If

Homily for the Fifth Sunday of Lent, Year A
There is a small, two-letter word in today’s gospel that has probably caused more spiritual problems and anxiety than just about other word in our vocabulary. It’s so small, that you would think it should be insignificant. Even in the original Greek of the gospel, this word has only two letters, just about as small as a word can be. The word I am talking about is “if.”

Unfortunately, we are all-too-familiar with that word of doubt, or questioning, or wonder. Now, it’s true that we can dream with the word if, but too often we use this word to doubt or question. What if my grades are good enough to get into the college I want to go to? Or, if only we had left home on time, we would have avoided all this rush-hour traffic. Or, what will happen if we get a foot of snow right before Sunday masses? Or, if you had listened to my advice, we wouldn’t be in all this financial trouble. If, if, if …it’s enough to drive us crazy thinking through what could have happened if things had been different.

Even the disciples and friends of Jesus are plagued by the if-syndrome. That small word appears no less than nine times in the gospel we just heard, sometimes on the lips of Jesus, sometimes from his disciples, but probably most telling in the words of the two sisters, Mary and Martha. Each of these sisters tells Jesus separately, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” In other words, if you had done what you are supposed to do – be the miracle-working Messiah – Lazarus would still be alive.

It’s so easy for us to get caught up in the if-syndrome, to think about how things could have been different with just a few changes in the circumstances. But whenever we do this, we are living in a fantasy world – the world of what could have been, but will never be. To live in a world of if’s is to discount everything that is happening now. Look at what Jesus said about himself: he said, “I am the resurrection and the life,” not “if I die and rise, then I will be the resurrection.” No – Jesus is life now, not just in some future what-if scenario. But also remember what happened when Jesus came to the tomb of Lazarus. Even though he knew that Lazarus was going to come back to life, Jesus wept – the grief of the present moment was just as real as the joy that was to come.

To live consumed by the if-syndrome is to live in a world that does not exist, except in our own minds. The world of if’s is a world of darkness, a world of despair, a world of temptation. The world we live in is a world of the present, a world of the right-now, a world of new life. And in this world, the only valuable what-if is the one of hope for the future, the one Jesus tells Mary and Martha: “If you believe, you will see the glory of God.”