Jesus said to her, “Mary!”
She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni,”
which means Teacher.
I didn't plan to retire from the VA. I resolutely ignored the "planning one's retirement" emails that came several times a month. Frequently, it seemed, friends and acquaintances stopped me or came by my office to say goodbye. I wished them well. But I intended to stay so long as my health stood up.
And then things changed and I began to grumble. My friars, friends, and family heard me but made nothing of it. I was waiting for things to get back to normal, or for a new normal to appear. Eventually, as my discomfort did not resolve, I would begin to ask in prayer, "How long, O Lord?"
If I was serious about that question -- a question which infers some kind of time line -- I didn't want to think about it. It was just there, a moan, a complaint, a question.
And then, last autumn, I heard, "Spring."
"April?" I asked.
"March."
One friend asked me if I could last that long, but I felt obligated by circumstances. I could not simply walk away from a serious responsibility. But neither could I imagine working there in April. That future had disappeared.
Lazarus lay in the tomb for four days. He was well beyond complaining although his friends and family kept it up for him. But something in him remembered the words of Ezekiel,
Look! I am going to open your graves; I will make you come up out of your graves, my people, and bring you back to the land of Israel. You shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and make you come up out of them, my people! I will put my spirit in you that you may come to life, and I will settle you in your land. Then you shall know that I am the LORD. I have spoken; I will do it,
He also remembered the words of Jesus:
Amen, amen, I say to you, the hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.
So when the voice of Jesus sounded through the tomb and his decaying corpse, Lazarus knew he must obey.
Mary of Magdala was standing outside the tomb of Jesus weeping when she heard the sound of his voice. Until that moment she might have wished she could be in the tomb with her Lord, like Aida with Radames. But someone, it seemed, had removed the corpse.
And then she heard his voice. She knew his voice. It was reassuring, comforting, and commanding. Thrilled, elated, obedient, suddenly revived from a deathlike grief, she turned to the Lord and embraced him.
God's people know his voice. It is both reassuring and commanding, as familiar as a mother's. It sounds through the core of one's being, and is more dear than I am to myself,
We know the voice of God from our liturgical prayers with the Church, and from our private devotions. It sounds with the ever ancient timbre of the Bible, but comes to us as wisdom ever new. It is the voice of the shepherd who
"walks ahead of them, and the sheep follow him, because they recognize his voice. But they will not follow a stranger; they will run away from him, because they do not recognize the voice of strangers.”
We can never hear enough of it and yet the Lord is not garrulous. His utterance is direct, brief, and magisterial. We must obey; we cannot imagine not obeying even when he commands us to
"Stop holding on to me.... But go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."
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I love to write. This blog helps me to meditate on the Word of God, and I hope to make some contribution to our contemplations of God's Mighty Works.
Ordinarily, I write these reflections two or three weeks in advance of their publication. I do not intend to comment on current events.
I understand many people prefer gender-neutral references to "God." I don't disagree with them but find that language impersonal, unappealing and tasteless. When I refer to "God" I think of the One whom Jesus called "Abba" and "Father", and I would not attempt to improve on Jesus' language.
You're welcome to add a thought or raise a question.