When Jesus Wept (31 page)

Jesus groaned, and the heads of angels and saints turned to look down upon the earth in wonder. His tear trickled down his cheek, and a spring burst forth at my feet. Pure, clear water spilled from its banks and flowed down a mountainside, leaving a myriad of new stars, like flowers, blooming and rising in its wake. I remember thinking,
On a clear night, constellations above the earth reflect on the still surface of the sea. But here? Only one of Jesus’ tears contains a galaxy
.

My eternal companions and I listened. We heard his voice echo from Bethany across the universe! He commanded, “Roll away the stone!”

We all waited in anticipation for the next word from his lips.

Then Jesus spoke my name: “Lazarus!”

Surely he could not mean me
, I thought. But all the same, I whispered, “Here I am, Lord.”

Centuries have come and gone since his holy sob ripped me loose from timeless conversation with the ageless ones. Ten thousand, thousand scholars and saints have asked, “Why? What made the King of heaven bow his head and cover his eyes and spill holy tears onto the earth? Why? Why did Jesus weep?”

When Jesus called my name, it echoed in my head. His voice raised a shiver along my spine. Why was my hearing suddenly so muffled? A moment earlier every sound had been bell-like in clarity. Now all was indistinct, as if I had fallen into a well.

Worse yet, why was everything dark? From brilliant, joyful light I had passed into all-encompassing blackness, deeper than the deepest night.

Why was I unable to move? I could feel my arms but not move them. I sensed my feet but could barely wiggle my toes. It felt as if someone were sitting on my chest.

The aroma of myrrh and spikenard flooded my nostrils.

What had happened? What was wrong with me?

I suddenly recognized what it was Jesus had commanded me to do: “Come out.”

He meant, “Come out of the grave!”

I was back in my body as it had been before the glories of paradise.

I was alive … but entombed!

As realization dawned, the emotion that overwhelmed me was not terror. It was sorrow. I had the most crushing feeling of disappointment and loss.
Eliza! Eliza!

The only relief came in knowing that Jesus—Jesus!—had
called me. To answer his call, to be with him again, was the only cure for my pain.

Rolling my body, I bumped futilely against a stone wall. The opening to the niche in which my corpse had been placed was on the other side of the slab. It felt as if Mary and Martha had enclosed a hundredweight of spices in the grave clothes. I could barely move! Lunging, I almost fell to the ground. My legs hit stiffly, propping me up only because they were tightly bound together.

Coins over my eyes had a metallic coldness. My face, wrapped in a cloth separate from the one that locked my arms across my chest, gave me a little freedom of movement to turn my head.

From which direction had Jesus’ voice come? Turning toward the memory of his call, I shuffled forward.

I heard shrieking cries. Mary? Martha?

Then I heard Jesus again: “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
¹
Faster now, I moved toward his voice and reentered the world of men.

Jesus’ disciples Peter, James, and John, as well as Samson and Patrick had rolled away the stone from the grave. They jumped back in terror as I groaned under the burden of a hundred pounds of burial spices.

Mary ran up the path as Peter and the others sprinted away. “He’s alive!” Mary cried.

“Something is …” Peter’s voice trembled.

“Come help me!” Mary snatched Peter’s fishing knife from his belt and, gathering her skirts, ran to me. “David! David!” She laughed and wept at the same time as she charged to the mouth of the tomb.

Others hung back, at once terrified and astonished by the sight of me standing in my shroud. I saw them motionless and wide-eyed below. All but Mary! My sister had no fear of what lay beneath the shroud.

“David! Alive! You are …”

She was breathless when she reached me. Wrapping her arms around my cocoon, she would not let me go.

“Mary,” I cried! “Cut me loose!”

She laughed and babbled and set to work with Peter’s blade. “Four days! Four days away from us, my dear brother!”

“Only four?” I marveled. “Four days?” I imagined centuries had passed in my absence. Time was nothing beyond this world.

Mary loosed my arms. “Oh, I thought my heart would break except the thought that you were with Eliza and the baby. Oh, David!” She filleted my spice-stiffened shroud like I was a giant fish. “You’re back. You’ve come back to us!” The weight of spices in the grave clothes was soon cut away.

Her joy at our reunion was not something I shared. “I saw them, Mary,” I told her quietly. “They’re all there. Waiting for us to join them.” I could not tell her the glory and beauty I had left behind. This world was a faded image of what I had experienced. “Eliza and my son. Only he’s all grown. A perfect, beautiful young man!” I worked with her to free my legs. Now others in the fearful crowd walked cautiously toward us.

“David! Our hearts were broken! Broken! It seemed so … so unfair that you, of all, would perish.”

“But Mary!” I stepped free. “I didn’t perish. I was alive, more alive … oh, the colors! Music! Mountains higher and more majestic than you could ever … Our dear ones who have gone before … they came to meet me! And so many others! How can I ever explain?”

I spotted Jesus over Mary’s shoulder. Sorrow for me filled his eyes. Of all those who witnessed my return from the vineyards of heaven to fallen earth, only Jesus knew what joy and beauty I had left behind.

Chapter 31

W
ord of my return to life after being dead for four days spread about the country. I could not leave home without being surrounded by a mob. The crowds wanted to see Jesus, but they also wanted to see me.

I was bemused by the attention. After all, I was the recipient of healing, not the Healer. Still, I understood their awestruck wonder.

