Sunday 6 April 2014

Lazarus - Part 3 - The Community


John 11:41-45
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.”
 Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

Lazarus released from the tomb
But still bound
by the clutches of death
It was the task of his community
to "Unbind him and let him go"
Without that release
he could not have drawn breath
Without that release
he could not have lived again.
Communities today
still bear responsibility
for giving life
For loosing
For unbinding
For giving permission
For being witnesses
to resurrection
For moving beyond the stench
to reach out
and bring life
And communities
bear the responsibility
of nurturing
and sustaining
the stirrings
of new life
wherever it is found.

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