Jesus raises Lazarus - Mitch Levingston

John 11:1-45

Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”

When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”

“But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?”

Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world’s light. It is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.”

After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.

So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Now Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem, and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them in the loss of their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home.

“Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”

Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

“Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”

After she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary aside. “The Teacher is here,” she said, “and is asking for you.” When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who had been with Mary in the house, comforting her, noticed how quickly she got up and went out, they followed her, supposing she was going to the tomb to mourn there.

When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. “Where have you laid him?” he asked.

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

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?”

Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. “Take away the stone,” he said.

“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”

Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”

So they took away the stone. Then Jesus 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 benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”

When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

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TRANSCRIPT

 

Hey, welcome to the Center podcast. We're a church based in general, Sydney, who loves Jesus. And so want to make him the center of our lives, community and world. We pray that you, blessed by this word and that it reveals God's love for you in a new way.

Good morning again, everyone. I know it was a long passage, but in those words I am the resurrection and the life. What an amazing declaration I am the resurrection and the life. The part of this lent series. In preparing for Easter, we. We started off with the 40 days of Jesus in the wilderness.

Last week, my, brought us a word from Mark eight way. Jesus tells us to pick up our cross and follow after him. So the purpose of reflecting upon the resurrection of Lazarus is this reminder that in in the journey of the wilderness, there is an end. Hope. Fasting, it said, will eventually lead to fasting and our case mourning leads to resurrection.

What I love about this passage is the vulnerability and the rawness of Jesus. Let's be honest, in our culture, we don't particularly appreciate vulnerability and rawness. Doesn't just say Jesus was crying, shed a few tears. Jesus is weeping. Jesus weeping very loudly and probably in the posture of a middle eastern man. This is confronting for us. I sat through so many Christian funerals.

There's very few tears. There's a lot of very few. Yeah, there's the acts of mourning and crying and grieving. But here we encounter our Lord weeping for his friends. It's confronting in that sense, because here we don't encounter this sort of stoic Jesus that doesn't feel emotion, who we encounter a man, the God man that feels emotions and rawness.

Also, the other thing I love about this is account is that some mysterious there is a mystery I think gives us a bit of a window into how God operates. There's a mystery there that the assumption would be that I guess what? When and Mary and Martha send a messenger to Jesus about the situation and Lazarus that he would act, he would do something instead of moving the action, he waits a, single day's journey.

He deliberately waits for two days, that's all. Okay. And and we know the answer. When I answer that, the Jesus declaration to his disciples that this sickness will not end in death. No, it's for God's glory. So that the that God's Son may be glorified through it. Okay. That's the that's the answer. That's the good kind of. If you're at Bible college and you had this question to answer an exam, that would be the answer.

But it's to pay this duty is there's still mystery. That's what I love about this. We're given a window into how God operates. Sometimes there is instantaneous action. Sometimes we're left waiting and waiting and wondering. So who knows how God's glory will be revealed in this situation? That's because I like to. I like to leave us all with a bit of biblical knowledge before we walk away on a Sunday.

So spend a couple of minutes just exploring is the context of the passage and how. I guess it just shapes John's gospel. So John 11 comes off the John ten, funnily enough, and in John ten, Jesus has nearly been killed by stoning. All right. So now Jesus has gone off into the wilderness as a way, I guess, to protect himself.

And and John 11 is actually in John's gospel. This is what's cool, that John's gospel, it's the catalyst that leads to Jesus death. So I guess you could say John, John, chapters 1 to 10 of the public ministry of Jesus. These are the works that he's doing. John 11 is the bridge to take away, like it goes from the point of public ministry to his Passion Week to his death.

And so it's really quite significant. And John's the only gospel author to give us this that's also I find interesting, too, is that after Lazarus is raised from the dead, and Lazarus is meant to be a bit of a foreshadowing of what will happen to Jesus because of they tried to Lazarus as well. They try to kill him.

So Lazarus operates as like a miniature like parable, you could say, for what would happen to Jesus. And I guess by extension to us. Also, the other cool thing about, the resurrection of Lazarus at that this is the seventh sign in John's gospel, John's and mine. I will chat more about this a better, so I won't go into too much detail.

So John has seven signs, but Jesus says seven I am statements. And there's this theme of new creation of light and darkness. And so this resurrection of Lazarus is the seventh sign in John. And as you should know by now, number seven in the Bible means what? Perfection. Completion. So, so really deliberate choice. Really cool play that that John is shaping for us.

