The Strangest Funeral Ever - Part B

With tears in his eyes, with anger in his heart, Jesus goes to the place of death, the tomb that houses his friend Lazarus, and conquers death by resurrection.

You know what that's called? In movie jargon we would call this a trailer, a preview of coming attractions. What Jesus did that day at the tomb of Lazarus, Jesus will one day do again at your grave, in your grave, in your grave, in my grave, as we will be raised from the dead.

He'll conquer death. Welcome to Connect with Skip Weekend Edition. Every year Hollywood spends countless millions making movies and they spend millions more advertising those movies. One great way they do that is with trailers.

They grab the most action-packed, thrilling, romantic, and moving moments of the movie and package it together for a minute and a half of pure excitement. Well today we're about to see God's version of a movie trailer and Skip Heitzig will have more on that in just a moment, but first let's see what's going on in the Connect with Skip Resource Center this month. As we approach the end of the year, here's a special resource package we have developed to say thanks for your support. Over four decades of ministry, Pastor Skip has been able to invite some excellent speakers to fill his pulpit. We want you to hear some of these memorable messages from teachers such as Josh McDowell. God said I want you to be able in the 21st century and open your scriptures and have a confidence thus saith the Lord.

It has not been lost. Also a part of this pulpit package, Dr. David Jeremiah. Jesus Christ shines in the world today by his reflection in the lives of his followers. Nobody's going to see Jesus if they don't see Jesus in us. If you can make an end of your donation of $100 or more to support this program, you will receive this pulpit package of 10 excellent messages on CD or by download. You will want to hear what Joel Rosenberg said about remarkable conversions in the Middle East. That's the kind of door that when you pray, Lord, I'd love to go build a friendship in the name of Jesus with a king and with a Muslim president. Apparently God says yes to some of these prayers. The pulpit package containing 10 different speakers giving full length messages to request your copy, go to connectwithskip.com or by calling 1-800-922-1888.

That is connectwithskip.com or call 1-800-922-1888. If you have a Bible or a Bible app handy, you'll want to load John chapter 11 as we join Pastor Skip for today's teaching, part two of the strangest funeral ever. I have come that they may have life and have it more abundantly. And so that theme goes 47 times in the Gospel of John. John wants you to know Jesus is about life, life, life, life, life, all the way through. And now he's standing in front of death and he is angry. Like we are.

Here's the difference. We're powerless to do anything about it. Now he's about to do something about it. We're powerless to do anything about mortality, death, lifespan. We can't do anything about it. We can't fix it. We are powerless to redeem ourselves. We are powerless to save ourselves. We are powerless to keep ourselves from the grave. And you know why? Because death is the result of one thing.

What's that? Sin. The wages of sin is death. We can't fix it.

Jesus can fix it. The wages of sin is death. This is happening and this has happened and will happen because there's sin in the world.

And the day that you eat the fruit of this, Adam and Eve, you will surely die. There's a myth in the United States of America. I encounter it many times when I do funerals.

And I've done a lot of them, as I mentioned. And sometimes they're funerals for people who are marginally religious or are not spiritual at all. But the myth is this, that the only thing you need to go to heaven is to just die.

That's all you got to do. So there's people, they live without God. They don't care about God. They never pray. They never read their Bible. They don't want anything to do with God.

And then they die and suddenly everybody's religious. Is that a church and he's in heaven and he's in heaven? Why would he want to be in heaven? Why would God make him be in heaven? He wanted nothing to do with God his whole life.

Why would God let him suffer in his presence forever? But that's the myth. All you got to do to go to heaven is just kick the bucket and you're there. There's another myth closely associated with the first one and that is, if you want to get to heaven, you just do good things. Be a good person. Be very, very sincere and fill your life with good deeds. No amount of good deeds can ever earn a spot in the kingdom of heaven.

Because the wages of sin is death and that's why Jesus came to the earth was to pay that debt of sin that no one else can pay. And just a note, by the way, Lazarus will get up, no question. Lazarus will be resurrected. You know what that means?

It means he has to die again. How depressing is that? Yeah, I died once. It was a real drag. And I haven't been feeling good the last couple days.

