The lectionary passage for Sunday is John 11, the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. In these days when the flow of life runs counter to my finding time to write, I chase words like a salmon trying to get upstream. Though the gospel accounts don’t say so, reading it through my eyes it’s easy to imagine Jesus was hindered in getting to his sick friend by the circumstances of his life. That was my starting point for my poem tonight.
second funeral
When Jesus got word Lazarus was ill
he waited two days before he started
toward Bethany – not that far away.
You have to assume he had the best
of intentions, after all he was Jesus.I know the story says he was sure
the sickness wouldn’t get the best
of his friend, but by the time he got
there, Lazarus was bound and buried,
When he got to the grave, Jesus wept,then he called Lazarus out of the tomb
and back into life. The scene might have
played a little better had they undone
the bandages before Lazarus woke up.
We don’t know much else about him –how long he lived, or how he felt about
his reanimation; how could he be the same?
No one recorded how much longer
he lived, or how those days played out.
The part of the story I wish I knewwas what happened at his second funeral.
I’ve always assumed he was outlived by
his sisters (they struck me as stronger),
so they would have buried him again,
this time without Jesus, who was gone.Some things familiarity can’t soften.
Peace,
Milton
One thing is sure – even if we get resurrected/reanimated, the death rate is still 100% (except maybe for Enoch, Elijah, and those still alive at the Second Coming).
I always wondered about this as well.
Death is a mystery. I’ve come to view it as exchanging your human suit for a different one. Though when it is my turn I may revert to type.
Lazarus will be a great story to find out when we’re there. Better than the next episode of “Lost”
yes, I’ve wondered about this too. In fact, I believe pastor and teacher Gerhard Frost wrote about this in one of his poems…long ago.