That was said before this passage leaves us with mystery as mysterious and perhaps to our perspective, a little callous, that Jesus would hear this knowledge about Lazarus and just sort of go, okay, this sickness might lead to death. But as it says here, you know, so God's glory, no, it's for God's glory so that the son may be glorified through it.

I just let his friend die. It could seem a bit callous for us, but because I am very much a spiritual influence on my spiritual journey, this week, look to my spiritual ancestors for some help and understanding this and the church. Father John Kristofferson and I have a quote here on the screen. This is from his homily.

This is from his teachings, from the gospel of John. I found this a really helpful little quote. I hopefully you can find it helpful to. Kristofferson says many men, when they see any of those who are pleasing to God, suffering anything terrible, as for instance, having fall into sickness or poverty, and the other and in any other a like are offended not knowing that those that those are especially dear to God, it belongs to endure these things.

Since Lazarus was also one of the friends of Christ and was sick. Okay, it's a little clunky because of the translation, but essentially Kristofferson is arguing that those that follow Jesus can kind of think, oh yeah, but we're protected. We should be protected from life's problems. And Kristofferson is by saying, hey, man, look, look at Lazarus. This was a dear friend of Jesus.

He still got sick and he still died. It's a powerful reminder of that, just because a Jesus is come, because Jesus conquered sin and death, there's still evil and pain and suffering.

What was Jesus doing in those two days? I don't know, I wonder that whenever he was praying, maybe he was preparing himself. And this this is something that may be right, may not be right. But in John's Gospel, there's a theme of light and darkness. And so when, when Jesus is preparing to go back to Bethany, but going to Bethany, that's only one mile from Jerusalem, I remember that whole light darkness theme.

Jesus says here it should be here on the screen. It says here. But Rabbi, this is from verse five. But, Rabbi, they said a short while ago the Jews there tried to stun you, and yet you are going back. Jesus answered, they're not 12 hours of daylight. Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world's light it is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.

Then location that which I was reading about, which some commentators argue, is that the idea here is that Jesus is saying is like, hey, right now it's still the hour of light. I'm not going to die right now. They've tried to kill me, but I'm still walking in the light. It's in the darkness that you stumble. It's in the darkness.

That's what Jesus equates with his death. It's in that that. That the hour of darkness is when he dies. So right now, he's still going to be protected. But Jesus is waiting, waiting for that moment to to set off those chain of events when darkness will come. I guess it's part of God being God and us being humans.

We do not understand. It's all part of this mystery that two days, that two days are waiting time of God, of Jesus knowing what he's doing but us left waiting, waiting to see when God will. I love it here that Thomas Thomas gets a bad rap. And look, I sometimes feel like I'm a bit of a doubting Thomas, so I guess I kind of, you know, I emphasize the Thomas, but I love what Thomas says here, is that with your Jesus determination to go, Thomas says this I want to come, let us go, that we may die with him.

I'm trusting that they were prepared to die, that I prepared to give up everything. Yet when that hour darkness came along, all of them fled. Let's just say, interesting aside, I think when Jesus gets back to Bethany, both the sisters ask pretty much the same question. They asked the if only question that if only question of oh, hello.

Oh, Marcus. Hello, buddy. Come down. You got a question of if only. And so when Jesus gets here, Ma says, you know, if only, Lord, that you had been here, my I, my brother would not have died. And Mary asked that same question. I'm sure that we've been tempted. Haven't we been tempted in that? If only God, you had done this, or maybe it's for ourselves.

If only I hadn't have made this decision. If only I hadn't have said this. If I only hadn't done that. And then let's just ask, why is this a human? This to it, that mystery. If only God, if only the sisters here, in terrible pain. This is what this is just a normal resurrection that Jesus is about to do.

Jesus response to Martha is, your brother will rise again. Now, Martha, as a good Jew, knew that. So passages like Daniel 1212 that the righteous being in the resurrected like the stars, or as I 65 and 66, which spoke about this idea of a new heaven, the new earth. There was this concept in Jesus. I mean, yeah, eventually all of us will be resurrected.

And Martha is familiar with this. Just. Yes. Look, I know this. That doesn't take away the pain I'm feeling now. This is where this this is the catalyst for this profound statement. I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even though they die. And whoever lives by believing in me will never die.