This might be number two. I might be dead in a couple days. He had to die again. Now, just for the record, if I ever get really close to death and I'm almost in heaven, don't you dare pray me back. You hear me? I will make life miserable for you if I find out you're the one responsible for bringing me back when I'm that close to heaven. I don't want to come back.

Are you kidding? Taxes again. Aging again. Aging again. So, tears, anger.

The third thing that's odd is approach. Here's Jesus, his face filled with tears. Here's Jesus, his heart filled with anger. And with his tears and in his anger, he goes somewhere. He does something with it.

He does something about it. He goes to the tomb of Lazarus, verse 38. And Jesus, again groaning in himself, came to the tomb.

It was a cave. The stone lay against it. And Jesus said, take away the stone. Martha, the sister of him who was dead, said, Lord, by now, this time there's a stench, for he's been dead four days. Jesus said to her, did I not say to you that if you would believe, you would see the glory of God?

They took away the stone from the place where the dead man was lying. Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, now Jesus prays publicly in front of people, Father, I thank you that you've heard me. And I know that you always hear me. But because of the people who are standing by, I said this, that they may believe that you sent me. Now, when he said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. A word about tombs and burial. In those days, they didn't embalm people.

I mentioned that last week. And so the day they died was the day they buried them. They buried them in a tomb, which was typically a cave, a natural cave appropriated for the use of a tomb, or they would carve out of a hillside in pure rock a little room, a tomb. The tomb was a room of about 8 by 10 or 9 by 10 by 8.

And it had shelves on the sides of the wall, niches, to accommodate eight corpses total, because usually families were buried together in a common tomb. When a person died, they were wrapped up with bandages, pieces of cloth. Every single appendage, each arm, each leg was individually wrapped. So it wasn't like a mummy. And then aromatic spices were put within the folds or between the folds of the wrapping. And that was to simply take away the stench.

It was only good for a couple days after that. The stench of the corpse would overpower and overshadow that. Once they were placed in the tomb, a stone was rolled in the front of it. A groove was cut on the outside of the tomb. So a large cartwheel, round kind of a stone was rolled downward in place to keep out animals, to keep out grave robbers, and to keep out the stench. The body was laid in state for one year. After a year, they would walk in that tomb. And by that time, all the flesh had eroded off the bones. There was simply a skeleton.

The bones were collected and placed in a very small box called an ossuary, or a bone box, and placed on one of those niches. That's what was happening here. Jesus says, roll the stone away.

And Martha protests. And I got to say, I don't chide her at all for saying, Lord, he stinks. If you have ever smelled rotting human flesh, you will never forget it. I worked in the medical field. And when I was training in radiography, they would bring in body parts and bodies that have been, the coroner would do this. They'd been found after two or three months of death.

And the smell, the stench, is something I will never forget. So I read this and go, I get this protest. And I bet Martha is assuming that Jesus just wants one last look at his friend. I just want to see Lazarus one last time. She's probably assuming that, which is one of the reasons for an open casket today, to have that last look. And so she protests, Lord, you don't want to look at a putrefying corpse. You've got to understand, that would tear Martha and Mary's heart out. They've already dealt with the grief of the loss of their brother.

Now to exhume the body after decay is adding insult to injury. So the protest. Jesus prays after having a word to her. And then he says, this is kind of interesting, if not strange in itself. When, verse 43, he said these things, he cried out with a loud voice. And the word for loud voice is the loudness of a multitude. To cry with the loudness of a multitude. It was a shout, Lazarus, come forth.

Probably even louder than that. And why did he have to do that? He certainly didn't need to shout, right? I mean, Jesus could have simply said, Lazarus, it's time.

Come on out, buddy. In fact, he could have just thought it, right? He could have kind of gone like this. Why did he have to shout?

Well, a couple of reasons, I think. Number one, Jesus is about to do a powerful deed. The most powerful, the greatest miracle of all of his miracles. And the voice matches the deed. A loud, powerful, commanding, consuming shout. There's a second reason, perhaps, that he shouted. Did you know that wizards would cast their spells or give their incantations by muttering, by whispering, very low voices? As to distinguish from that nonsense, that black magic, he shouted, Lazarus, come forth.

