WWUTT 911 Raising Lazarus?

John chapter 11 records one of the most spectacular miracles of Jesus, and that is raising

Lazarus from the dead, demonstrating and assuring to us that we have the resurrection of the dead in Christ when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily study in the word of God that we may be conformed to the image of Christ.

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Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. We continue our study of the gospel of John, chapter 11 this week, the final messianic sign of Christ that John records in his gospel, and that is when

Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. I'm going to read through the entire story to start out here, verses 1 through 44.

Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister

Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother

Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent to Jesus, saying, Lord, he whom you love is ill.

But when Jesus heard it, he said, This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the

Son of God may be glorified through it. Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, so when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.

Then after this he said to the disciples, Let us go to Judea again. 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. After saying these things, he said to them,

Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him. The disciples said to him,

Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover. Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant he was taking rest in sleep.

Then Jesus told them plainly, Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe, but let us go to him.

So Thomas called the twin, said to his fellow disciples, Let us go also, that we may die with him.

Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off, and many of the

Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. So when

Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated 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 from God, God will give it to you.

Jesus said to her, Your brother will rise again. Martha said to 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 everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?

She said to him, Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.

When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, The teacher is here and is calling for you.

And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him.

When the Jews who were with her in the house consoling her saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there.

Now when Mary came to 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 his spirit and greatly troubled.

And he said, Where have you laid him? They said to him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept.

So the Jews said, See how he loved him. But some of them said, Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind also have kept this man from dying?

Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it.

Jesus said, Take away the stone. Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him,

Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead for 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.

And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me.

I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.

When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come out.

The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips and his face wrapped with a cloth.

Jesus said to them, Unbind him and let him go. What a beautiful story.

I mean, you feel the chills just reading and hearing the story, right? Of Jesus raising this man from the dead, though he had been in a tomb for four days.

And so we have the promise, just as Jesus said to Martha, that we also will receive a resurrection like his because we believe in Christ, who is the resurrection and the life that is demonstrated in this story, that Christ has the power to raise the dead.

So he will also raise himself from the dead. Going back to John 10, which we were looking at over the last couple of weeks,

Jesus said in verse 18, no one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.

I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it up again. This charge

I have received from my father. So Jesus does this for us.

Second Corinthians 521, for our sake, he became sin who knew no sin so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

Christ taking our sins upon himself with the life that he laid down, dying on the cross.

And then what we receive is his righteousness. He clothes us in righteous robes that we would be righteous before God.

Jesus has done this for his sheep. I lay my life down for the sheep.

All who believe in him have received this righteousness and we are adopted into the family of God as his sons and daughters and may call upon him as father.

Jesus demonstrates his power over death itself in this story by raising

Lazarus from the dead. Now, we know with his death on the cross and resurrection from the grave that he has demonstrated that power anyway, but we see that in his power to even raise others from the dead.

We might think to ourselves, well, of course, he raises himself from the dead. He is God, but he raises even us from the dead.

We who believe in Christ. John 11, verse one. Now, a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister

Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother

Lazarus was ill. Now, the thing about this, and John has done this other times in this gospel, but he presupposes that you already know this story.

When he wrote this gospel, the gospel is spread far and wide. Matthew, Mark, and Luke had already been written.

And what had been written was the gospel that had been proclaimed by the apostles. Matthew, Mark, and Luke were not writing anything down that had not already been proclaimed in the world, in the churches, and was increasing on the earth as it continued to be preached.

So these things were written down for our benefit. Matthew writing specifically to the Jews, that was his main audience.

Mark was writing primarily to the Gentiles. And Luke was writing to a man named Theophilus, an account of these things that Paul had preached, the gospel according to the way that Paul preached it.

And then in Luke's next letter to Theophilus, which was the book of Acts, it was an account of the way the gospel, as it had been proclaimed according to Luke's gospel, had gone out into the earth and increased, and the church was established and spread, and how the gospel made it to the whole world with the apostle

Paul getting to Rome and preaching the gospel from the capital city of earth at that particular time.

So here, John is writing a gospel after a time that the gospel has already gone out into the world.

But he is writing of some things more deeply theological concerning what Jesus taught.

Now, of course, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all include things that Jesus taught. But John is more specific about Jesus' discourses than the other three gospels are, especially who

Jesus claimed to be as one who was sent from the Father and one who reveals the Father. John is more specific about those things than the other three gospel writers were.

