We have been reflecting a lot recently about who Jesus was as a person, both God and human. It’s easy to view Jesus as special, and having God-like qualities, but here in our Gospel reading this week, we are reminded again about the human nature of Jesus. Jesus had been friends with Mary and Lazarus for some time before we meet them here in this reading. In fact, we are told that he loved them. Jesus learns that Lazarus is sick, and so he travels to be with Lazarus and Mary, knowing that Lazarus has already died.
When things feel hard, no matter how much we feel like we are living in hell-on-earth, and I’m sure we have had those moments, we need to try and remind ourselves that there’s heaven-on- earth too.
When Jesus approaches the tomb of Lazarus and sees his friend weeping, and other friends of Lazarus weeping, Jesus is moved to tears himself. Even though he knows there is a plan for his friend and that his friend will live again, the grief and sadness expressed around him in that moment affects him deeply. The crowd remarks how Jesus must have loved this person so much that he is moved to tears, but I think there is more going on here. Jesus, in his true humanity, expresses empathy for his friend. He literally feels her pain and weeps with her in that moment.
I’m sure many of you have been to the funeral of a person you weren’t close with, and perhaps you’ve also experienced the same kind of empathy that Jesus did in that moment with Mary and the crowd at Lazarus’ tomb. In moments of collective sadness, we feel the grief of others deep in our souls. When a loved one gives a eulogy and describes the things that they will miss about someone, we are right there with them, imagining that person and the hole they will leave in the lives of those who had the privilege of knowing them. We weep along with those in the crowd because in a small way, we can take some of that grief from them and express it ourselves. That’s what empathy can be: feeling someone’s pain alongside them so that they can know they are not alone, thus easing the burden of their pain a little bit.
When we attend funerals, we are also reminded of everyone else we have lost and grieved our entire lives. Funerals let us process our own grief anew and freely express sadness and loss that we, by necessity, have had to push aside during our day-to-day lives. In those moments where we remember someone else, we remember ourselves and our own losses and let them flow with the others in the room. It is a collective release: a catharsis. We can imagine that Jesus was not only feeling the sadness that his friend felt in that moment, but also the weight of things that had already happened, and the weight of things to come.
All Saints’ Day seems particularly meaningful given the tone of our lives the past 18 months. There is so much grief in the world, so much loss, and a lot of pain and struggle. But we see Mary, even though she is upset, grieving, and angry at Jesus for letting her brother die, has faith that God and Jesus will make it right. She believes that even though there is pain now, that God will continue to be faithful to God’s people, and to Jesus.
The message of hope is one that can be difficult to focus on when we are so entrenched in our own challenges. We often tell folks that “it gets better”, but how is that helpful right now? We can hope that it gets better (or maybe we can’t, and that’s ok too) but we also need to figure out how to make the here and now better. In today’s reading from Revelation, we are told that “the home of God is among mortals” (21:3). I think this is really important to focus on: God dwells within us and around us always: God’s home is here. When things feel hard, no matter how much we feel like we are living in hell-on-earth, and I’m sure we have had those moments, we need to try and remind ourselves that there’s heaven-on-earth too. God’s home is here with us, and God is with us always. And when we are unable to see that or remember it, know that there are those around us who will sit and lament with us, and help share our burden when it feels too heavy for us to bear.