Do you believe this love, Martha? Yes, Lord. I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world and resurrections resuscitation. What do you want to call him and not new? This isn't the first time it's happened in the Bible. The prophet Elijah Rice people, Jesus himself raised, Jairus daughter and the widow's son in the town of nine.

So resurrections. This isn't the first one to happen in Scripture, but this is the first one to be linked with Jesus divinity. See, Jesus just doesn't offer life. He's just like, okay, I'm going to bring Lazarus from the dead. I'm going to resuscitate him. Temporal, temporal. He is love. If Jesus is resurrection and life, this is profound because who is the one that gives human life?

God. God is the one who breathes life into Adam. God, someone who breathes into us, our spirit. He's the one that can take it away. Now Jesus is saying the statement that he is the one to do that. He is the resurrection. He is the source of life. And if you get a John commentary, you will find lots and lots of ink spilled over unpacking the complexity of this.

What this meaning of the sentence of his price now, I think, is giving us this profound statement. Jumping ahead when Jesus then encounters Mary at the tomb when count it just such a human Jesus. This is from verse 33. We read when Jesus saw her weeping, that's Mary and the Jews who had come along with her, also weeping.

He was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. Where have you laid him? He asked. Come and see, Lord, they replied. And there's the Sunday school. And so I learned Sunday School, the shortest Bible verse in Scripture. Jesus wept.

Now this will be definitely a branch of conversation. We'll actually look at the Greek and some of the meaning of this. But just to keep it simple for this morning, that that word that says there on the screen about, about Jesus being deeply moved in spirit and troubled, a legitimate way of translating it. And the same Greek word is used in other places in the gospel to mean anger, to mean fury.

Also can be used. It was used in classical Greek to describe like a horse snorting, like a I can. I want you to picture this picture. Jesus, there. He's not just like, when I think a deeply moved, just maybe he's just spirits, a bit troubled. There's this visceral action. He's angry, he's angry, and it's like he's snorting, snorting and crying with the weeping.

This has led to some debate. Well, why would Jesus be angry? This is why more modern translations have used that. That that phrase about being deeply troubled. Yeah, it's probably easy. Understand? Why would he be angry? Is he angry at the tears of Mary in the fellow Jews? Is he anger them? I should know, come on, man, I'm.

I'm Jesus. He shouldn't be upset. But the anger like perhaps a saint. Deeper. But Jesus is the resurrection and life. The opposite of life is death. Death isn't part of God's purposes. Death is caused by sin, a death I call our perspective. We choose, let's say, death. A bit of a friend possible a death. It's an enemy. In fact, in one Corinthians 1526, Apostle tells us, the last enemy to be destroyed is death, not the last friend.

Not the last comfort, but the last enemy. So at the tomb last year. So we have picture this Jesus here is weeping and angry because that tomb represents the enemy, the enemy that has destroyed his father's good creation. It's the enemy that he has come to destroy. Even though he dies, what he's about to do in raising Lazarus from the dead, as still makes him weep and still makes him angry, gives us just.

It's that profound moment where I am the resurrection and the life had Jesus weeping just such a wonderful, just blending of how Jesus is by God and human in this one moment.

I mean, Jesus does call out Lazarus from the dead. Martha gives him a little warning, and that warning is, comes from verse nine. Take away the stone. He said, but, Lord Martha said, this, Martha, the sister of the dead man, by this time there is a bad odor, for it has been for days. And also a reason for this to in Jewish culture it was believed that a soul had left the body and gone.

Now to share after three days. Fact, there's some Jewish writings which would tell people to go, hey, go check the tomb after three days, just to make sure that that person is actually dead. He might not be. So by waiting for days. Jesus has in that culture well and truly race. Lazarus guy is dead. And it's just so simple.

It's a lovely simplicity about how he resurrects Lazarus. Jesus takes the posture of prayer, looks up to heaven. Father, I thank you that you've heard me. I knew that you always hear me. But I say this for the benefit of the people standing here that they may believe you sent me. That's probably what he was doing for those last two days.

He's praying. Praying for this moment. When he said this, Jesus called a loud voice, Lazarus, come out! The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen and a cloth around his face, said earlier that John, setting up the resurrection of Lazarus to point us to Jesus own resurrection. But Lazarus still needs hope to take off his grave clothes.

