Today’s proclamation of the Gospel begins and before the first sentence is heard in its entirety, we think we know the message. This confidence is a red flag. Our familiarity with the text may prevent us from being attentive to the Gospel’s heartbeat calling ours into synchronicity. Similarly, we may journey through life inattentive to red flags and humanity’s grieving heartbeat until discomfort of the present grasps our attention.

John writes of kinship and community. We hear about Jesus of Nazareth, his disciples and his dear friends, Lazarus, Martha and Mary. Following Lazarus’ illness and death, we hear of the Jewish community who come to comfort Martha and Mary in their grief. Certainly, the community too was experiencing its own grief.

Upon Jesus’ arrival, he is questioned. How close in relationship was he to this family that both sisters raised the same issue? “If you had been here…” Responding to Jesus’ question of her, Martha acclaims, “I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”

Do we share Martha’s belief? Do we believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world? If so, do we appreciate our role in this living text? Christ is coming into the world through us when we lean into discomfort of the present. Leaning into this discomfort is our consent. As our heartbeat synchronizes with the Word, our faith expands and God’s grace flows.

Discomfort of the present may manifest in our personal lives as familial, financial, institutional, legal, religious, social or spiritual problems. It could be a medical diagnosis, unemployment, bankruptcy, divorce or the death of a loved one. Maybe it is an awareness that some aspect of one’s identity is neither accepted nor respected by the dominant culture. Excluded from consideration, they experience an array of social disparities as well as social death. Those relegated to the margins of society often experience discomfort of the present as a way of life. Conversely, awakening to one’s own privilege in unjust systems, the privilege one was taught not to see, fosters discomfort of the present.

Several years ago, as I contemplated Jesus restoring Lazarus’ life, I recognized words unfamiliar to me. Yet they clearly spoke to me then as they do now. [Jesus] cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, tied hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go.”

Jesus calls the mourning bystanders to actively participate in the liberation of their sibling, Lazarus, by untying him. Individually and collectively, they are confronted by discomfort of the present as they are called to break the common practice of not touching used and therefore unclean burial bands.

We too are being called to participate in the liberation of others. For whom is Christ calling us to untie and let go? In some manner, each of us is tied by the systems and institutions in which we live and participate. Dare we risk resisting social sins by touching today’s unclean burial bands? Too many of us have become comfortable with being tied to practices and ways of being that privilege some at the expense of the dignity of others.

What are today’s social sins disguised as unclean burial bands? Misogyny, patriarchy, colonization, white body supremacy, racism, homophobia, transphobia, anti-Semitism, Islamaphobia, nativism, xenophobia, American exceptionalism, anti-immigrant, poverty, extreme wealth, classism, authoritarianism, Christian nationalism, clericalism, mass incarceration, war. These are some of the burial bands of injustice calling us to discomfort of the present so that we may liberate others. In doing so we too are liberated.

Discomfort of the present is real in our systems and institutions. Are we desensitized to it? What is the price we pay to ignore it? Discomfort of the present is real. As injustice pierces the heart of Christ, he weeps calling us to the work of liberation. As it pierces our hearts, we too weep but our weeping is not enough. Are we willing to lean into this discomfort of the present and act upon Christ’s call to actively participate in the liberation of others from injustice?