Pr. Mark Stirdivant:

The Lord be with you! This Sunday, March 29, is the fifth Sunday in Lent. We are a week away from Palm Sunday and Holy Week, even though the pace of life for us these days is quite different from what we’re typically used to. A week away may seem longer than usual!

Let us prepare our hearts for study in God’s Word, using this Sunday’s Collect of the Day, which gives us a helpful theme for our Lenten Resurrection celebration.
Let us pray: Almighty God, by Your great goodness mercifully look upon Your people that we may be governed and preserved evermore in body and soul; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

The Introit at the beginning of the service is from Psalm 116, and it focuses the Christian mind on hope for life in the face of death. In verse 15 there’s this lovely verse: “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints.” God sees the horrible outcome of death through different glasses—glasses tinted with the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ! Because of the cross, death is now different. It’s even precious, thanks to what our Good Shepherd has done for us!

The Ezekiel 37 vision is the well-known “dry bones” story. How many of you remember singing about how the leg-bone is connected to the ankle bone? Even though dry bones are raised up, clothed with flesh and given the breath of life, the real resurrection that Ezekiel witnessed in his encounter was the encouraging promise that through all trials and evils of this life, Christ and His eternal kingdom of righteousness by grace reign supreme.

Romans 8:1-11 begins a wonderful comforting chapter of Scripture with a profound exclamation: There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus! No condemnation is more than the lack of a bad thing—it’s all the good things, the blessings of God that were earned for us by Christ’s cross payment, that come with it that flood the whole chapter that follows. We are not in the flesh, nor minded toward things of the flesh anymore. Our perspective has been graciously changed (thanks be to God!) to things of the Spirit and eternal life.

John 11 is the story of Jesus raising Lazarus. This is the great miracle leading up to John’s account of Holy Week. Perfect reading for the Fifth Sunday in Lent! The buzz about Lazarus was still buzzing when Jesus was riding the donkey into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday! Martha is a striking character to follow through John chapter 11. Remember the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10? Martha was distracted with cooking and preparations and took it out on Jesus that Mary wasn’t helping her! Then here she states the beautiful hope in her brother’s resurrection at the last day, to which Jesus responds, “I am the resurrection and the life.” Yet, just as Jesus orders the tomb to be opened, Martha spoke up with the distracted observation, Hey, Jesus, there’s going to be a stink after 4 days of a dead body being in the tomb! That’s just like we are, and Jesus comforts us, too.

As we look forward to God’s promise to be governed and preserved evermore in body and soul, as we prayed at the beginning, we can use this hymn stanza to solidify our confidence in Christ, from hymn 552:

O Christ, who shared our mortal life
And ended death’s long reign,
Who healed the sick and raised the dead
And bore our grief and pain:
We know our years on earth are few,
That death is always near.
Come now to us, O Lord of Life;
Bring hope that conquers fear!

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

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Readings:
Ezek. 37:1–14 O dry bones hear the word of the LORD!
Psalm 130 If You, LORD should mark iniquities, O LORD, who could stand?
Rom. 8:1–11 there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus
John 11:1–53 I am the resurrection and the life.