Jesus will come out of the tomb and like like clothes will be left. The. But if it's pointing to that hope of Jesus, but also for us. That one day each and every one of us, if we believe in Jesus, Jesus will stand outside our tomb and call out, Mitch, Peter Murray, insert your name. Come out. That is the Christian hope.

In this series, I've been wanting to leave you with just tools, to draw the toolbox to help in your Christian walk. I think the first toolboxes is actually probably need to learn how to whip. It was Hippolytus of Rome who said of Jesus, hey, what need was there to wait for him? He, he, he was soon about to rise, but Jesus wept to give us an example of sympathy and kindliness towards our fellow human beings, Jesus wept that he might, by deed rather than would teach us to weep with those that wait.

Simple and profound. So profound teaching Jesus gave us a model to weep with those who weep. I'm guilty of this. I think many Protestant evangelicals are guilty of this, that when people are suffering, we try to give them those cliches. Look, we're trying to be nice. Oh, God's will is a mystery. God has a greater plan. God has a greater purpose in this.

Yes, sure, I know that. I know, I know a stack of things. I've been to Bible college, but perhaps in the moment when suffering is happening, I don't need to be reminded of that. That's just a simple act of weeping is all that we need and try to give pithy answers. Don't try to. And I give comforting words.

Just weep. Be silent. That's the model Jesus gave us. Second thing, too is it actually for his part, and tiding with Easter and Lent? The whole point is is Easter series is to prepare us for Easter, to prepare us for eternity, and often wonders, okay, once you've been resurrected from the dead, death would have no fear anymore, wouldn't it?

Imagine Lazarus, that the Jewish authorities are trying to kill him. It's like, okay, I, I know what death is like. I've been there. I don't know what it's like to overcome that because my God has rescued me. And so if you are doing the challenges and following the excellent at at night, there's actually an app. And if you're not doing the the lent challenges, you can still do this.

You can still find the Apple or Google it online. But there is an excellent exercise which is called am I Ready to Die today? And the basis of the question is that am I ready to join God in heaven and part of the exercise that actually ask, so if you knew you were going to die in the next 24 hours, what would you do?

What would you say? What would you pray for? And I think it's a big question. I we knew that we were definitely going to die tomorrow. We'd probably live our lives very differently, wouldn't worry about small things, be more focused on more spiritual matters. And so the next question essentially is that, well, okay, if that's how you'd live your life, if knowing if you had 24 hours left to live, why aren't you doing that each and every day?

It's a great question. It's a wonderful question. That's my challenge for us, is that Jesus is the resurrection and life. It's a question that he asked of Martha is, do you believe this? Ask that to you to do you believe this? Do you believe that there is life in Jesus, and that with him that you will never die, that you will be raised to life again?

Because one day Jesus will stand in front of all our teams. We're being cremated. We're being buried where that might be. And he will call out, Mitch, come out! And that's a profound hope. That's a profound hope in the midst of a world full of pain and suffering, in the midst of a world where we have a God that does deal with mystery, that we fully don't comprehend how this moment is leading to greater glory.

Perhaps that simple act, believing that Jesus is the resurrection and life. And if you haven't done that, I encourage you today come up to the prayer corner to receive prayer. Pray for to receive Jesus as the one who is the resurrection and life. Let me pray over us friends.

Lord, you said those words. Father, I thank you. You have heard me. I knew that you always hear me. And Lord, we thank you. That wasn't just the words of your son that you hear. That's the words of those who put their faith in Jesus Christ. You also hear. And, Lord, today each of us sit in this room in very different spaces, some of us in a very, very good place, some of us in a place of great difficulty.

I thank you that in coming to John 11 we see in you the tensions of mystery, tensions of what we would call I answered prayer of trying to figure out how this is leading to a greater glory. But we also say in this Jesus who weeps, who weeps alongside us, and Lord, wherever we are today, pray that ultimately each and every one of us believe in you.

Believe that you are the resurrection and the life. And I pray that each and every one of us here will experience the taste of life that you will bring when your kingdom comes in its fullness. So I ask this now in the precious name of Jesus, Amen. 

Thank you so much for joining us. Don't forget to write and subscribe to help others discover this channel. Check out the description if you want to find out more or get in touch with us at the center. Gerald. But in the meantime, praying for God's hand over you as you continue to step into everything Jesus has in store for your life.

Be blessed.