7th Sign: Lazarus Come Forth, Part 1

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. You see, they made it specific.

They even figured they have good leverage. This is someone Jesus loves. But Jesus thought, something else. That's a very important part of our spiritual life. You see, it's in these kind of moments, these dire painful moments of life, that God says to you and me, trust me. You have to distrust me, but we don't want to trust them. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church, located in Metairie, Louisiana.

Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now, as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. Death, an inescapable part of life. Death is ruthless and often comes without warning. It's unrelenting, can't be cheated, can't bribe it, can't elude it. Death is indiscriminate.

It is a great equalizer. What does a billionaire have to do with the poorest people in a third world country? What do they have in common? They die. What about really healthy people and unhealthy people? They die.

Or the righteous and the wicked, they die. And humans have always been very uneasy about it. We'll do almost anything to delay it.

Any way possible that we can delay it, we'll take it. We stay away from it as much as we possibly can. Some people even say, I don't even like to talk about it.

That may be fine, but you won't avoid it. The ancient world wasn't like that at all. In the ancient world, everybody saw people die. Most people that went into adulthood saw countless people die. Everyone died in their home, your grandparents and parents and neighbors. Everyone died and you were used to seeing it, but not for us. There are people probably in this room that have never seen anybody die and never want to.

I don't want to see people actually die. When someone does die, somebody else gets to see them die, then they carry them off. We make preparations for them and we invite people to the funeral home.

People have homes. Funerals don't have homes. But we call it a funeral home. Then we embalm the body and dress it up. I still remember one of the very few times the thought I had as I looked at my father in a casket was one of the few times I ever saw him in a suit.

You put him in a suit. Then there are people that go there and walk by and they say things, doesn't he or she look nice? It's our culture. No matter how hard we try, we can't ignore or sanitize death. Death must be dealt with. And that's where Jesus Christ comes in. I am so thankful for John chapter 11 because it reveals to me that because of Jesus Christ, death meets its master.

So I invite you to open your Bibles to John chapter 11. We have been in a series for quite some time called The Seven Signs of the Son of God. John writes his gospel by giving us seven different signs, specific miracles that reveal the nature and power of God in Jesus Christ. All of them designed by John so that you would put your faith and believe in him. This is the book that sets forth the deity of Jesus Christ.

This is the seventh one and the final one. In the first 16 verses, we'll deal with the delay. There is a delay in this chapter. He uses it to build the faith of the disciples. Then there's two conversations that he has in the next section to build the faith of Martha and Mary. Then there is this extraordinary miracle to proclaim who he really is and what he's here for.

And then the response to that. Now, to set up Chapter 11, look at verse 39 of Chapter 10. It says, Therefore, they were seeking again to seize him and he eluded their grasp. It's all out war now on Jesus Christ in Jerusalem. The authorities in Jerusalem are doing everything they can. They want to seize him and they want to execute him.

But he eludes their grasp because its time hasn't come yet. And he went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John the Baptist was first baptizing. And he was staying there. When John started his ministry is on the east bank of the Jordan. The place that John started his ministry is called Bethany. The place where Lazarus, Mary, and Martha live is called Bethany.

There are two Bethanies. It means house of poor. And so that's kind of the irony of this. And it says while he's there, he said many came to him and were saying, Well, John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man is true. And many believed in him there. Jesus is having a robust, great ministry in the trans-Jordan.

Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, though, they're seeking to kill him. He goes on and he says, Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister, Martha. Lazarus is a common name.

Not an unusual name at all at that time. He just wants to tell us that. He said it was the Mary. He said, Who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick. That's kind of ironic because she doesn't do it in the Gospel of John until later.

This is before she did it. But John knew that everybody was aware of the story of Mary anointing Jesus feet. This is around 90 A.D. And so the other gospels have told us.

So John just assumes his readers know. And then the sisters sent word to him saying, Lord. Behold.

He whom you love. Is sick. Interesting words, Lord.

Curiosity. They recognize who he is. And then he says, He who you love. Is sick.

It's not a copy. This isn't for God, so love the world agape love this universal decision to love. This is for. This means my friend. Lazarus is not just someone God loves.

God loves the whole world. Lazarus is a friend of Jesus Christ. So they set this up by saying the Lazarus, the one who you love.

What are they thinking? Well, first of all, I think they're thinking Lazarus should have some advantage in. I mean, he's Lazarus, he's the friend of Jesus. When Jesus is your friend, you know, this is the guy that turned water into wine. This is the guy that took the stormy sea and made it calm. You know, this is the guy that took a picnic basket and turned it into a buffet for thousands of people. That's this guy.

He's my friend. He caused the lame to walk, the blind to see. And I'm sure these girls know that he raised Jairus' daughter from the dead.

And he also raised the widows of Nain's son from the dead. They know all this. So they say, these are strangers, but this is the man you love. Talk about an ace in a hole.

I think they think they got it. Then that word in verse four. But. It's a big word. It's important. Have you ever made your case to God in your own prayer life?

Of what you want God to do, when you want him to do it, and how he should do it. But. Doesn't work out that way. You see, they made it specific.

They even figure they have good leverage. This is someone Jesus loves. But Jesus thought something else. That's a very important part of our spiritual life. You see, it's in these kind of moments, these dire, painful moments of life, that God says to you and me, trust me. You have to just trust me. But we don't want to trust them. No, no, Lord, I know what I want you to do here.

Then you give him some good reason. But when Jesus heard this, he said, this sickness is not to end in death, but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it. Same thing he said about the man born blind. Who sinned, this man or his father? Jesus said, no one. This is going to reveal the glory of God. He says the exact same thing here. Now, all I think the disciples heard was this sickness is not going to end in death.

So they're thinking, OK, he's going to do something great here. Now, Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. That's agape. He loves them all.

Lazarus, he loves as a friend, but they loves them all. So when he heard that he was sick, he stayed two days in the place where he was. Shocking.

What? Wait, wait, you love this guy. And then you just said, OK, this is hang around here for a couple of days.

I mean, you run to the guy, right? I mean, that's the way this works, except this is all about timing in this situation. It took one day from the messenger to go from Mary and Martha to Jesus. Then Jesus stayed two more days. Then it will take one day, say one day for Jesus to get to them. That's crucial to understanding this whole thing.

You see, it's four days. Now, we know something here. That I find quite interesting. The Jews believed something a little bit different. They believe that when a person dies, your soul hovers around your body for three days.

The soul. And so now got to understand, they don't have a corner. You know, sometimes people look like they're dead. They may not be dead.

You know that. So they come up. The rabbis come up with this idea that the soul hangs around for three days. So when Jesus healed, you see Jairus' daughter, she had just died. And then he brought her back to life.

A typical Jew would say, yeah, she wasn't really dead. Then you have the widow of Nain's son, and he's actually on the processional go to be buried. So the soul was right there. Because the soul hangs around the body for three days. But this is four days.

There can be no doubt now. That's why Jesus is waiting for these days to pass. See, it's such a really important part of understanding this whole story.

And so when he had heard that he was sick, he stayed two days in the place where he was. And then after this, he said to his disciples, all right, up and shine, guys, let's go. We're going to Judea today. You could just imagine what they're thinking. What?

Today? Yeah. Now, remember, they're having a tremendous ministry in Bethany on the Transjordan.

All kinds of people are believing in them. So, yeah, we're leaving. We're going back to Judea today. The disciples said to him, Rabbi, the Jews are just now seeking to stone you, and you're going to go there again. Bethany, where Lazarus and Mary and Martha are, is only two miles from Jerusalem.

So they're very close, suburbs. And so the point would be, what do we go back for? They're going to stone you when you go back.

See, that's what's going to happen. Jesus said, 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, I love when Jesus talks like that.

I want you to, I'm going to do this, but it's very important to understand, every time he talks to the disciples like this, I want to give you an idea of what their facial expression was. Every time. Like, I have no idea what he's talking about. What?

They never get it. You see, and Jesus is saying, look, the light of the world is here. As long as it's daytime, I'm going to do the will of the Father.

There's a nighttime that's coming. I won't be here. But as long as the Father wants me to be here, I'm going to be here to that point. I'm going to do the work of God.

That's what I'm going to do. The disciples, in a sense, don't get it. They said to him after he said to them that our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go so that I may awaken him out of the sleep.

He said, let me dumb it down a little further. He's asleep. I'm going to go, and I'm going to awaken him out of the sleep. Now, understand again, in the Bible, every time a believer sleeps all the way from the Old Testament, men like David, it means it's a euphemism for death. Believers don't die. They live. They just sleep.

The body sleeps. That's all that Jesus is saying. Once again, though, the disciples don't get it. That was too far above them. They couldn't understand that, and so the disciples then said to him, Lord, if he's fallen asleep, he'll recover.

There's no need to go here. I mean, if he's asleep, people wake up. He's going to wake up.

Just let him go. Now, Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought he was speaking of literal sleep. What an interesting verse for John to write.

He's writing that about himself. John was right there. John's one of them.

He said, yeah, we thought he was talking about sleeping. John has to admit in 90 AD what he was thinking 60 years earlier, and he said, that's just the way it was. Then it doesn't say it in verse 14, but I'll say this. Jesus rolls his eyes. I just think he does. Jesus rolls his eyes and says to them plainly, Lazarus is dead.

Now, they get it. Oh, he's dead. Why didn't you say so? You see, why didn't you say so?

He said, Lazarus is dead, and I am glad for your sakes that I was not there. Why did he delay? So that you may believe.

