Night of the Living Dead is a black and white horror film directed by George Romero and first released back in 1968. The plot revolves around the mysterious reanimation of the dead and seven stranded characters trying to survive the night in a rural Pennsylvania farmhouse. The movie begins with two bickering siblings Johnny and Barbra driving to a remote cemetery to place a wreath on their father’s grave. Johnny humorously teases his sister with the classic line, “They’re coming to get you, Barbra!” With that fun turns to fear for the rest of the film and none of the protagonists escape death with most turning into flesh eating zombies during the course of the night!

Night of the Living Dead has been heralded as the defining influence for modern horror cinema. It has been analyzed for its symbolic commentary on the Vietnam War and Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s. It was entered into the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry as a work of historical and cultural importance. It was also a profitable little horror flick being produced for just $114,000 and grossing about $42 million. For these and perhaps other reasons, Night of the Living Dead keeps coming back to life. There have been four sequels: Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Land of the Dead and Diary of the Dead. Over the decades there have also been colorized editions of these movies and remakes of these movies and 3-D versions of these movies sold with multiple pairs of special effects glasses. The most recent re-release in the Dead Series was just a couple weeks ago with the DVD release scheduled for May.

I’m not one for horror movies and have never even watched Night of the Living Dead in its entirety, but I am troubled by the pervasiveness of zombie-like existence in real life. We get bitten by circumstances that sap our energy and joy. We get pursued by people who bully and condemn. We get overwhelmed by fears and anxieties that cloud any vision of light and hope. And ever so gradually, sometimes before we even see it in ourselves, we’re walking around like the living dead.

I run into the living dead among my clergy colleagues in other locales: well-trained, effective leaders that over time get worn down and jaded by petty bickering that makes their church undesirable to even attend, let alone a vital community for changing the world! And there they are, just lethargically putting in time…

I run into the living dead in my office: highly educated, successful couples whose career aspirations and family responsibilities and social commitments pull them in multiple directions. Then after getting the kids launched they look around at what’s left of an empty nest and see themselves just going through the motions of cohabitation and a relationship on life support.

I run into the living dead in the daily news: a Blaine High School sophomore so distraught about life that he turns his car into an oncoming SUV killing himself and injuring the other helpless driver; bombers in Peshawar and Baghdad and a gunman at a seminary in Jerusalem have such a low value of life that they kill themselves along with a hundred random civilians; last Saturday afternoon within hours of each other, two Hispanic youth were gunned down just a few miles East of here as gang violence escalates without respect for individuals, groups or culture. In our two scripture passages for today, both Ezekiel and Jesus were also walking among the living dead.

Ezekiel has this vivid dream about a valley of dry bones. The fact that they were dried out and scattered indiscriminately was a violation of Jewish burial rites. The hideous valley was indicative of a society that was dead to the care for each other even while they were yet alive. But then by the breath of God and only by the breath of God, these bones started to rattle and come together and reattach with sinew, muscle and skin. Ezekiel was a priest and prophet from about 600-550 BCE. Verse 11 explains that this strange dream was about Ezekiel’s beloved Hebrew people whose mighty nation of Israel dried up and fell apart and were scattered as exiles during his ministry. The Jews were walking around as living dead with the breath of God as their only hope for resuscitation. God promised to open their graves of isolation, bring them back together in their homeland, and re-knit them as a people once again.
From time to time we all feel dryness deep down in our bones; a dryness that won’t go away; a thirst that cannot be quenched. Oh, we try to revive ourselves from polluted rivers of power, possessions, sex, drugs, alcohol, affluence… But nothing we reach for, no antidote we create can bring us back to life. Like Ezekiel we blurt out the lament, “Can these bones live?” (37:3) And God’s promise to Israel is still God’s promise to us: “O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD… I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live… I will put my spirit within you… then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken and will act…” (vv. 4, 5, 14).
Then we look the other way to our New Testament reading from the gospel of John. When the story opens we learn that Lazarus, a friend to both Jesus and the disciples, fell prey to a terminal illness and Jesus’ help is summoned by Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha. By the time Jesus arrived, Lazarus had already died and was entombed. The rest of the story is a script right out of a Hollywood horror flick. Lazarus has been decomposing – the odor of death is pervasive. Verse 39 of the King James Version has Martha crying, “Lord, by this time he stinketh; for he hath been dead four days!” Jesus weeps with and for the mourners, and then gets to work. Ordering the stone rolled away from the entrance of the tomb, he prays and then calls into the darkness, “Lazarus, come out!” (v.43). And as Lazarus emerges, Jesus commands to those around, “Unbind him, and let him go.” (v. 44)

As part of our Wednesday night confirmation routine we read and discuss the scripture passage for the coming Sunday. This story was it for last Wednesday night and predictably, the youth got hung up on the believability of the dead coming back to life. In my small group, rather than getting bogged down in that debate, we moved in two different directions. First I asked, “What’s stinking in your life? Where do you feel and smell death because of decisions you’ve made or experiences you’ve had?” And then second, I asked, “Imagine you’re Lazarus, just awakened, standing outside your own tomb looking at a stunned crowd of people who don’t know whether to laugh, cry, or run for the hills. What would you do different if you had a second chance to bring life to something that caused death the first time around?” How would you answer those same two sets of questions? “Where do you stinketh?” And, “How would you use a ‘do over’.” We don’t have to exist like the living dead. God gives us all second chances in Christ, to die to self, as the Apostle Paul puts it – to put behind us an old life and awaken to a new one filled with restored relationships and renewed purpose.
When I was prepping for this sermon, a staff member handed me their empty paper Starbucks coffee cup with a quote they thought might be applicable. You know, “The Way I See It” quotes printed on the side of the cup? #251 was submitted by Andy Webster, a hospice chaplain in Plymouth, Michigan. He writes, “Our greatest prejudice is against death. It spans age, gender and race. We spend immeasurable amounts of energy fighting an event that will eventually triumph. Though it is noble not to give in easily, the most alive people I’ve ever met are those who embrace their death. They love, laugh and live more fully.” Maybe we do experience a resurrection when we can look at life and respond to life through the lens of death. We rediscover an urgency, a purpose, an energy, a blessing in our existence that we can completely overlook when we’re just trudging through a rote zombie-like existence.

It’s not all that odd to close a sermon with a quote from a coffee cup. Leonard Sweet published a book a year ago entitled, The Gospel According to Starbucks. He took a close look at the core values of this company that has drawn people to wait in line to spend $4 for a cup of coffee multiple times per week. Sweet summarizes these values with the acrostic EPIC which stands for Experiential, Participatory, Image rich and Connected. If Starbucks can provide an EPIC encounter, so can the church. As a community of faith we create common Experiences, we provide diverse ways to Participate, we offer Images that stimulate spiritual reflection and we Connect people with networks of friendship and support. Through the church, God’s most tangible presence on earth, God breathes life in the face of death.
Tombs are okay dwellings for the dead, but if you’re alive, they are no place to linger. That’s why Ezekiel called for the bones in the valley to reassemble and get on the move. That’s why Jesus called for Lazarus to come out of the tomb and become unbound. That’s why life is no place for the living dead!