When I had witnessed my cousin’s daughter’s illness in Capernaum, I knew Deborah was very, very ill. Ravaged by fever, her body could not keep the spark of life within it.

I watched her sink toward the abyss of the grave.

I saw her just after her last breath fled. She was dead—not sleeping, as we know sleep, but gripped by the utter stillness that banishes hope.

When Jesus returned her life to her, I was utterly dumbfounded, never dreaming I would have the same experience myself.

Jairus’s neighbors crowded around to see Deborah. Before long, Galileans from as far away as Nain journeyed to meet the young woman and hear the stories from her mother and father.

Soon afterward complete strangers, covering distances from Caesarea Maritima on the west to Caesarea Philippi in the north, converged on the tiny lakeside village.

Jesus himself had departed, but the fame of the healed ones continued.

And now I knew the truth of that for myself.

I was besieged. I had even hired some men to patrol my vineyards and orchards to keep the curious from trampling my vines or helping themselves to the early figs.

Soon enough, undeserved fame was the least of my worries.

Late one evening, after the crowds had finally given up hoping for another glimpse of me pruning my roses, there was a furtive knock at the garden gate.

My aged porter answered the summons. Nicodemus was wrapped in a cloak up to his eyes, with a hood over his head. The Pharisee was ushered into my office. When I offered him a seat, he accepted but closed the door behind him.

I suggested a cup of my best wine, but he declined.

“I don’t want your sisters to worry,” he said, “nor even to know about this until we decide what’s to be done.”

“Worry about what?” I demanded as I trimmed the smoking wick of an oil lamp. “Done about what?”

Flipping the hood back off his head, he put both elbows on his knees and leaned forward. “They are seeking your death!”

I was shocked. So far as I knew, I had no enemies worthy of the name. If I had gained some unmerited celebrity, surely envy could not rise to the level of murder. “Who? Who wants me dead … again?”

“The Temple authorities,” Nicodemus declared. “I have very few friends on the Council, as you know, but there are still some with just enough remaining conscience to send me anonymous notes. The latest said that Lord Caiaphas wants to kill Jesus … and you!”

“But why? For bringing me back from the grave? This
is a reason for murdering both of us? Your source must be mistaken.”

“Listen!” Nicodemus demanded, fixing me with a forceful gaze. “And believe it! Here’s what happened in a secret meeting, to which I was not invited. You know how the scribes and certain Pharisees try to discredit Jesus?”

“Of course! They try to trap him with words, accuse him of Sabbath-breaking, of sorcery. Try to get him in trouble with the authorities over paying taxes. Remember, I saw what they attempted to do with my own sister.”

Nicodemus nodded and stroked his beard. “They haven’t stopped. After your … restoration …”

No one quite knew how to report that someone had been brought back to life. Raised? Revived?

Nicodemus continued, “There was a furor in the Council at the lack of success in destroying Jesus’ reputation, and now about you! ‘What are we accomplishing?’ they said. ‘If he goes on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away our leadership positions and our nation.’ ”

I snorted. “Right to the heart of the matter: their wealth, their importance, their ability to stay on good terms with Rome. It doesn’t matter that Jesus teaches us to love our enemies.”

“Or that he raises the dead. No, that makes him worse in their eyes. You can dismiss the teaching of a rabbi from the Galil, but you can’t argue when the evidence of divine authority walks around the streets of Jerusalem. You again, you see?”

Suddenly I understood the threat I represented. Alive, I was a witness to Jesus’ power. I was the ultimate testimony to the truth of his claims. As was Peniel, the once-blind man. “And how did Caiaphas respond?”

“He told them they were stupid and ignorant and easily
panicked. He told them …” Nicodemus lowered his voice and motioned for me to bring my ear close to his lips. “He told them it was better for one man to die for the people than that the nation perish.”

“He said that? The high priest?” Amid my words of protest I knew the truth of the report. Lord Caiaphas and all his cadre were perfectly capable of killing anyone they saw as a threat to their ability to remain in power. “And that plot includes me?”

Nicodemus nodded grimly. “You especially. Jesus must withdraw from Judea, and you must go with him. In time this may blow over … or Caiaphas may die … or something. But for now, you both must leave.”

“Jesus certainly must go,” I said. “But me? How can I say this? I’m not afraid of dying. Never will be, ever again.”

My friend’s gaze bored into my own. He saw there that I spoke the absolute truth. Still, he shook his head. “But others may be hurt trying to protect you. Think of Mary. Think of Martha. Carta and Patrick. If they tried to rescue you, they would die too.”

I understood but still was not ready to agree. “Let me think and pray over this tonight. We’ll talk again tomorrow.”

Again, the good-hearted Pharisee disagreed. “No, nor can we meet again anytime soon. I’m certain the high priest’s assassins will try to follow me to you or to Jesus. I’m glad you hired bodyguards, but it’s not enough.”

“They’re not bodyguards,” I protested. “Those men are here to protect the grapes, not me.”

Nicodemus dismissed the difference. “Doesn’t matter. They may be the only reason you haven’t already been attacked. But you can’t stay inside your fences forever. They will certainly try to kill you in Jerusalem and make it look like the act of a thief
or a Zealot. Or they might bribe one of your guards to kill you himself.” Nicodemus shuddered.

Bowing my head in thought, I said, “We need to know what’s going on inside the Council. Who can we trust to bring the news?”