Dear Parish Family,

On All Saints Day, I am thinking about what Mary said to Jesus when she went to “where Jesus was” and told him that Lazarus had died. While the text says that she knelt at Jesus' feet respectfully, we are also told she leveled what must have been a crushing accusation at a man who loved her brother Lazarus: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Many of us respond to the death of a loved one in a cascade of what ifs and accusations.

If he’d only gone to the doctor sooner.

Why did she keep eating junk food?

How could a whole healthcare team not watch him more carefully?

I was taught that this (John 11:32-44) is a story about eternal life. Certainly that is a worthwhile interpretation. However this time reading through the text, I saw something different based upon my own emotions after losing a beloved friend. I felt compassion for Mary, who, while speaking to Jesus with faith, also was a bit accusatory along the lines of Where were you when I needed you? Sometimes people cry out at God in their grief. In this story, Jesus grieved as well. John says Jesus began to weep. His faith was firm, however. Some of the people who had gathered said of Jesus, Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying? To my ear, that sounds an awful lot like “What have you done for me lately, God?” I wonder why we so often need more proof that God is reliably with us? Jesus grieved for his friend and for those around him who were also mourning.

This story, affirms for me once again, that God is with me when I grieve. That Jesus shed tears for his friend tells me that he experienced the full range of human emotion, and why wouldn’t he. Through grief and through fear, remembering that God is present to me in those times is key to moving through them.

In a life fully lived, there will be grief and fear. And there will also be joy and hope because there is love. I would not be willing to give up that joy and hope to avoid the grief and fear. Life is a “both/and” enterprise. Remember— God is with us and we do not need to be alone. It also comes with the responsibility to be as present to one another as we can. Be ready for the moments when God is sending you to be by someone else’s side in their own grief and fear.

When we begin a prayer with “God be with you,” we are not saying “May God be with you,” but rather “God is with you” [now and always].

In peace and love,

Pan +