His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros

Homily for Lazaros Saturday

April 8, 2023

Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church

Baltimore, Maryland

 

My beloved brothers and sisters of Saint Nicholas Church, the center of Greektown in Baltimore, the Saturday of Lazaros brings us into the timeline and the historical events of Holy Week. It is no accident that the Apolytikion for today and Palm Sunday, is the same: Τὴν κοινὴν Ἀνάστασιν, for this is our prelude to the symphony of God’s love to follow.

Today, the Lord Jesus Christ calls forth Lazaros from his tomb. As we chanted in the Matins this morning.

         Λόγῳ σου Λόγε τοῦ Θεοῦ, Λάζαρος νῦν ἐξάλλεται, πρὸς βίον παλινδρομήσας….

O Word of God, by your word Lazaros now leaps forth, taking up again the path to life….[*]

He calls for His friend, Lazaros, whom He left in order to bring His disciples to the brink of believing.[†]

He calls for His companion, Lazaros, as He grieves with the sisters Martha and Mary, whose tears bring the Lord to weeping.[‡]

The incarnate Word of God calls for Lazaros to come back from the dead with these words:

Λάζαρε, δεῦρο ἔξω!

Lazaros, come forth! [§]

Standing before the the tomb of Lazarus, and understanding that He too would go down into such a tomb, the Lord Jesus exercised the authority that He had as Son of God. He had waited to return to Jerusalem, making a point of waiting for Lazaros to be four days dead in the grave. Lazaros had, by then, already traveled to Hadës, which the Prophet David describes as the place where one is “forgotten, cut off, laid in the lowest pit, in darkness, and the shadow of death.” [**]

Four days dead! One more day than the Lord would spend in the tomb, to show that he was dead beyond any shadow of a doubt. Lazaros was even beginning to reek with the lingering smell of death. His sisters had fallen far beyond hope, into the depths of grief and mourning. And in the moment of their deepest sorrow, the saintly Martha and Mary expressed their frustration and remorse to the Lord – Martha said:

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” [††]

And Mary said:

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not be dead.” [‡‡]

Their sisterly heartache presses on the Lord, until we read:
When Jesus saw Mary weeping, and the Judeans who had accompanied her wailing with grief, he shuddered in His spirit, and was shaken deep within. [§§]

Jesus asks to be taken to the grave. And in a marvelous reversal of roles, these Sisters say to the Lord what the Lord said to His first Disciples: ἔρχου καὶ ἴδε, Come and see. [***] The Lord had invited His very first followers into the story of our salvation by saying: “Come and see.” Now, Martha and Mary invite the Lord Himself to see where that story seemed to end, with the same invitation. At this, the Lord broke down. We hear these bittersweet words in the Gospel: ἐδάκρυσεν ὁ ̓Ιησοῦς, Jesus wept. [†††]

It is as if in that moment – in the death of a single human being, His friend named Lazaros, the Lord Jesus wept for every human being who has ever died. The Lord came to the cave of that grave walking of His own free will, but realizing that others would soon carry Him to His own grave in the garden.

We sang: Λάζαρος νῦν ἐξάλλεται, πρὸς βίον παλινδρομήσας –  Lazaros now leaps forth, taking up again the path to life. But the truth is much deeper than the resurrection of a single life that would have to die again. The truth which our Lord Jesus Christ knew in that moment, was that His soul would soon leap from His Tomb into Hell, and libertate all of humanity forever.

My Friends:

Today, we learn once again that the story of our lives does not end in death, but in life, and eternal life in God. But we must all pass through that door, in order to arrive to the other side. Lazaros died to live again. We must die to ourselves in order to live forever.

This is our prelude to the symphony of Holy Week, when we will travel with the Lord and pause at His tomb for the Three Days. And we will leap with everlasting joy when we hear the Good News of the Angel, who sits within the Empty Tomb: “He is Risen! He is not here!”[‡‡‡]

         Καλή Δύναμη, καὶ Καλή Ἀνάσταση!