March 22, 2026 – FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT

+ From the Gospel according to John (11:1-45)

Now a man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother, Lazarus, was ill. The sisters therefore sent word to Jesus, saying, “Lord, behold, the one you love is ill.”
When Jesus heard this, he said, “This illness will not lead to death, but is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. When he heard that Lazarus was ill, he remained two days in the place where he was. Then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.” The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are you going there again?” Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world; but if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.”
He said these things, and then he added to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go there to awaken him.” His disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will get well.” Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought he was speaking of rest through sleep. Then Jesus said to them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and for your sakes I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe; but let us go to him.” Then Thomas, called the Twin, said to the other disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem, and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him. But Mary remained sitting in the house. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha answered him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”

When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying secretly, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” When she heard this, she got up immediately and went to him. Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. Then the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, when they saw Mary, that she rose up quickly and went out, followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep.
When Mary reached the place where Jesus was, and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled, and said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see!” Jesus wept. Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he, who opened the eyes of the blind man, have kept this man from dying?”
Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone!” Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be a stench; he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. Jesus then looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.” After he had said this, he cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with burial cloths, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him and let him go.” Many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what Jesus had done believed in him.

The Word of the Lord