Words of Welcome

John 11:1-45 We can try to put it off for as long as possible, but death is part of life. We all have a terminal illness – even if it takes decades to manifest itself. Although there are two things in life that are inevitable – death and taxes – we don’t like dealing with either of them. One of the reasons we don’t like to deal with death is that it means saying goodbye, and we don’t like to say goodbye. It"s as novelist George Eliot says: "Only in the agony of parting do we look into the depths of love." I realize this isn’t a very happy way to start a sermon, but John’s story is about life and death. Like the earlier stories in John there are words with double meanings and there are also revelatory statements. Last week we heard Jesus say, "I’m the light of the world." This week we hear another statement, and whether or not he made the statements himself, the statements reveal how the early church, especially John’s community viewed Jesus. In John 11 we meet ...