Now it's public. You got to understand, once you say those words, now you're on the line. If that guy didn't come out of that tomb, you're done. There's a third reason, I think, simply to command their attention. You know, when he said, roll the stone away, I bet everybody's doing this, or leaning in, husband talking to wife, leaning in, you know. It happens sometimes when I preach, I notice people talking to each other. Jesus wants to get their attention, Lazarus, whoa. They're now locked into him, locked into this event, and Jesus wants everyone to understand the drama of what is happening. So in a loud, commanding, powerful, Lazarus, oh, by the way, why did Jesus have to address him by name? Why couldn't he just say, come forth?

The answer is to limit the response. Right? If Jesus, with his power, would have said, come forth, Hades would have emptied itself. Every corpse in that cemetery would have, boom, shot up. That'd be quite a scene.

So he's very specific. Lazarus, come forth. Verse 44, and he who had died, just picture this, came out, bound hand and foot with grave clothes. Can you just see him shuffling his way to the entrance of the tomb? And his face was wrapped with a cloth, and Jesus said to them, so practical, loose him and let him go. So Jesus went to the grave, walked to the tomb.

He didn't have to. Couldn't Jesus have simply, from wherever he was, before he got into Bethany, where he met Martha and Mary, simply from that point done it? You remember the nobleman's son, John chapter four? Nobleman's son was dead. The nobleman came to Jesus.

My son is sick. And then his son died. And Jesus said to him, your son lives.

Now that's 20 miles away. It's a long distance miracle. Jesus doesn't need to be there to get it done.

Couldn't Jesus have said, Mary, Martha, go to the tomb. You're going to see something really cool. Blow your mind.

Your brother is alive. Jesus goes to the tomb. Now, put it all together. With tears in his eyes, with anger in his heart, Jesus goes to the place of death, the tomb that houses his friend Lazarus and conquers death by resurrection. You know what that's called?

In movie jargon, we would call this a trailer, a preview of coming attractions. What Jesus did that day at the tomb of Lazarus, Jesus will one day do again at your grave and your grave and your grave and my grave, as we will be raised from the dead. He'll conquer death.

I want you to see this. Turn backward to John chapter five. Look at two verses. You're about to see the general principle of which we have seen a mere preview of. We've seen the preview.

Now here's the full scope. Two verses. John chapter five, verse 28. Here's Jesus speaking. Do not marvel at this, for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice.

You get that? And come forth, Lazarus, come forth, and come forth, those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of damnation or condemnation. So what happens at Bethany with Lazarus is but a pale anticipation of what will happen in our future resurrection. You know when that is, by the way? You know when we're going to be resurrected? At the rapture. The rapture of the church. Some point in history when Jesus is done with this whole mess, he will come down out of heaven and take those who are alive on the earth and believe in him up with him and a whole new event happens called the tribulation period.

At the rapture of the church will be a physical resurrection of our bodies. I want to read it to you. You don't have to turn there, but write it down. Jot it down. First Thessalonians chapter four, verses 15 through 17.

I'll read it. And listen how close this sounds like to what we read with Lazarus. For the Lord himself, Jesus himself, will descend from heaven with a shout.

Isn't that interesting? A shout like he did at the tomb of Lazarus and with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first and then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and thus we will always be with the Lord. So when Jesus comes in the future to collect the church, it's going to be with a shout and I've always wondered, well, what do you mean a shout?

What's that about? It might be simply as he comes down, he'll say, come forth and that will be resurrection day. Talk about an extreme makeover.

Every day when you look in the mirror, just think about what's coming. Your resurrected body, revised, renewed, upgraded, physical, physical body, reconstituted from the old you. Now I got a question. I get a lot of questions about the Bible and one was from a dear lady who said, why on earth would God Jesus ever want to resurrect our bodies who at that time are in various forms of decay and some of the molecules are scattered all over the place and why would he even want to gather the dust and the ashes and the molecules and bring us back together? That's a good question.