And so in this particular gospel, John presupposes certain things that you've already heard, you've already known.

He's made a reference to Judas, for example, the one who betrayed Christ because he's taking for granted.

You've heard this story, and you know Judas is the one who turned Jesus over for 30 pieces of silver, and then

Jesus was crucified. So here, John is presupposing that you've already heard the story of Mary who anointed the

Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair. By the way, John records that story.

We haven't read it yet. It comes up in chapter 12. But he's putting in here in this part of the story, at the time when

Jesus visits Bethany to raise Lazarus from the dead, mentioning who Mary and Martha were and reminding the reader of what they had heard.

Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair. And this is the one whom

Jesus even said in the other Gospels that many people would remember her because of what it was that she had done.

And sure enough, people knew this story. And so reading the Gospel of John, they knew of a woman who had wiped

Jesus' feet with her hair, anointed him with oil and wiped his feet with her hair.

And so that's what John is making reference to. You've heard this story. This is the woman that I'm talking about.

This is one of those sisters. So the sisters sent to Jesus, this is verse three, saying,

Lord, he whom you love is ill. But when Jesus heard it, he said, this illness does not lead to death.

It is for the glory of God so that the son of God may be glorified through it.

Now, it's interesting for Jesus to say there this illness does not lead to death when in fact

Lazarus did die. Well, the point Jesus was making was this illness did not lead to permanent death, but it would be a temporary death that would be used for the glory of God to be displayed.

Now, I've been asked before when Lazarus died, did he go to heaven? I believe that he did, that his spirit went to be with God, as it says in Ecclesiastes.

The body returns to the ground from which it was made and the spirit returns to the one who gave it.

And that, of course, is God. So the the spirit goes to be with God. And I believe that Lazarus was, in fact, there, but explained to Lazarus exactly what was going to happen and that he was being sent back.

But we don't have any account of Lazarus talking about what he experienced when he was with God. He didn't come back from the dead to write a bestselling book.

Heaven is for real. And tour with that ministry and make lots of money off of the fact that, hey,

I died and I went to heaven and I've come back to talk about it. That was not what Lazarus was allowed to do.

In fact, the Apostle Paul, Second Corinthians, Chapter 12, says that he was caught up into the third heaven and what he experienced in what he saw.

He heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter. And so the

Apostle Paul would not even talk about what it was he saw when he was when he was caught up into the place where God is, the place where God dwells, the third heaven.

And I always seems like I have to qualify what third heaven means. First heaven is where the birds and clouds are.

The second heaven is where the sun, moon and stars are. And the third heaven is the place where God dwells. OK, so don't don't read into third heaven any deeper than that.

It's not like the Mormon levels of heaven. But nevertheless, Paul was not allowed to speak about what it was that he saw.

What is it that Paul saw? Well, we don't know because he wouldn't talk about it. But here's my theory. Here's my theory about what

Paul saw when he was caught up into the third heaven. He saw the same thing John saw in his revelation.

But it was not for Paul to talk about what it was that he saw, the things that are taking place in a heavenly realm to bring about the final judgment.

Paul may have been allowed to see those things, but only John was going to be the one that was going to write about them.

Lazarus likely saw many great and wondrous things in his time that he was dead and his spirit was in the place where God lives.

But he was not allowed to speak about those things when he was raised from the dead, that the glory of God would be demonstrated in this miraculous thing that Jesus did, raising a dead man back to life.

So I do believe that Lazarus was truly dead and his spirit departed from his body and went to be with God.

But at this particular point here, Jesus says the illness does not lead to death.

It was not going to be a permanent death. This illness was not going to cause it. It is for the glory of God that the son of God may be glorified through it.

And indeed, we continue to glorify Christ and his wondrous power because of this story as a demonstration of Christ, the

Messiah, who had been sent by the father. Verse five. Now, Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.

Then after this, he said to the disciples, let us go to Judea again. Now, remember, this is exactly the place he had just fled from at the end of Chapter 10 after he had said that that the father is in me and I am in the father.

The Jews received this as blasphemy because Jesus was making himself equal with God. So they sought to arrest him.

They grabbed stones. They wanted to stone him, but he fled from them and went across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing.

