who was dead as a doornail, and starting to decay!

He calls them all out of their tombs and invites them to live again, differently, on the other side. So maybe that’s the invitation we’re all called to hear, to wonder about, and to pray for faith and courage enough to respond to every day – and maybe, especially – as we head into these remaining days of Lent this time around.

From what …

Out of what …

Toward what … are you being called?

“Come out” of what’s expected and do that thing, volunteer for that project, get involved in that ministry, sign up for that class, take or leave that job, finally.

“Come out” of what’s always been safe and comfortable. Give away that gift or offer up your time or extend that mercy.

“Come out” of your pride and ask for help or ask for direction or ask for forgiveness.

We all have things that keep us entombed – that keep us in the dark – that keep us locked up or locked away from what God would have us do or be or become. This morning – and every day that we gather around Word and sacrament and in the presence of one another – we are hearing God’s call to us…

…to come out of our tombs. …to step into God’s light. …to throw off the darkness and the trappings that tie us up and keep us down and prevent us from living most fully, as God intends.

So, as we wait and long and hope for Easter, let’s plan to “come out, come out from where ever we are.” Let’s hear God calling our name in a way we haven’t before. Let’s accept the invitation for a change and step into a new way of living right where we are.

Let’s be unbound by the good news that even though tombs may not be just for dead people anymore, neither are things like resurrection and new life and second-chances. We all stand to be revived, resuscitated, raised up in some way to get a taste of everlasting life – not just after we die – but on this side of heaven, too, thanks to the grace we share and that calls us by name, in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen