(John 11:17-45)
If you’re familiar with John chapter 11, then you have already stood in awe of the rock-solid faith of both Mary & Martha. Martha professed to Jesus her confidence in the Resurrection when she stated that she knew her brother would be raised on the last day. “Martha answered, ‘I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day’” (v.24). In one beautiful confession, she acknowledged believing both that Jesus would return on the last day and that when he did, all believers would rise again, including her brother.
Yet her faith was not just a forward-looking faith; in looking backward, it also assured her of how differently her brother’s sickness could have ended. “‘Lord,’ Martha said to Jesus, ‘if you had been here, my brother would not have died’” (v.21). We see Mary demonstrate the exact same confidence. “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’” (v.32). Subtle as it might be, notice they don’t express mere optimism that it could have gone differently if Jesus had arrived earlier, saving Lazarus from death, but complete confidence that it would have gone differently because Jesus would have healed him.
First of all, where does this kind of faith come from? To get the full picture, I think that any time we come across John 11, it should always be read with Luke 10 in mind. That’s where Luke records for us the account of Jesus at the home of Mary and Martha, long before Lazarus had even been sick. At that time, Martha was busying herself tidying up the house and preparing food for Jesus. In her mind, Mary was just sitting around doing nothing while she did all the work.
But Jesus saw it differently. He used that opportunity not to rebuke Martha for her loving service, but to remind her that Mary had made the better choice: to prioritize hearing the Word. Whenever we have the opportunity to listen to Jesus, take it.
Why does that account fit so well with what we have here in John 11? Because it would appear that over the course of time between that visit from Jesus and the death of Lazarus, the sisters took Jesus’ encouragement to heart, prioritized his teachings in their lives, and their faith was strengthened as a result. That would explain the sisters’ beautiful expression of confident faith that Jesus would have healed Lazarus if he had arrived earlier.
Of course, that kind of faith comes with a catch, doesn’t it? When we know what God can do, it can lead us to struggle when he doesn’t. Some who were present expressed that very struggle when they witnessed all of the grieving and sadness caused by the death of Lazarus. “But some of them said, ‘Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?’” (v.37). If he was able to act, then why didn’t he?
As you faced the ugly, gut-wrenching reality of the death of someone close to you, perhaps you’ve had similar questions weigh heavily on you. You’ve wondered it previously: why didn’t Jesus, who reveals in Scripture both that he can heal disease and raise others from the dead, why didn’t he intervene when it came to my father, my mother, my spouse, my loved one? He could have, but instead, he did nothing. Why? Well-intentioned fellow Christians have tried to provide every possible response to appease this frustration, but their answers don’t satisfy us. We still come back to this: “if God could have, then why didn’t he?”
Or, like Martha, you’ve both confessed and struggled with the reality of a Savior who was capable of healing and holding off death, but did not. “But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask” (v.22). Do you hear the confident trust in her words, coupled with the longing of what her heart truly desires? She both expresses confidence that Jesus had the power to save her brother from dying, but also that, “it’s not too late, Lord – and I am optimistic that even now you can choose to grant my heart’s desire and raise my brother from the dead.”
Is it too much to ask of God to somehow have asked even this sort of miracle in the life of my loved one? Why not a miracle? Why not my loved one? Was my loved one not worthy of this type of death-defying miracle that Lazarus received? Am I not worthy of it?
Before we allow Jesus to address and answer these questions, we want to remember how God himself feels about death. And, like no other account in Scripture, this event provides us with a powerful example.
At the beginning of this whole narrative, we see the risk Jesus was willing to take to deal with death: his disciples were afraid for his own life! When Jesus shared his desire to go to Lazarus, they were shocked. “‘But Rabbi,’ they said, ‘a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?’” (v.8). They realized Jesus was putting himself in danger by going anywhere near Lazarus, where he would be putting himself right back in the thick of those trying to kill him. Is there really any question if Jesus cares about people dying when he’s willing to put his own life on the line to do something about it???
We also experience Lazarus’ death from Jesus’ perspective. “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!’ (v.33-36). “Jesus wept!” And it wasn’t just because he missed his friend – the one he was going to raise back to life in just a moment! – but also because he personally witnessed firsthand the devastating effect death has on people in this world.
How much does God care? Since Jesus came into this broken world, let’s not presume he doesn’t care about death or loss. He’s actually the One person able to do something about it. And he showed it powerfully with Lazarus. “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’” (John 11:41-44). Can we question if God really cares about people dying after a miracle like this? Hardly!
But we must go further, because Jesus also knows what happens to those who die physically who are also spiritually dead at the same time: that they are lost forever to hell. God expressed this concern through the prophet Ezekiel, saying, “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?” (Ezekiel 33:11). So yes, God certainly cares about death, and far more than we could imagine, as his heart is concerned not just about the pain of needing to plan a funeral, but the possibility of being lost eternally.
But we must go further still. Why did Jesus raise Lazarus? Was it simply to dry the tears of mourning loved ones? To undo the sting of death?
He revealed it by his own words when he spoke to his Father, explaining the deeper intent behind this miraculous occasion, “that they may believe you sent me” (v.42). God knows our greatest need: faith in him! God knows there is no hope for anyone who does not believe.
Even before Jesus arrived at the gravesite, he had already said the same thing to his disciples. “[Jesus] told them plainly, ‘Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe” (v.14-15). God knows our greatest need: faith in him! God can do so much more than raise a corpse to be alive again; he can bring dead souls to be spiritually alive, guaranteeing not just an extension of a longer life here on earth for a few more years, but for an eternity!
And his raising of Lazarus from the dead didn’t just bring Lazarus back for a few years, but rescued souls for eternity. “Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him” (v.45).
Isn’t that how God operates? We have tunnel vision, focusing on the one thing, and all the while God is thinking of the bigger picture. He gave sisters back their dead brother, but he gave who-knows-how-many onlookers the greatest gift of all: saving faith in him. They heard Jesus’ powerful words and saw them in action with their own eyes, and through it, the Holy Spirit gifted them with faith and eternal life. Jesus gave so much more than just life to the dead!
The resurrection of Lazarus was not a promise that God will miraculously raise our loved ones from the dead here and now.
It’s a promise much greater than that.
God WILL raise all those in Christ on the Last Day, and it will be forever. God knows our desire and exceeds what we could ask for by promising not just a few more years together in this short blip of life that barely even registers on the timeline of eternity, but he promises forever together for all who believe in him.
Lazarus died again. You will die. I will die. We will all have our own John 11 story. But it’s not the dying that sets us apart. We have that in common with all people. Everyone dies.
But what sets us apart, what is uniquely shared among us and all believers, is that we know the One who lived again. We know the One who still lives. We know the One who will live forever. And through faith in him, we know that we, too, will live with him forever, together with all of our loved ones who in faith fall asleep in Jesus.