Here's the answer. The resurrection of your body is important to complete your salvation. Now hear me when I say this. Salvation has three different aspects to it. There's a past aspect, a present aspect, and a future aspect. You have been saved, past tense, from the from the penalty of sin.

That's past tense. That's called justification salvation. You've been saved from the penalty of sin, past tense. You present tense are being saved from the power or grip of sin. That's sanctification salvation. One day in the future you will be saved from the very presence of sin itself. That's called glorification salvation.

So past, present, and future. The Lord designed us as body and soul and has plans on redeeming both and renewing both. Just a final note before we close up. Why did Jesus tell those guys to roll the stone away? I mean if he has resurrection power, if you can say Lazarus come forth, can't he just go like this to the stone? Or spin it up and cast it like to the moon?

You could have spun that thing around and thrown it in the ocean. Why did he say hey you guys roll the stone away? You do it.

Not me, you do it. And then why did he say loose him and let him go? I mean again couldn't he just go Lazarus hold still pull those bandages off and there he goes. You know why? Because only God can raise the dead.

Man can move a stone. You do what you do and I'll do what only I can do. And what I love about this is there's a partnership in this miracle, right?

And I see that as ministry. None of us can change a life. None of us can save a soul.

I don't save anybody but I sure love tossing away gravestones and taking off grave clothes, don't you? It's about all we can do. Only he can change a life. Only he can do stuff like that.

We can do this stuff and it never gets old to see him do it. Now unfortunately the story ends here and we see the reaction that we'll look at next time but it's sort of how will I say this? It leaves me with a longing. I wish there were more details. I wish John would have said and here's what Lazarus looked like and here's what Lazarus said.

Wow! Or and then Mary and Martha embraced Lazarus. We're not told those details.

It'd be nice to know. I can guarantee you this. That morning funeral was turned into a party. The tears that they had were dried up and it was eclipsed by a joy they never imagined and again that's a preview of coming attractions. Revelation 21 and God will wipe away every tear and there will be no more death and no more sorrow. So the bottom line is we conclude and we say death is not the final word. Jesus Christ is the final word because in him is life and he is the resurrection and the life and he proves it. Well one day he will wipe away every tear. There'll be no more death or sorrow. What an encouraging reminder from Skip Heizer.

Now we don't know when that day will come but we can live each day with a hope and anticipation of that coming attraction. We know that today there is death and sorrow affecting so many of us and if you're going through a hard time and need someone to talk or pray with would you call us? You can talk with someone today when you call 1-800-922-1888. Now before we leave you today we want to tell you about a great resource. Over the years Skip Heitzig has invited a number of notable speakers to come to Albuquerque. For an end of year resource we want you to hear some of these amazing messages by speakers such as Tim LaHaye.

I travel all over the country and speak at prophecy conferences and it's very seldom that you find churches that really recognize the importance of history written in advance only by God coming true so we can believe what we believe. Also a part of this pulpit package the familiar voice of Pastor Chuck Smith. I'm overwhelmed when I see what God is doing here.

What a thrill to see the work of God being wrought here in Albuquerque. This package contains 10 full-length messages available on CD or as a download. We will send it to you as a thank you when you make an end of year donation of 100 dollars or more to support this program. Request your pulpit package at connectwithskip.com or by calling 1-800-922-1888. This resource is available through the month of December and this pulpit package includes a classic teaching by J. Vernon McGee.

I count it a privilege to be here to talk to many young people and especially those that are interested in Bible study. This is sure a high pulpit made for a tall fellow. Request your pulpit package at connectwithskip.com or by calling 1-800-922-1888. That is connectwithskip.com or call 1-800-922-1888. And today's teaching, The Strangest Funeral Ever, was so encouraging it would make a great addition to your audio library. It's available on CD for just four dollars plus shipping when you contact us at 1-800-922-1888 or when you visit connectwithskip.com or write to us at P.O. Box 95707 Albuquerque, New Mexico 87199. And join us next time as Skip Heitzig looks at the powerful consequences of our choices right here in Connect with Skip Weekend Edition, a presentation of Connection Communications. Connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.