Let me understand the teaching of your precepts; then I will meditate on your wonders.              Psalm 119:2

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 him, 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 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 also go, 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 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 man 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 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.” Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him. John 11: 1-45

            One of the toughest things for Christians to understand is how a loving God can seem absolutely oblivious to the suffering of His children.  We usually try to get the Lord off the hook by saying things like, “Well, we don’t understand” or “We don’t always have the answers”.  Of course, moments come when that is all we can say as we have to simply trust in our Father above that His will is right for us.  But it sure is tough to face the hurting who are devastated by loss and to have no better answer to give than the fact that somehow God knows even if we don’t.  This dilemma is especially true when a loved one dies.  A loved one dies who should not have died in our opinion.  It is a child.  It is the victim of an accident.  It is the soldier who gives his or her life in a distant country eight or nine time zones away from us.  But is it possible that God can be glorified somehow in these moments when we just don’t understand?  St. John thought so.  It is what the death and resurrection of Lazarus are all about. And it also happened to two sisters who were just as puzzled at the inaction of the Lord, and perhaps just as angry at Him, as some of us are when the same thing happens to us.

            You and I know the whole story.  We know the end;  Lazarus lived.  Mary and Martha did not.  We forget that fact.  What you and I see in this wonderful miracle is the culmination of some of the greatest signs St. John ever gave us that show Jesus to be more than just a man; that He is in fact, the Lord God Who lived among us and showed us His glory.  In fact, the raising of Lazarus is the last great sign done by Jesus in the entire Gospel of John before His own death and resurrection.  It started with the changing of water into wine back in chapter two.  It continued with the healing of a royal official’s son and the healing of a lame man.  The next great sign was the feeding of the five thousand. Then came the walking on the water.  The sixth great sign in John’s Gospel was the one Vicar preached on last week, the healing of a man who was born blind. The seventh sign was this one today with Lazarus.  Of course, Jesus did a lot of other miracles.  Matthew, Mark, and Luke even have some of the ones that John left out of His Gospel.  But as John ended it all he spoke to each of our hearts when he wrote under the Holy Spirit’s inspiration: “Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book;  but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

            Mary and Martha knew none of this.  Or if they did they were hardly thinking about these things.  For them all that mattered was that Lazarus was sick.  The Gospels make it seem that their parents had already died.  Lazarus was the last male relative close to them.  If he went their world would literally crumble all around them.  And they loved Lazarus; it’s not just a materialistic thing they are worried about.  And they know that Jesus loved Lazarus too.  And they know that Jesus loves the both of them.  Mary and Martha have already had that famous afternoon dinner argument where Jesus was in their home once.  Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet soaking up every word the Lord is saying to her and perhaps Lazarus was there too listening as well.  And Martha fumes because she is busy cooking the dinner and she is getting no help at all.  A loving Jesus tells her not to worry about these things important as they are.  First learn from Him, the Savior told Martha, then all these other things would have their place.  Mary was also the one who anointed Jesus’ feet with ointment and dried them with her own hair as one of the deepest signs of love and respect the Lord Jesus ever received in His earthly lifetime.   A lot of love exists when it comes to Jesus, Lazarus, Martha, and Mary.

            So the word goes out as fast as it can from the two sisters to the Savior, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.”  And you and I read today, “So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.”  … Um…. What????  You and I can clearly read the words in 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.”  Again… What???? Did Jesus somehow get the message wrong or misinterpret it?  No.  Did Jesus somehow mistakenly think Lazarus was on the mend so the emergency had passed?  No.  He knew Lazarus was dying.  In fact, He even told His disciples after the fact that Lazarus had already died.

            Have there not been moments in your life when you cried out to the Lord God just as desperately as Martha and Mary did only to have it seem that God has entirely ignored you?  It is an old dilemma.  How can a loving God allow such things to occur; and in this case to the very people He so loves?  I’ll tell you this.  As a Pastor I could never get away with what the Lord did and rightly so.  If you called me and said, “Pastor, Mom is dying, come quickly to the hospital” and I replied, “Well, I’ll get there in a couple of days” – you would have every right to be enraged at me.  But now we’re talking about the Lord here.

            One answer is to understand something subtle.  Martha and Mary wrote a message to Jesus reminding Him that He loved Lazarus.  The word in the original language is the word for earthly love. It is love as human beings understand it.  But when St. John goes on and says, “Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus” He actually uses a different word for “love”.  It is “agape”.  That is the kind of love that God has, divine love, the love that comes from the heart of the Lord that human beings cannot always understand.  It is a love that has God doing things in His way, always for the good of His children, but sometimes in ways we just don’t understand. The lesson is that even though God may not seem to respond to your prayers at the instant you voice them to Him, it does not mean He does not love you.  And in His own timing you will know that and see it to be so.