Now, let's go to him. You see, the delay was for the disciples to strengthen their faith. You see, that's a very important part of this to understand. Therefore, Thomas, who has a very bad reputation among people like us, Thomas, who was called Didymus, said to his fellow Decite, let us go so that we may die with him. Now, he could be cynical or a fatalist, but I'm not so sure. Thomas is a little more impressive guy when you really look at him than what you might think he is. I think Thomas has shown courage. He knows what's going to happen in Jerusalem. He said, but he's my Lord. If he dies, I die. I'm going with him. You know, so I think that's what Thomas said.

So that's kind of the whole reason for this whole response. He's dead. Now we go. John sets it up with so I want to continue the story now. Now we're going to see these conversations that he has with Martha and Mary. So when Jesus came, he found that he had already been in the tomb four days.

Now, put the math together, I hope this isn't too difficult for you, but put the math together. What does that tell you? When the messenger got to Jesus, Lazarus was already dead. Soon as the messenger left Martha and Mary, he died. So when he went and told Jesus, your friend, he was dead. He was dead for four days.

The one day, then a two day and a day back, you get the four days. So he says there that he had been in the tomb for four days. Now understand, when they bury, that's how they do it. Immediately, you're going to be buried.

And so after that, it says then that now 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. Now, what you really need to understand is just how different this is than what you and I think a typical funeral is. It's completely different. When someone dies, they are immediately buried. Now what they do is that they don't, there's no embalming or anything like that.

They put some spices to try to make it smell better, and then they wrap them in wrappings, and then they'll cart them off. If you're affluent like Lazarus is, you're in a cave. Remember Joseph of Arimathea put Jesus in his cave.

The affluent would have a cave like that, and they would put him in there. And then that would start the funeral service. The funeral service is seven days.

Now, that's pretty foreign to us, isn't it? I mean, I've watched people go to a funeral home to pay their respects. Got to go and pay my respects. So they go walk up to the family, sorry to hear about it, about 15 minutes there, then they're out. And I've seen people get on their cell phone as they're leaving the funeral home just to start talking about their day. Okay, I have an appointment.

Let's do lunch. You know, that's not what they did. Lazarus is apparently a man well off. He has a lot of connections in Jerusalem. So a whole bunch of the Jews from Jerusalem came out to his home. When they come out, they begin to mourn with the family. And off and on, it's not to continue, but off and on for seven days, they come and mourn.

Now, a family like Lazarus would have a little more money, and so they would also have professional mourners. And they're almost all ladies. These ladies are great at wailing and crying. And so you bring them in, and they sort of prime the pump, get people stimulated. And so they wail and cry along with Mary and Martha. It's just an interesting aspect of the way they do things.

During this time, the family served bread, hard-boiled eggs, and lentils for the week. There's no celebration of the life in a Jewry funeral. This is the mourning or the loss type of thing. The other factor is you could still go by the family's home for 30 days and mourn with them.

Seven days is the required amount, but you go up to 30 days doing this with them. They had a very serious view of this. Now, what I find so interesting is that the whole context of this is kind of an interesting thought. What happens to you after four days?

Have you thought about that? One writer wrote this. He said, the Jews do not embalm.

The Jews did nothing to stop decay. They wrap the body and sprinkle spices on it to mitigate the smell. That's it. Here's what happens in four days. He said, it's pretty grisly stuff. The heart has stopped beating. The body cells are then deprived of oxygen, and they begin to die.

Blood drains from throughout the circulatory system and pools in any low places in the body. The muscles begin to stiffen in what we call by the Latin word rigor mortis, and that sets in after three hours. The person has rigor mortis. By 24 hours, the body has lost all of its heat. The muscles then lose their rigor mortis in 36 hours, and by 72 hours, the rigor mortis has vanished.

All the stiffness is gone, and the body becomes soft like just a big sack. He says, looking a little deeper, as the cells begin to die, bacteria go to work. Your body is filled with bacteria, and that's a different subject, he said, but the bacteria in the body of a dead person begin to attack and break down the cells completely. The decomposing tissue takes on a horrific look and smell and emits green liquids by the 72nd hour. The tissue releases hydrogen sulfide and methane as well as other gases. The horrible smell is now emitted. Insects then and animals will consume the parts of the body if they can get to it. That's what Lazarus is like.

That's important for you to understand because I don't think we think about it from that point of view. So now Martha shows up. Martha then, for when she heard that Jesus was coming, went to meet him, Mary stayed in the house. Martha then said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Even now I know, whatever you ask of God, God will give you. She shows him respect, but just a general rebuke.

Lord, if you'd have been here, he wouldn't be dead. What is she questioning here? You say, well, just this timing.

Not really. She's questioning his goodness. Like you and I do.

I hear it over and over. I just can't understand how God can let this happen. What are you saying? I question his goodness. Otherwise, because if I were God, this wouldn't have happened.

It's questioning the goodness of God. At that website, you will find not only today's broadcast, but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word, we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word, 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org.

That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word.