Year A: Lent 5 | Ezekiel 37:1-14 | Romans 8:6-11 | John 11:1-45
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
March 22, 2026
the Rev. Jonathan Hanneman
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Way back in Advent I announced that this year the Bishop has asked the priests of our Diocese to focus our messages around resurrection, an effort he’s titled, “Life Is Changed, Not Ended.” Turns out that’s a tricky theme to maintain. Part of the trouble is the nature of the different Church seasons. It works pretty well with Advent and Epiphany, but with Lent being a time to prepare for death, the spotlight is more on wrapping up our lives well as we accompany Jesus on his final journey to Jerusalem, not what comes after. But a bigger issue is that resurrection is just so foreign to our everyday experience it’s easy to ignore the idea.
It isn’t that we don’t ever notice it happening; even the least attentive person can see leaves emerging from tree branches and flowers blooming near walkways and hear the unusual voices of migrating birds right now. But we expect those things to happen sooner or later, and even though they do spark hope, they feel small and commonplace and eventually just drift into the background of our minds. What we want is a miracle, something big and bold and undeniable—something that changes the world, that screams out Life’s presence in a dramatic and irrefutable manner. We want something that somehow continues to overcome our own tendency toward complacency. Resuscitation and revivification just don’t cut it. No, we look for full-on, bone-rattling, decay-undoing resurrection. Anything less than how we dream that might look just feels like a cheap tease.
Unfortunately, apart from the everyday miracles life brings as it marches throughout the ages, none of us are particularly likely to encounter the kind of resurrection we’re really looking for during our lifetimes—not many have. Scattered bones joining to become complete skeletons and regrowing all their muscles is the stuff of visions, not real life. And it often feels like any hope for supernatural intervention died out along with the ancient civilizations whose stories we still read. Modern society often feels like Lazarus in the tomb, not even aware of—much less able to do anything about—his own decay.
Yet there is something life-giving in our passages today—something all of us consume yet none of us can truly produce, something we rely on moment to moment but escapes notice until it’s missing.
In the ancient world, breath was both far more vast and far more intimate than we English speakers tend to think of it. In the modern world, my breath is mine alone—something which slips into my lungs I then exhale as waste once my body is done with it. Not so for our predecessors. Breath was one of the pillars of existence. The wind itself was breath—Nature’s ongoing in- and exhalation that shaped seasons and landscapes. The atmosphere essentially consisted of diffuse breath. Breath was what held vitality, the mysterious substance that allows for life. Breath was a core component of what it was to be human, pairing with a body to produce the soul, the individual self with its own consciousness, preferences, appearance, abilities, and personality. Both ancient Hebrew or Greek thought traditions agreed: there was no way to distinguish between breath and spirit. Though ephemeral to humans, the spirit world would have been where breath had substance, will, and influence without the need for a body. In fact, much of what we read in the Bible as “spirit”—capital S or not—would probably be better interpreted and understood in terms of breath.
People often misinterpret Paul as favoring the spiritual over the physical—a heresy known as Gnosticism.[1] They point to passages like we read in Romans where he contrasts “flesh” and “spirit,” with spirit always coming out on top. We would better read what he’s saying in terms of body and breath. Essentially, he’s making arguments in line with the virtue ethics popular in his era. For him, “body” (aka “flesh”) is essentially the base aspect of human nature—something that might be able to move and react to outside influences, but only on a level we would think of as instinctual. Breath is where intelligence, reason, and the ability to choose were found. Selfishness and cruelty—all the things naturally aimed at keeping the individual self alive—were rooted in “body.” Nobility, kindness, love—all that we term “humane”—were dependent on “breath.” Paul doesn’t contrast the physical world with some supernatural spirit realm. He’s trying to explain how we, as Christians, exchange our instinctual breath—“the spirit of the flesh”—with God’s breath. As we inhale the same Divine air that filled Jesus’ lungs, as we empower our bodies with that which drives the Divine’s own nature, we infuse that same divinity into our very being. Walking in or by the Holy Spirit is simply expelling the foul air of our animal nature and replacing it with the essence that forms and is drawn from the Creator’s own self. By turning our attention to breath rather than body or flesh, we learn to live as the children and images of God we were born to be.
The same thing goes with “spiritual” gifts. We need to restructure that idea from some sort of set list of mystical empowerments allowing an individual to perform superhuman deeds and think of them as breathing giftings—abilities that emerge to bring life and fill specific needs as God’s breath moves among us, rising and falling, shifting and changing, bringing fresh energy and confirming God’s active presence not only to the “gifted” self but to the entire community—Christian and non—among whom we live.
Ezekiel encounters the power of this same breath. Through his vision, he realizes that reunited bones and unnatural restoration of bodies will do nothing to bring life. Not until he utters God’s oracle to the breath—to the Spirit of the Divine—is there any real hope. The ancient Israelites,[2] a people broken in spirit[3] and scattered to the far reaches of the known world, may have somehow eventually figured out a way to reunite, but without Divine nature filling their lungs and empowering their bodies to behave in patterns consistent with who God is, their efforts would remain rooted in death and bound to decay.
Less obvious but just as essential is the presence of breath in the story of Lazarus. Hearing of his friend’s illness, Jesus pauses and takes a deep breath, during which Lazarus exhales his final one. As he approaches Bethany, though the sisters arrive separately, each breathe the same words of disappointment and dying trust. When he comes to the grave, Martha warns him to avoid the decay now present in the air.[4] As Jesus speaks, a wind seems to rise, filling Lazarus’ lungs and restoring life to his body. God’s Breath becomes Resurrection, displaying its superiority to and power over Death.
So then, what for us—citizens of a stagnant world just waiting for the end to come? Can we, too, somehow experience Resurrection? Nothing involving death is certain—no one living truly knows what happens on the other side of that curtain. But even so, there are ways for us to prepare should God grant that hope. And the primary means of preparation is to live.
Now.
But not under the power and influence of what Paul calls the flesh: the animalistic and self-focused nature that allows us as individuals to survive but never truly leads anyone to thrive. Instead, we seek God’s Breath. We inhale the air that is Life and allow it to cleanse and transform not only us but everyone with whom we interact. Infused with fresh energy, we open our eyes to look beyond ourselves and see the world around us not only as it is but how it might become as Resurrection takes hold. Transformed by Divine presence not simply surrounding us but within our very bodies and at the heart of our relationships, we find the power to walk as children of God, reflecting the character of the One Who Provides—generous, humble, joyful, and loving. Drawn into alignment with the Divine, our lives become balanced inside and out. And at that point, it’s possible that Resurrection loses its meaning. Following Jesus’ footsteps, drawn into and empowered by God’s own being, maybe the lines between worlds blur, and rather than fearing to encounter Death, we simply walk through it, stepping not into darkness of the unknown but continuing to inhabit the Eternal Life that already fills our lungs.
[1] Though there are many variations on Gnostic teachings (a good bit of Modern American Christianity is rooted in Gnostic error), the core problem is elevating the “spiritual” to the detriment and denigration of the physical.
[2] Ancient Israel is not the same as the nation of Israel Western powers inserted into the Middle East in the wake of World War II.
[3] Or “devoid of breath”
[4] A legitimate concern: medical theory from well before that era to the mid-1800’s posited that air with foul smells carried an invisible corruption that could settle into other bodies as various forms of disease.