A Lectio Divina Approach to the Sunday Liturgy
BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (Series 6, n. 15)
Fifth Sunday of Lent, Year A – March 8, 2008
“The Lord of Life”
BIBLE READINGS
Ez 37:12-14 // Rom 8:8-11 // Jn 11:1-45
N.B. Series 6 of BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD: A LECTIO DIVINA APPROACH TO THE SUNDAY LITURGY includes a prayerful study of the Sunday liturgy of Year A from the perspective of the First Reading. For another set of reflections on the Sunday liturgy of Year A, please go to the PDDM Web Archives: WWW.PDDM.US and open Series 3.
I. BIBLICO-LITURGICAL REFLECTIONS
The prophet Ezekiel’s vision of the dry bones and the promise of the restoration of the people of Israel (Ez 37:1-14) is one of the most fascinating passages in the Bible. This passage summarizes his mission to the Jewish exiles in Babylon to renew and give life. His task was to prophesy and preach the word of God to a deeply humiliated people who had experienced the total destruction of defeat and the anguish of death. The chosen people were lifeless “dry bones” scattered in the sere landscape of a lost battlefield. In their dismal situation as exiles in the land of their despotic conquerors from 597 to 538 B.C., the people of Israel were buried in “graves” of desolation and hopelessness. By proclaiming to them the Word of God, the prophet Ezekiel was to give the Babylonian deportees a new spirit to enable them to rise from their misery and captivity.
The authors of the Days of the Lord, vol. 2, comment: “The Exile has remained in biblical memory the great trial, the punishment for sin, where God revealed himself in all his holiness, even in the midst of the nations, and in his unshakable faithfulness. For this reason, this stage in history is recalled during Lent. Ezekiel, the priest and prophet, was among the deportees. He is, among all the prophets, the herald of God’s faithfulness and power, which the vicissitudes of history cannot hold in check. When everything seems lost, when the visible guarantees of the covenant have disappeared – dwelling in the Promised Land, the Davidic dynasty, the Temple – God remains faithful and capable of creating a new future for his own. He will open the tombs that hold them imprisoned; he will lead them out (Ez 37:12-14). The liberation from captivity is guaranteed by the word of the Lord. This is one of the principal lessons of Ezekiel’s oracles: You shall know that I am the Lord. In one form or another, this affirmation is repeated eighty-six times in the book of this prophet. And this is what we will essentially remember from this reading: nothing can cause us to doubt the promises of the Lord, who will deliver his people since he has committed himself to it.”
The loving care of God for his people Israel in raising them from the graves of desolation, destruction and death in the land of the Babylonian exile is marvelously crystallized in the life-giving action of Jesus, the Son of God, the Savior of all peoples. By his passion and death on the cross, Jesus became the Lord of life, wielding absolute and radical power over sin and death. The raising of Lazarus from the tomb of death and putrefaction was a “sign” not only of mastery over death given by the Father to the Son of Man, but also of the glory of his resurrection on Easter.
The authors of the Days of the Lord, vol. 2, explicate: “Death cannot defeat the God of life and the living. God delivers his people from their graves – the grave of deportation, for instance – as soon as they turn from their sin. (…) Of this power and this mission, Jesus gave signs, among which the raising of Lazarus stands out. Through this sign, he showed that he himself was the resurrection and the life. (…) The process of moving toward life is started at baptism, in which we are born to faith. Still under the law of death, we can and we must, animated by the Spirit who vivifies us, lead a life free of the control of mortal flesh, with the assurance of one day sharing in the Lord’s resurrection. Such a certainty must not, however, cause us to forget the inescapable step of the cross. Christ, resurrection and life, has gone through it with us. The raising of Lazarus had as its immediate consequence the condemnation of Jesus to death; he freely gave his life so that we might live forever.”
Immersed into the paschal destiny of Jesus Christ, the baptized believers become witnesses and instruments of “life” in death-dealing situations of today’s world. By virtue of the life-giving Spirit that we received at our baptism, we are caught up in Christ’s resurrection. Beautiful examples of the power of life over death abound. My personal experience of it, which I report below, is sheer “grace”.