            But I do not believe Mary and Martha quite get it, anymore than we sometimes do when we get angry at God.  Godly Mary will not even leave the house at first when she hears Jesus is there.  Martha does, but only to launch an accusation against Jesus: “Lord, if you had been here my brother would not have died.”  It is the old, “Where were you God when I needed you the most?”  But Martha still has faith.  She is the one we admire this time around.  Even in her sorrow and in her anger she still believes.  She may not understand. But she trusts in Jesus.  And because she has faith Jesus says to her those words of comfort that we have heard at graveside after graveside and which Vicar even used just this past week in a cemetery:  “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.”  All of Jesus’ divinity and majesty are voiced in those words to you and to me.  Death does not have the final say; He does.  He is the Christ, the Son of God, the fulfillment of every prophecy that said God would come into this world and be with us.

            Mary though, doesn’t seem able to believe all of this;  at least she cannot say it out loud. What she does say is the exact same accusation which her sister hurled against the Lord.  And then she cries.  And there is no majesty and awe that will make Mary feel any better.  So Jesus cries with her.  To me, this is one of the greatest signs of Jesus’ humanity.  He was troubled in His heart, probably as much by the grief of Mary as by the death of His friend Lazarus.  And with all of us who ever cried at the death of someone we love Jesus cries and has His heart broken too.  If you ever think that God is so far away that He never could ever understand what you endure then remember Jesus crying today.  He does understand.

            And then a miracle happens.  And what is so odd is that there are some things in this miracle that are almost eerily similar to what would soon be happening in Jesus’ own life.   They come to a cemetery where there is a cave where the lifeless body is put.  That was what they did with Jesus’ dead body after they took it down from the cross.  A stone was rolled against the entrance of the tomb that had to be rolled away.  Sound familiar?  Outside are the women who are weeping.  Were there not women at the tomb of Jesus on Easter Sunday morning and Mary Magdalene is crying her eyes out?  Martha had forgotten what Jesus said about the resurrection and the glory of God.  The disciples of Jesus on Easter had forgotten what Jesus said about the resurrection.  When Jesus performs the miracle of the resurrection here He uses a personal name, “Lazarus”.  On Easter Sunday to convince weeping Mary Magdalene of His being alive He uses her personal name, “Mary”.  The body was wrapped in linen cloths and the face of Lazarus was wrapped in a separate cloth and they had to be removed so the risen Lazarus could rejoin the living.  Jesus’ body was wrapped in linen cloths and His face was wrapped in a separate cloth.  And He folded them up when He left the tomb to rejoin the living.  And in each case, Lazarus, and His own, the resurrection occurred by the authority of Jesus Himself and in His own power.

            In one strange way, if you will allow me, it was almost as if Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead so that He Himself could take Lazarus’ place in death, also ours.  It says that following this miracle an angry ruling Council led by the High Priest Caiaphas begins a very determined search for a way to arrest Jesus and put Him to death.  And Caiaphas used some strange words when he called the Sanhedrin to do that.  He said, “It is better for you that one man should die for the people.”  He didn’t know what he was saying but he really said it all.  Jesus took your sins and mine and also the death that comes from it for us all and He died for us.  He took our place in the tomb that should have been ours forever. And when He did we all came back to life just like Lazarus.  And even though we believe that at a later date Lazarus did die again, the resurrection you and I and he will receive on the last day will be forever, and even on the day when earthly life ends for you and me we live at that moment forevermore in heaven with Jesus.

            What is the point of this sermon?  Jesus Christ has never stopped loving you.  And He loves you as God in the way only God can love you. That means that sometimes we won’t understand every action of His or what seems to be inaction on His part.  But you don’t ever have to doubt His love for you or for those you care about. And on that day when He calls you by name and we rise again, as the Bible tells us we will on the last day – everything will be clear that day.  But the resurrection is real.  Lazarus’ return to life was real.  Jesus’ own resurrection is real and is an historical, verifiable event.  And your resurrection and the resurrection of your loved ones who died believing in Him is just as real.

            A young boy named Philip was always considered the slowest child in his Sunday School class.  He had Down’s Syndrome.  And even though the other children in the class accepted him they knew he never could keep up with them for the most part.  One day the Sunday School teacher passed out empty plastic eggs, the kind that you could pick up in any five and ten store.  She asked them all to fill the egg with something that reminded them of Easter and Jesus’ resurrection and of the hope we have.  The next week each child opened his or her egg;  one had put a flower in the egg.  Another had put a seed planted in dirt.  Philip’s egg had nothing in it and the class sighed because the boy had obviously not gotten the assignment.  But he shouted out, “The tomb was empty.  Jesus’ tomb was empty!”  He got it.  It wasn’t that long after that when Philip died and passed from this life.  His entire Sunday School class came to the funeral.  And as each of them filed past the casket every student put an empty egg on top of it. Philip got it.  May we get it as well. Amen.