Unbound. All Saints' Sunday - November 7, 2021. The Rev. David M. Stoddart

John 11:32-44

Unbind him, and let him go. Over the years, I’ve read many accounts of people who have had near death experiences. These are stories of individuals who have been medically dead for minutes or hours or, in some cases days, but have then revived or been resuscitated. But during their time of being dead, they have had amazing experiences. Many recount seeing light composed of indescribable colors; meadows, trees, mountains beautiful beyond anything in this world; deceased relatives looking whole and happy; heavenly beings, benevolent and powerful. They report feeling completely accepted and fully at peace. And not a few of them describe direct encounters with the Divine. One man, named Peter Panagore, expired from hypothermia on an ice climbing trip in Canada in March of 1980. Before coming back to life, he had a remarkable experience of God. In his book, Heaven is Beautiful, he recalls feeling utterly loved and hearing God speak:

God said, “I love you more deeply than your imagination could ever have conceived. I know you and love you, Peter. You are my creature. Because you are here, now you know how much I love you, and you know how great my love is.” . . . And God continued, “In the way I love you now, and you know that I love you, I also love everyone, every human being, every person on earth, right now, always.”

Reflecting on this, Panagore writes,

God’s love was so wide and deep, so full and sweet, so safe and eternal. It was so much greater than any love I had ever felt before, and yet somehow I knew I had always been loved in this way by God for my entire life, even when I was in my physical body and could not feel the fullness of that great love. I knew I was always beloved.

The whole experience radically changed this man and has shaped his life in the decades since it happened. His is one of many similar and awesome stories, and I share it with you because I wonder: Do you think Lazarus had a near death experience? He certainly qualifies: he’s been dead four days and then is restored to life. What do you think happened to him during those four days? What did he see? What did he hear? How did he feel?

This Gospel passage clearly illustrates the power and authority Jesus has as God’s Son. And so we can easily focus on that, and consider how this miraculous event touched Martha and Mary and all the people around them who witnessed it, and how it inspired faith in them. But me, today: I’m thinking about Lazarus. This must have had a huge impact on him. The Gospel, frustratingly, offers us no details of his reaction or his life after this happens, but the final words may give us a clue: The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”

Lazarus certainly needs to be freed from his funeral wrappings, but John’s Gospel is not so simple: it is always operating on multiple levels at once. So when Jesus says, Unbind him, he d0es not just mean untie those pieces of cloth. I believe that Lazarus, having been to the other side, is set free from the fear of death itself, and, as a result, set free to share the love he encountered there, the love which Jesus embodies. Lazarus is now a man spiritually unbound.

The Letter to the Hebrews says that Jesus came to free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death (Heb. 2:15). And in light of that, on this All Saints’ Sunday, I would invite you to reconsider your ideas of what makes someone a saint. When we look back over 2,000 years of Christian history, we can say with certainty that saints are not morally perfect people. They are not sickly sweet do-gooders. They are not necessarily pious or obedient or heroic: saints are free. They are not bound by the fear of death. And because they are unbound, they are free to love fully and generously in the Spirit of Christ.

And so we are called to be. The opposite of love is not hate: it’s fear. Our greatest fear, of course, is the fear of physical death, but it casts a long shadow. In addition to the fear of actually dying, it can take many other forms: fear of disappointment, fear of failure, fear of change, fear of loss — all the little deaths we don’t want to die. And throughout the Bible, Old Testament and New, people who live in fear do not fully live at all. But we don’t need the Bible to tell us this: we have all experienced the truth of it. I know for myself that my worst days are days when I allow the fear of death in any of  its various forms to take hold of me. When that happens, and I am caught up in anxiety and trying to protect myself and control everything, then I am not present, I’m not available to God or to others, I’m not at peace, I’m not happy, I’m not loving.

But perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18), and it’s the perfect love of God, which Lazarus, Peter Panagore, and countless others have experienced that sets us free. Each one of us will share in the resurrection of Jesus: we get a foretaste of that resurrected life even now. We are and will be embraced by God’s life and God’s love forever, and so will everyone we love. It’s a sure thing. So we can practice dropping our fear. Life in this world is beautiful and challenging and wondrous. And we are free to live it, really live it. Learn what it means to love. Take risks for the sake of goodness. Create beauty. Discover grace in the midst of pain and heartbreak. And when we fail or forget, we can count on God’s forgiveness and help — and get on with the joy of living. We are eternally safe. Even if we die today, we are safe. God’s love is the beginning and the end of everything. If we are really going to follow Jesus, then we will practice living as if this were true. Think for a moment: how would your life be different this week, today, if you lived without fear and chose to trust that you are and will be safe in God’s love forever? If we can live like that and trust like that, however haltingly or imperfectly, then we are unbound, and we will be what Jesus calls us to be, the light of the world. We will be saints.