I am deeply privileged to have come in contact with a twenty-year old young man named Brendan. I met him last February 21 at the Emergency Room of the Good Samaritan Hospital in downtown Los Angeles where we brought a sick friend through the help of the “911 team” for emergency admission. At the age of sixteen, Brendan had an accident, which left him quadriplegic. While doing a gymnastic trampoline exercise, the 6’4” handsome athlete fell and broke his neck. Very brilliant and gifted, he won a scholarship at U.C.L.A. where he is taking pre-law. Though his body is paralyzed and has many physical symptoms to be addressed, his spirit is indomitable and full of hope. He was able to rise up from the grave of depression and misery, and with his dreams he soars up like an eagle. He hopes to travel to New Zealand. When he graduates, he wants to serve in an athletic rehabilitation program that would help disabled athletes like himself. His Aunt Jennifer, a professional nurse-lawyer and lovely as a model, committed herself to take care of Brendan. On account of the triage system, Brendan had to wait for four to six hours and perhaps even more at the emergency room, but he was so serene and patient, peacefully wheeling around in his high-tech wheelchair. I thanked Brendan for the life-giving witness he had given me. When I bid Brendan and Jennifer goodbye, I knew that my life has been radically inspired by their commitment to life, courage and faith, and by their intense witnessing to the gift of Christ’s “resurrection”.
II. POINTS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF THE HEART
What were the death-dealing experiences of the chosen people Israel that made them feel they were “dry bones” and that they were dead and buried in the “graves”? What was God’s offer of life and vision of hope to his distressed people? What does the divine promise of rising from the “graves” mean? How does this affirmation of God addressed to his chosen people impact you personally: “I will put my spirit in you that you may live”?
Why is the raising of Lazarus a “sign” of the resurrection of Christ and our own resurrection? Why is the sacrament of baptism a “death and rising” experience with Christ? Why is Jesus Christ the Lord of life?
Do we believe that death cannot defeat the God of life and of the living? How do we witness in today’s anguished world the reality that the power of life is stronger than death? Do we willfully commit ourselves to choose the power of life and give witness to the life-giving Spirit in many intense death-dealing situations? Do we radically commit ourselves to Jesus, the Lord of life?
III. PRAYING WITH THE WORD
Leader: Loving Father,
we thank you for the prophet Ezekiel’s vision of the “dry bones”
and the rising of the suffering people from the “graves” of desolation.
You are true to your promise:
“I will put my spirit in you that you may live.”
Your life-giving Spirit enabled the people of Israel exiled in Babylon
to rise from distress and return to you,
renewed and joyful as a redeemed nation.
We thank you for the power of life
manifested in the “resurrection” of Lazarus.
It is a sign of the resurrection of Jesus,
of our resurrection to divine life in baptism
and the resurrection of the body at the end time.
Immersed into the paschal mystery of Jesus Christ,
we believe in the power of resurrection and the strength of grace.
We avow that death cannot defeat the Lord of life.
Fill us with the Spirit of Jesus.
We commit ourselves to choose the gift of life
rather than the destruction of sin and death.
Grant us to be instruments of life in today’s anguished world
and witnesses of grace in death-dealing situations.
O loving God,
help us to die to sin and to live with Jesus Christ,
forever and ever.
Assembly: Amen.
IV. INTERIORIZATION OF THE WORD
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” (Jn 11:25-26)
V. TOWARDS LIFE TRANSFORMATION
ACTION PLAN: Meditate on the power of life at work even in death-dealing situations of today’s world and on the fecundity of Christ’s death on the cross. By your courageous witnessing and acts of charity, endeavor to promote the life and power of Christ where there is misery and sadness, violence and hatred, sin and death.
ACTION PLAN: To help us experience more gratefully God’s gift of “life” personified in Jesus Christ, make an effort to spend an hour in Eucharistic Adoration. Visit the PDDM WEB site (www.pddm.us) for the EUCHARISTIC ADORATION THROUGH THE LITURGICAL YEAR (Vol. 4, n. 15): A Weekly Pastoral Tool.
Prepared by Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang PDDM
PIAE DISCIPULAE DIVINI MAGISTRI
SISTER DISCIPLES OF THE DIVINE MASTER
60 Sunset Ave., Staten Island, NY 10314
Tel. (718) 494-8597 // (718) 761-2323
Website: WWW.PDDM.US