DAILY CONTEMPLATION

April 4, 2026 ~ Paremhotep 26, 1742

Our Lord Jesus Christ performed miracles with this view:
that by those miracles He might signify something further,
that besides that they were wonderful and great, and divine in themselves,
we might also learn something from them.
Let us then see what He would have us learn in those three dead persons whom He raised.
He raised the dead daughter of the ruler of the synagogue…
He comes to the house, and finds the customary funeral obsequies already prepared,
and He says to them, “Weep not, for the damsel is not dead, but sleeps.”
He spoke the truth; she was asleep; asleep, that is, in respect of Him, by whom she could be awakened.
So awakening her, He restored her alive to her parents.
Again He awakened that young man, the widow’s son
The Lord “​came near to the city; and behold there was a dead man being carried out”,​ already beyond the gate.
Moved with compassion, for the mother, a widow and bereaved of her only son, was weeping,
He did what you have heard, saying, “Young man, I say unto you, Arise.”
He that was dead arose, and began to speak, and He restored him to his mother.​
He awakened Lazarus likewise from the tomb… 
These three kinds of dead persons are three kinds of sinners whom, even at this day, Christ does raise.
The dead daughter of the ruler of the synagogue was within the house;
she had not yet been carried out from the secrecy of its walls into public view.
But the second was not now indeed in the house, but still not yet in the tomb;
he had been carried out of the walls, but not committed to the ground.
He who raised the dead maiden who was not yet carried out,
raised this dead man who was now carried out, but not yet buried.
There remained a third case, that He should raise one who was also buried; and this He did in Lazarus.
There are then those who have sin inwardly in the heart, but have it not yet in overt act…
And as it often happens, as we know, as men daily experience in themselves,
when they hear the word of God, as it were the Lord saying, ​“​Arise,”
the consent unto sin is condemned; they breathe again unto saving health and righteousness.
The dead man in the house arises, the heart revives in the secret of the thoughts.
This resurrection of a dead soul takes place within, in the retirement of the conscience,
as it were within the walls of the house.
Others after consent proceed to overt act, carrying out the dead as it were,
that that which was concealed in secret, may appear in public…
he too who has committed the open act, if haply admonished and aroused by the word of truth,
he rise again at the Voice of Christ, is restored alive. 
But they who by doing what is evil, involve themselves even in evil habit,
so that this very habit of evil suffers them not to see that it is evil,
become defenders of their evil deeds,
and are angry when they are found fault with…
such as these, pressed down by a malignant habit, are as it were buried.
Yea, what shall I say, brethren? Of such kind it was said of Lazarus:
“He has been dead four days; by this time he stinks.”​
That heap placed upon the grave, is this stubborn force of habit,
whereby the soul is pressed down, and is not suffered either to rise or breathe again…
Therefore, the Lord came, to whom of course all things were easy;
yet He found in that case as it were a kind of difficulty. He “groaned” in the spirit;
He showed that there is need of much and loud remonstrance to raise up those who have grown hard by habit.
Yet at the voice of the Lord’s cry, the bands of necessity were burst asunder,
the powers of hell trembled, and Lazarus is restored alive.
For the Lord delivers even from evil habits those who “have been dead four days”
St. Augustine