And that was where he was at this particular place. Somebody had come to him, somebody who knew his whereabouts and said to him.

And I mean, the people did know where he was. They just weren't bothering to go to that place to get him and bring him back to stone him because it was as long as he was over there, he wasn't bothering anybody.

And that's why the Jews weren't really seeking after him to find it. But once he came back into Judea and once he went to Jerusalem, then he was going to become a nuisance to the

Jews because he was going to proclaim to be the son of God to the Pharisees. He was going to be performing these miracles and people were going to listen to his teaching.

And so they wanted to have him arrested and killed. So Jesus is not in Judea. He's on the other side of the

Jordan because his time had not yet come. But here, having heard about Lazarus being sick, he stayed there two days longer.

And then after this, he said to the disciples, let us go to Judea again. And the disciples said to him,

Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you and you want to go there again. And Jesus answered, are there not 12 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. Now, the disciples didn't understand what it was that Jesus was talking about, but he was basically saying to the disciples, you're with me.

OK, you are walking in the light. Why do you fear? Why do you fear death when you are with me?

And so this is all setting things up for Christ raising Lazarus from the dead. The disciples are worried about going back into Judea and dying at the hands of the

Jews because they sought to kill Jesus. So Jesus is going to demonstrate the power of God by raising

Lazarus from the dead to show the disciples they have no fear. They have nothing to fear because they're with the one who has the power over death itself.

When Jesus dies, he's going to do so because he lays his own life down, not because anybody has the power or the authority to kill him, but because Christ has all the authority and he lays his life down of his own accord and he has the authority to take it back up again.

And he does all of these things for the will of the father, for our sake, because he lays his life down for the sheep that he might be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

So here he's going to demonstrate to the disciples they have nothing to fear if they believe in Christ.

There's nothing that they have to fear of man. You are with the one who is the light. That is

Jesus Christ. You know, going back to the reference to Christ being the light, which John had established from the very beginning of this gospel in chapter one.

So again, Jesus says, are there not 12 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. Those who do not know me, they stumble and fall into darkness and die, and they will not find resurrection because they were not with the son who raises the dead.

Verse 11. After saying these things, he said to them, Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.

The disciples said to him, Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover. Now, Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant that Lazarus was taking rest and sleep.

And if he was asleep, well, then the illness is leaving him. He's going to recover. He's going to get better.

And Jesus told them plainly, Lazarus has died. And for your sake, I am glad that he was not there.

Now, Jesus making this reference to Lazarus has fallen asleep. Paul uses the same reference in second

Thessalonians. I'm sorry, first Thessalonians chapters four and five, where he's talking about the resurrection of the dead.

And he says that our brothers and sisters who have died, it's not like they've missed the chance to to witness the return of Christ.

They're going to be raised from the dead. They've fallen asleep. That's what that's the way Paul references their death.

They aren't dead. They've fallen asleep. And we are all going to experience a resurrection on that day when

Christ returns unless he returns before we die, because he says the dead in Christ will rise first.

And then we also who are left will be caught up with them. So there is a sense in which when we die, we go to sleep because we're going to be raised to life again.

Jesus is using that same term here, but the disciples don't understand what it is that he's talking about.

So Jesus has to say it flatly. He has to say, Lazarus died for your sake.

I'm glad that I was not there so that you may believe. You may believe that I am he who raises the dead.

Let us go to him. So Thomas called the twin, verse 16, said to his fellow disciples, let us go also that we may die with him.

I'm going to explain Thomas's statement a little bit more when we come back to this story again tomorrow.

But in the meantime, may you be encouraged to know that in Christ, we have the resurrection of the dead.

We are going to we are going to receive the kingdom of God in glory.

We do not have anything to fear of judgment, for even though mankind may try to harm us, may try to put us to death or will ridicule us, will ostracize us, will isolate us because of the faith that we have.

We have nothing to fear of man, because in Christ Jesus, we are of the family of God.

We will receive this kingdom. We will we will receive resurrection from the dead.

So what do we have to fear of any man? Be confident today in Christ in knowing that your sins are forgiven, that you may live and do all things to the glory of your father in heaven, who has given you life everlasting through his son.

Amen. You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. We hope you are a part of the church family committed to gospel teaching, and we thank you for including us in your

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