Call me too, Lord

‘Take the stone away!’ Jesus ordered.

Martha, the dead man’s sister, answered, ‘There will be a bad smell, Lord. He has been buried four days!’

Jesus said to her, ‘Didn’t I tell you that you would see God’s glory if you believed?’ They took the stone away. Jesus looked up and said, ‘I thank you, Father, that you listen to me. I know that you always listen to me, but I say this for the sake of the people here, so that they will believe that you sent me.’

After he had said this, he called out in a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out!’ (verses 39-43)

Read John 11:28-44

Sometimes, missing someone who has died, we go to their grave alone to ‘talk to them’. This wanting still to be close to someone we loved is natural. Yet the dead cannot advise us, nor, as far as we know, can they hear us. No matter what we say, they cannot respond to us.

It is all the more amazing, then, that when Jesus spoke to dead Lazarus, now four days buried, Lazarus not only heard him but also responded. The voice that called Lazarus out of the dust when he was first created was the same voice that made the universe out of nothing. When that voice calls, everything, living or dead, listens and obeys.

Next time you visit a loved one’s grave, go there with Jesus. Think of that voice calling your loved one, and you too. Imagine your loved one in heaven and you on earth responding, ‘You called, Lord? I’m coming!’

Lord, you called the dead, and they came. Call me too, so that in life or in death I might come gratefully to you. Amen.

by Alicia Simpfendorfer, in ‘Assurance for each Day’ (LCA, Openbook, 2004)

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